I’ve played Grand Theft Auto V. since it started in 2013. So I know the map pretty well. But seeing the whole thing perfectly recreated with 3D printing is wild and makes me appreciate how much detail and work Rockstar put into this digital world. Not to mention how impressive this 3D map is in both accuracy and scale.
The cool 3D map from GTA V go viral on Twitter was created by Dom Riccoben. He is a product designer who often uses real world data to recreate actual locations as exact “data sculptures”. But since Covid-19 screwed everything up, Riccobene couldn’t go out and do his job. So since he needed to do something to pass his time, he looked into the virtual worlds of GTA V
His plan was to create high resolution datasets from RDR2 and GTA V. He would then use this data to create huge, perfectly scaled 3-D physical maps of the game worlds. He described the process as “an immense technical challenge”.
“To start with, I used a custom script to scan the grounds and buildings in RDR2 first, ”Riccoben explained in an email. “Then I managed to port it for use in GTA V. It runs in the game and collects floor heights in a radius of 500 to 1000 meters around the player when you press a hotkey that adds up to 1,000,000+ data points per scan. “
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Since the games do not appear on the entire map at once, Riccobene had to slowly scan the map by hand using this process. He estimates that it took him around 100 hours for each game to have enough data for his data sculptures.
“The next challenge was to merge the point clouds and convert the data set into real data so that I could manipulate, process and analyze it with professional map and cartography software,” said Riccobene.
To do this, he mapped all 500 million coordinates that he had scanned and collected to actual coordinates on Earth. This enabled him to create a height grid. With that, he could start printing the map with his software and tools. But that too was tricky, as was to be expected. Some tiles would only take an hour to print, while more complex areas with lots of buildings and elevation changes could take up to 12 hours.
“I used a proprietary workflow to convert the tiled dataset into igamesnewss as 3D printable meshes,” Riccobene explained. “Each tile is an 800 MB 3D model. From then on, it was a matter of trial and error dialing into my 3D print settings to print the buildings, grounds, and the water features in black all at once. They also had to fit together seamlessly as an assembly. “
All in all, it took me about 125 hours to print this out GTA V 3D card in his viral tweet. You can see more of the behind-the-scenes process on his Instagram. He estimates the entire project, including printing, retrieving data, creating the elevation maps, and fine-tuning, is complete Lasted over 400 hours spread over a year.
Although this of course took a lot of work and time, Riccobene is enthusiastic about the results and had a lot of fun doing it.
“It was probably the most pleasant and technically demanding project I’ve ever worked on.”
After this is done, his next plan is to follow the same process for that RDR2 Map. He’s already spent over 200 hours working on it and hopes to create a similarly impressive map using this rock star game in the near future.
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