Download Digital Terrain DEM (Digital Elevation Model) and create contours Maps



Download Digital Terrain DEM (Digital Elevation Model) and create contours Maps

Digital Elevation Model is a 3D representation of a terrain. It is generated by collecting elevation points of terrain. We don’t have to do hectic work like this as webgis provides us with ready-made digital elevation data. WebGIS is where you can find all the leading information and resources for Geographical Information Systems. Here you will find how to download Digital Terrain Data and create contour map.

Download Digital Terrain Data:

1.) Go to link: http://www.webgis.com

2.) Digital Terrain data is all we need. You can explore the links given. We will download from SRTM. You can read the documentation for information. Click on SRTM 3.

3.) Click on large map.

Digital Terrain Data create contour map
Digital Terrain Data create contour map

4.) Here you can determine the coordinates of the tile in which your location is lying. You must know where your location is on earth i.e. North East or North West etc. As you determine the coordinates of tile, go to previous page and Click on the map where your location is.

5.) Now click the tile from the index you determined from the large map. It will automatically downloaded to your computer after clicking the link.

Digital Terrain Data create contour map

Extract DEM and create contour Map:

Contour map shows contour lines with relative space indicating the relative slope of the surface. Here we will open DEM in QGIS and create the contour Map.  Here are the steps:

1.) After opening QGIS, we first need to extract the downloaded file, and import the .hgt file using add raster layer tool in QGIS, where you will see a singleband gray image as shown below.

Digital Terrain Data create contour map

2.) Go to layer properties and click style. Notice the minimum and maximum value. These values are in meters.

Digital Terrain Data create contour map
Digital Terrain Data create contour map

3.) In render type dropdown select singleband pseudocolor and click classify.

Digital Terrain Data create contour map

4.) Click apply and ok.

Digital Terrain Data create contour map
Digital Terrain Data create contour map

5.) Now we will extract contours from this image. Go to Raster-> Extraction-> Contour as shown. 

Digital Terrain Data create contour map

6.) Set the pop up as shown below.

Digital Terrain Data create contour map

7.) Click ok. The contour file is loaded into your canvas.

Digital Terrain Data create contour map
Digital Terrain Data create contour map

You may also be interested in QGIS tutorial. Now you can easily analyze the surface by seeing the contour map. Hope this tutorials helped you. If you want to share some suggestion or want to ask some question do comment below.

Create 3D Map from DEM

Author: Akshay Upadhyay

Owner and Director of a Private Limited company which serves individual to large scale industries in the field of Maps and GIS. He is a Gold Medalist in M.Tech(Spatial Information Technology) and owns some famous Technology blogs and website... Know more

7 thoughts on “Download Digital Terrain DEM (Digital Elevation Model) and create contours Maps”

  1. Hi, I use the TNRIS (texas) interpreted DEM that come in an .IMG file, newer version that is georeferenced and the older .dem file that does not. I would like to overlay in GE, Can you help?

  2. Interesting read and very helpful. The only issue i had was i cant get the psuedocolour range to work as the map disappears after changing the style and so cant create the contour map. These also is no option to create an contouring so maybe have a newer version of the software. Also the possibility of the metadata not being in the files i downloaded from that link ( heights were there and nothing else). Still finding my way around the software too which doesn’t help.

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