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Abstract

A digital map system for displaying three dimensional terrain data uses terrain data in the form of polygons. The polygon database is produced from a database of elevation points which are divided into, for example, n.times.n (where n is a positive integer) squares which have an elevation point in the center of the square. The center point forms four polygons with the corners of the square. The elevation of the center point may be chosen to be the highest elevation point in the n.times.n square, the average elevation of the elevation points in the n.times.n square, the elevation of the actual center point, or other methods. The method chosen depends on how the data base is to be used. The size of the n.times.n square chosen also depends on how the data base is to be used since there is a tradeoff between the resolution of the displayed scene and the amount of data reduction from the original database of elevation points. The polygon database may be used in a pilot aid using a synthetic environment, a flight simulator, as part of the control system for a remotely piloted vehicle, or in a video game.

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