In a paint program, draw one or more colored shapes that will be converted to an extruded object.

Save the painting as either a BMP file with 256 or less colors or as an IFF file with 32 or less colors.  The file types with these specifications use a color palette.

The first color (color 0) in the palette is the background color and this color is usually not turned into a 3D object.  In this example the black color is the background color.

Each color palette index used will have an object created for it.  An outline is created around each area of color in the bitmap.  Each outline is faced with triangles and extruded.

Each object created can be given its own extrusion parameters:

• created as an outline only.
• the outline is filled with faces but not extruded (no thickness).
• the outline is extruded but no faces are added.
• the outline is extruded and only faces at the bottom are added or only faces at the top are added or faces are added both at the top and the bottom.
• the top and bottom extrusions can use different bevel profiles to create the extrusion.
• each object can have different bevel profiles.

The BMP or IFF file known as a contour map can be converted to a landscape.  Color palette index 0 is the lowest elevation in the landscape and color index 255 for BMP files or color index 31 for IFF files is the highest elevation.

The contour map can create a landscape that resembles real world terrain or an imaginary landscape that looks nothing like terrain.

Why create such a strange looking landscape?  To create 3D objects that look like carvings.

The example bitmap was converted to a landscape.  The landscape was then converted to a 3D object with the automatic generation of UV texture coordinates.  A texture was then applied to the 3D object to make it look like a wood carving.

To make each shape look like it was cut from a block of wood, the triangles at sea level were deleted when the landscape was converted to a 3D object.