Height Field IPAS?
From the POV Ray manual:
"A height field is essentially a 1 unit wide by 1 unit long box with a
mountainous surface on top. The height of the mountian at each point is taken
from the color number (palette index) of the pixels in a graphic image file."
This is great for making fractals (or other images like the PCX files produced
in Vista Pro) into 3D landscapes! I have tried to do similar things in 3DS but
havent' come close to the detail possible in POV Ray. I tried to convert a GIF
to a DXF but this resulted in HUGE file w/o enough detail. POV ray actually
computes 2 small triangles for each pixel in the bitmap.
I would think that you could use an AXP or PXP type process to duplicate this
effect. You would need a parameter for the bitmap and could scale the
dimensions to the stand-in box. The POV height field can accept 8bit GIF
files, 16bit POT files created in fractint, and even TGA files for 24 bits of
depth information.
It sounds like the Yosters are working on something very similar!
–Nat'n