procedural-art: Procedural Mountain Landscapes from Elevation Data Without AI

Repositorydogum/procedural-artTool

The open-source project procedural-art renders engravings, prints, and photographic mountain vistas using real SRTM elevation data and math. Bypassing generative image models entirely, it operates both directly in the browser and as a set of Claude Code skills.

Key points

  1. Renders accurate landscapes of mountains, canyons, and islands based on real SRTM elevation tiles and OpenStreetMap data.
  2. Relies entirely on NumPy, physics, and path tracing without using any generative AI image models.
  3. Includes two Claude skills: procedural-terrain-art for print styles and orbit loops, and procedural-realism for photographic terrain and ray marching.
  4. Offers a serverless, client-side web application that downloads elevation tiles in the browser and includes presets for 94 notable peaks.
  5. Published under the Apache 2.0 licence with active CI and releases, though currently in an early phase with 11 GitHub stars.

Why it matters

The project demonstrates a deterministic alternative to diffusion models, providing developers and designers with precise, reproducible landscape visualisations anchored in actual geographic data.

Analysis

Deterministic Geometry Over Synthetic Imagery

procedural-art deliberately diverges from diffusion-based image generators by rendering real geography rather than synthetic hallucinations. Originally designed to recreate an AI illustration of Mount Ararat using real elevation profiles, the toolchain processes Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) elevation grids using Python and NumPy.

Dual Skills and Client-Side Tooling

Packaged as a plugin for Claude Code, the repository provides two core modules:

  • procedural-terrain-art: Generates six distinct print styles (such as woodcuts and line engravings) using hidden-line elimination, exporting banners, static prints, or orbiting animations.
  • procedural-realism: Introduces atmospheric rendering—including haze, snow lines, water bodies, and city lights—alongside a path tracer tailored for glass and metal still lifes.

The accompanying web application, Any mountain, runs entirely in the browser. It fetches elevation tiles directly to evaluate terrain geometry on the client without requiring a backend server. Users can choose from 94 curated mountain viewpoints or locate any peak worldwide via OpenStreetMap.

Maturity and Intended Audience

The repository targets creative coders, cartographers, and developers building autonomous agents that require verifiable, data-backed visualisations. While the codebase is systematically structured with automated testing and versioned releases, low engagement metrics (11 stars, 1 fork) indicate an early-stage project. Nonetheless, its principled reliance on real elevation data offers an intriguing blueprint for deterministic spatial rendering.

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Summary generated by AI (Gemini 3.8 Flash, 9 November 2026). It may contain errors – the original source is authoritative.

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Locations

  • Mattersburg
    Johann Nepomuk Bergerstraße 7/2/14
    7210 Mattersburg, Austria
  • Vienna
    Ungargasse 64-66/3/404
    1030 Wien, Austria

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