Visual MODFLOW 3D-Explorer - advanced 3d visualization and animation of groundwater flow and contaminant transport models

Visual MODFLOW Categories: flow models - pathlines/capture zones, flow models - saturated zone, model interfaces and modeling shells, solute transport models - saturated zone, MODFLOW programs

Visual MODFLOW 3-D Explorer

Finally! A system that delivers everything you need to easily, effectively and affordably visualize and animate your modeling data in three-dimensional space!

The Visual MODFLOW 3D-Explorer is a built-in 3D visualization system for displaying and animating Visual MODFLOW models using state-of-the-art 3D graphics technology. The advanced visualization capabilities of the Visual MODFLOW 3D-Explorer provide you with all the tools you need to create impressive and informative 3D representations of your modeling data using vibrant colors and high-resolution graphics.

Main Features

• Display site maps using AutoCAD (.dxf) files and/or bitmap (.bmp) image files
• Display the model grid lines using 2D slices or a 3D grid
• Display pumping wells and observation wells using colored tubes
• Display soil property zones (geology) and boundary condition distributions using color maps and/or solid grid blocks
• Display modeling results (heads, drawdowns and multispecies concentrations) using contour maps, color maps and 3D isosurfaces
• Display particle tracking data using 3D pathlines with time markers
• Create multiple horizontal slices, vertical slices, and vertical cross sections
  through the model domain
• Create 3D cutaway views to see "inside" the model
• Create semi-transparent views of most display objects
• Animate time-varying modeling results
• Save the scene configurations for easy recall at a later time
• Edit and enhance the screen image using text, lines, arrows, and shapes
• Export the screen image to a graphics file (.bmp, .emf, and .wmf)
• Print the screen image to a color printer using a customizable page layout

Data Requirements

Aside from the unparalleled 3D graphical features and display customization options, the other notable advantage of the Visual MODFLOW 3D-Explorer is that it reads the model data directly from Visual MODFLOW project files. This avoids the messy data conversions required by other groundwater modeling software and ensures you will always have a true 3D representation of your model data and simulation results.

The Interface

The basic layout of the VMOD 3D-Explorer interface is shown in the following figure.

The interface consists of four primary components:

1. The Display Screen displays the 3D graphical image of the model.
2. The Navigation Panel controls the position and rotation of the 3D model display.
3. The Model Tree Panel contains a structured list of the available model elements.
4. The Display Properties Table contains a tabular list of the display properties available for the selected model element.

The Model Tree Panel and the Navigation Panel are both "dockable" panels which means they can be moved and "docked" to another location on the interface or they can be left as "floating" panels on your Windows desktop (i.e., they are not docked to any location on the interface). These panels can either be docked on the left side of the interface or on the bottom of the interface.

Displaying The Model Elements

The Model Tree Panel should appear as shown in the following figure. If the Model Tree Panel is not visible, click View/Model Tree from the top menu bar or click the [Model Tree] icon.

The upper section of the Model Tree Panel contains a structured list of the Model Elements which can be visualized while the lower section of this panel contains the element properties table. The Model Tree Panel can be used to selectively view model elements or alter the display properties of selected model elements.

The Model Tree is structured in a hierarchical fashion where model elements within the tree can be expanded by clicking on the "+" symbol.

Each model element listed in the Model Tree has an associated list of "display properties" that can be accessed by selecting (clicking) the model element from the Model Tree. A brief description of each display property is available by clicking the mouse pointer on the display property. This produces a tool tip (description of the property) in the bottom of the Model Tree Panel (below the Display Properties Table).

Although each model element has a different set of display properties, there are many display properties which are common to most model elements. These common display properties are described in the following table.

The following is a brief description of the various model elements and the display properties for each model element listed in the Model Tree.

VMOD Project Properties

The VMOD Project element consists of general settings including:

• Project Title properties (text, text size and text color)
• Scene background color
• Vertical exaggeration of the model

The Project Title can be moved to any location in the Display Screen by clicking on the title and dragging it to a new location.

Axes

The Axis model element allows you to customize the appearance of the X, Y and Z axes including:

• Axis line color
• Axis label properties
• X-axis label text
• Y-axis label text
• Z-axis label text

Grid

The Grid Slice elements allow you to display the model grid lines on a 2D horizontal slice through the selected layer of the model (see figure above) or as a 3D grid of the entire model.

Site Maps

The Visual MODFLOW 3D-Explorer supports both AutoCAD DXF files and bitmap image files. The Site maps model element contains a list of the site maps used in the Visual MODFLOW model and allows you to control the display properties for each individual site map.

In cases where the site map is not appearing clearly because of the colors used in the DXF file, you can specify a fixed color to apply to all lines and attributes of the DXF file.

Wells

There are three different types of wells available in a Visual MODFLOW project:

• Pumping wells
• Head Observations
• Conc. Observations

The display properties for each type of well consist of:

• Well radius
• Color of casing
• Color of well screen
• Well label (on/off)
• Well label size and color

These display properties can be controlled as a group or individually.

Properties and Boundary Conditions

The Input model elements consist of the different model properties and boundary conditions available in a Visual MODFLOW modeling project:

• Conductivity
• Storage
• Boundaries
• Long Dispersivity
• Constant Concentration
• Initial Concentrations
• Species Parameters

Each of these model elements contains a subset of either different property zones, or in the case of the Boundaries elements, different types of boundary conditions. The display properties of these model elements (color, visibility, semi-transparency) can be controlled as a group or individually.

Model Output

The Output model elements consist of three different types of modeling results generated by a Visual MODFLOW model:

• Heads and Drawdowns (including water table elevations and dry cells)
• Concentrations (including multiple dissolved species)
• Pathlines (including time markers)

The Heads, Drawdowns and Concentrations can each be displayed using a variety of graphical formats including:

• Isosurfaces
• Color maps
• Contour maps
• Color fields

Each of these graphical formats has a distinct set of display properties regardless of the model elements that are being represented.

Displaying Isosurfaces

An isosurface is a 3D planar surface defined by a constant parameter value in 3D space. Isosurfaces are typically used for demonstrating the spatial distribution of a selected parameter. For groundwater modeling purposes, isosurfaces are generally
used for representing the spacial distribution of heads, drawdowns and concentrations.

The VMOD 3D-Explorer allows you to create and simultaneously display multiple isosurfaces for the Heads, Drawdowns and Concentrations model elements. In each case, the display properties of the isosurface will be the same regardless of which model element is being displayed.

The isosurface display properties include:

• Surface name defines the name of the isosurface as it will appear in the Model Tree under the selected element
• Isosurface value is the element value for which the isosurface will be created
• Isosurface color is the user-specified color of the isosurface
• Color from palette will use the element color palette to automatically color the isosurface according to the specified isosurface value
• Show borders will display a color map of the element values on the borders (sides) of the model domain when the isosurface intersects the edge of the model domain
• Color map on cut away will display a color map of the element values on the section of the isosurface that is removed by the cutaway region
• Remove in cutaway will remove (erase) the isosurface object in a cutaway region
• Semi-transparency setting (On/Off) allows you to see through the isosurface

Displaying Color Maps

A color map is used to display the spatial distribution of a parameter on a planar surface. The Visual MODFLOW 3D-Explorer allows you to create color maps on multiple horizontal and vertical slices for almost any combination of model elements.

The color maps of the output elements (heads, water table, drawdowns and concentration species) will plot distributed colors according to the calculated value of the element in each grid cell of the model. A customizable color legend will automatically be generated for each color map.

The color map display properties include:

• Upper and Lower Threshold Cutoff Values which are used to effectively "Cutoff" regions of the color map containing values outside of the threshold range.
• Color Palette option to customize the range of colors used to represent the selected model element distribution.
• Semi-transparency setting (On/Off) allows you to see through the color map.

Displaying Contour Maps

Contour lines, or isolines as they are sometimes referred to, are a set of lines plotted on a surface defined by points having equal values of a given parameter. The Visual MODFLOW 3D-Explorer allows you to simultaneously plot multiple contour maps for any combination of heads, water table elevation, drawdowns and concentrations.

The contour map display properties include:

• Line Properties (on/off, color, width, style, color fill between lines)
• Automatic Intervals (min. value, max value, and interval value)
• Custom Intervals (user-defined contour values)
• Labels (on/off, size, color)

Displaying Pathlines

The Visual MODFLOW 3D-Explorer plots three-dimensional flow pathlines using solid lines to represent the flowpath of a groundwater particle.

The pathline display properties include:

• Color and Width (solid color for all forward tracking pathlines and a different color for all backward tracking pathlines or each pathline can be plotted using a color scale to represent the travel time along the flowpath)
• Time Markers (on/off, color, size, time)
• Individual Pathlines can also be turned on or off 
• Time Intervals (display pathlines only for specified time intervals)

Animating Model Results

The Visual MODFLOW 3D-Explorer has a built-in animation tool for viewing transient groundwater flow and contaminant transport modeling results. The animation tool automatically steps through the entire sequence of output time steps for the selected model parameters (heads, drawdowns, or concentrations).

Typical model animations include:

• Groundwater plume migration
• Seasonal or tidal water level fluctuations
• Water level drawdown due to pumping

Saving Scene Configurations

All 3D images and display settings can be saved to a Scene Configuration file for easy recall of the model display during a presentation or during your next Visual MODFLOW 3D-Explorer session.

Printing and Saving 3D Images

The Visual MODFLOW 3D-Explorer comes with a built-in image editor for enhancing the 3D model image using a selection of graphical tools including:

• Titles and footers
• Descriptive text
• Lines and arrows
• Shapes and symbols

These images can either be saved to a graphics file and pasted into a report or they can be printed to a printer.

If you print the image to a printer, the Page Setup options also allow you to customize the layout of the printed page using a selection of page design options including:

• Plot Border
• Plot Description
• Project Title
• Company Logo

These page design options can all be used together or you can select individual page design options.

Clearly, the Visual MODFLOW 3D-Explorer is the most powerful and affordable 3D visualization software package available today for professional groundwater flow and contaminant transport models.

Back to Visual MODFLOW Main Page.

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Visual MODFLOW Demo

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