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Image to Lithophane (STL)

Turn a photo into a 3D-printable lithophane or relief heightmap STL, flat or curved, with a live 3D preview.

Free, no uploads, no sign-up. Runs 100% in your browser.

How Image to Lithophane (STL) works

The photo is sampled into a grid of thicknesses (dark = thick for lithophanes, bright = tall for reliefs) and turned into a closed, watertight solid with a flat back and side walls, optionally bent into an arc. It is written as a binary STL ready for any slicer.

Input: JPG, PNG, WEBP, AVIF. Output: STL.

How to use Image to Lithophane (STL)

  1. Drop a photo.
  2. Set the width, thinnest and thickest points, frame and curve.
  3. Check the 3D preview.
  4. Download the STL and slice it.

Tips

  • 0.8 mm to 3 mm thickness works well for white PLA.
  • Higher detail makes bigger files and longer slicing. 5 points per mm is plenty for a 0.4 mm nozzle.

Image to Lithophane (STL) FAQ

Is my file uploaded?
No. Everything runs in this browser tab on your own device. Engines are downloaded once and cached, but your files never leave your computer.
Are my files uploaded?
No. This tool runs entirely in your browser tab. Files are read from your disk into memory and the result is generated locally.
Is it free? Are there limits or watermarks?
Free and open source (MIT). There are no file-size caps, daily quotas, accounts or watermarks.
Does it work offline?
Yes, once the page (and any engine it needs) has loaded, it keeps working without a connection thanks to the service worker cache.

Related tools

  • STL Inspector & Repair: Check STL files before printing: size, volume, weight estimate, watertight and manifold checks, normal flipping and triangle reduction.
  • 3D Model Viewer: View GLB, GLTF, OBJ, STL, PLY, FBX, 3MF, DAE, 3DS, USDZ, AMF, VRML, OFF and point clouds with orbit controls, lighting, wireframe and screenshots.
  • 3D Model Converter: Convert 3D models between GLB, glTF, OBJ, STL, PLY and USDZ, with unit scaling, centring and Z-up fixes.
  • GLB / glTF Optimizer: Shrink GLB and glTF files with Meshopt compression, quantisation, mesh simplification, deduplication and WebP texture resizing.

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