CARLA tutorials and unstructured map

Interesting tutorials:

• Pygame for vehicle control

• Retrieve simulation data

• Traffic manager

• Change textures through the API

• Instance segmentation sensor

• Generate maps with OpenStreetMap

Pygame controller

Autopilot and recording from ego-vehicle and spectator

Custom unstructured map

To create a custom map, I duplicated the BaseMap provided by CARLA. This empty map offers a sky as a starting point. I then crafted a landscape in the Unreal editor, adding foliage, rocks, and other elements using CARLA’s materials. Once complete, you can launch the simulation and spawn a controllable car and camera. However, this process doesn’t generate a road layout or waypoints, and lacks traffic management, spawn points, or autopilot functionality. You can see the result in the video below:

Create map using OpenStreetMap

Thanks to https://www.openstreetmap.org/, you can download a .osm file containing all road information and easily convert it to .xodr format (OpenDRIVE) using one of CARLA’s provided scripts (PythonAPI/util/osm_to_xodr.py). After launching CARLA and starting a simulation, you can dynamically set the OpenStreetMap using the command python config.py -x /path/to/map.xodr. The resulting map is fully navigable—autopilot, spawn points, and other features work perfectly. You can see an example in the video below: