10 replies to this topic

[ed dawson]

Hi.  I threw a couple of queries into the pot and got a very rapid and satisfactory response, so here goes for the next one.

When I create a shape, particularly a bunker, I am finding that the control point density is too high.  The first thing I do is set to and delete at least half of them.

Is it possible to limit the numer of control points which are laid down by CF when the shap is created?

Thank you.

[Crow357]

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[NoPutt]

Uh Oh, Art broke the #1 rule of the CFL...lol

[Acrilix]

I seem to remember that you can also create it as something other than sand and then switch it to sand afterwards to get a shape with less control points.

[ed dawson]

Thanks - the response to your first reply has me worried - lol.  But I will certainly try your other suggestion as it mainly seems to be the bunker which causes problems .

[Kablammo11]

Best Answer from Acrilix, ed. I frequently use my fairway layer to draw the contours of fairway bunkers and my green layer for greenside bunkers for the same reason: Too ungainly and too dense to alter a bunker outline. 

Changing is frightfully easy: Just click on a control point of that spline and in the upper CF bar you can allocate a different mesh type to it without influencing the control points.

[Mike Jones]

You can do all things with the layers library but until I have my tutorials finished I'm not going to get into it as it's too big a topic to discuss in a q & a thread.

[Mike Jones]

First set of tutorials are up regarding the Layers Library.

[Cintigolfer]

Does a higher number of control points increase the time it takes to build splines?

[Kablammo11]

Of course it does. By probably something like 24.8 miliseconds - it's not an important consideration. 

More control points also mean more verts and more tris, though, and that could influence performance (a tiny bit at best, but still). All in all, though, this should be of no consequence as well. 

 

Mike once told me, and I heard his saddened shake of the head over the audio, that he did not understand why people (he actually meant me but said "people") would want and go fiddle with these settings, because after all he made them the way they are now because he put a lot of thought and knowledge into why they should be like that. And that people (me) did not really understand what dramatic consequences and repercussions even the slightest changes of these settings might cause. So, my advice to you would be: Don't go there! You can pretty much get anything you want and need with the default settings. You may switch out textures and maps, but leave those spline settings alone, especially if you should be on your first project. Patience, grasshopper.

 

Special little tip: I like to draw splines with less control points in them than I will need and add some more during fine-tuning the outline. If I need an extra control point to smooth a corner or get more accurate outlines, I create it by holding the ctrl-key and right-double clicking on the nearest control point to make a new one appear. To delete surplus control points hold the shift key and right-doubleclick. Using this method is a lot faster, much safer and more economic than altering the spline settings.

[Cintigolfer]

Thanks for the information.  I have been trying to keep the number of control points low.  I really liked the tip to draw bunkers as a fairway and then convert them to bunkers.  So far with my very limited experience, I have found it is easier to add a few control points than to delete a significant number of them.  With fewer control points for long straight sections of fairway, it is much faster to adjust where the side of the fairway is.