St Andrews The Old Course 2022

Announce and discuss forthcoming and recent course releases or request beta help from members.
ponkey
Posts: 74
Joined: April 5th, 2020, 10:28 am

Re: St Andrews The Old Course 2022

Post by ponkey »

alarduran wrote: July 15th, 2022, 10:37 pm Hi, folks.
I was intrigued about the effects of changing the internal edges of the fairways to a sharpness of 1 from one of 0. I gave it a try on Royal Birkdale #10 fairway. I attach comparative screenshots. Changes are very subtle but I think they are worth of it (bumpiness are a bit more noticeable).
Regards.

Sharpness=0
Image1.jpg

Sharpness=1
Image2.jpg
Hi.

I quite like this idea. I've tried it on Carnoustie and there don't seem to be any problems and it looks a lot better both in the game and in the top cam.

Peter
linkster
Posts: 95
Joined: June 13th, 2022, 1:12 am

Re: St Andrews The Old Course 2022

Post by linkster »

Sounds like I better put writing the next LIDAR tutorial higher on my priority list, you are all getting close to figuring out how to get a LIDAR terrain into APCD! :cheers1:

A lot of the magic happens in QGIS. I create a point grid to sample the raster LIDAR data to the desired density, same as in the green contours tutorial. I go to the attributes table for the points and multiple each by 10 and round to an integer number. Then create a raster from the point grid with the 10x elevations as data points. I also add a buffer ring of 0 value elevations around the grid. This helps with the small .dem import screen in APCD and facilitates the terrain scaling.

When doing a constrained z scale in APCD, the average height for the terrain does not change, but the extremities of the heights do (the 0 value buffer verts). The distance between the average terrain height and the 0 value verts gets scaled to 1/10th. So what I do is take a small section of the 0 value verts and raise them to where they will be after scaling. That height will be AVG - 1/10*AVG. For example, if the average terrain height is 400, raise the small section of 0 verts to 360. Then for the constrained z scaling, select all the terrain verts but NOT the raised verts. When doing the scaling with the mouse, do not let go until the surrounding 0 verts line up with the height of the raised verts. The scaling must be done in one motion to get a true 1/10th scaling. When the constrained z scaling is complete, select the entire terrain again and move it down so that the 0 verts are back to being 0 height. The verts moving motion is forgiving, it usually takes a few attempts to get them back to 0.00 height. When finished I delete the buffer ring of 0 verts so that the dimensions of the terrain exactly match what is in QGIS which helps the placement of the overlay texture.
User avatar
Adelade
Posts: 1346
Joined: August 27th, 2019, 10:24 am

Re: St Andrews The Old Course 2022

Post by Adelade »

Ah thats a much quicker solution, I should have thought of that too! :thumbup:

Whats the purpose of doing x10 elevations though? To get rid of decimals or something?
Finished Courses - Main: Amedal (fictional), Nine Bridges (real)
Other: Austin, Sheshan, Kauri Cliffs, Le Golf Nat. Updates: Whirlpool, Royal Lytham, Royal St George's, Chicago, Chambers Bay, Munchen Nord E
Working on: 2 fictional courses + a couple things...
ponkey
Posts: 74
Joined: April 5th, 2020, 10:28 am

Re: St Andrews The Old Course 2022

Post by ponkey »

ponkey wrote: August 22nd, 2022, 10:12 pm
alarduran wrote: July 15th, 2022, 10:37 pm Hi, folks.
I was intrigued about the effects of changing the internal edges of the fairways to a sharpness of 1 from one of 0. I gave it a try on Royal Birkdale #10 fairway. I attach comparative screenshots. Changes are very subtle but I think they are worth of it (bumpiness are a bit more noticeable).
Regards.

Sharpness=0
Image1.jpg

Sharpness=1
Image2.jpg
Hi.

I quite like this idea. I've tried it on Carnoustie and there don't seem to be any problems and it looks a lot better both in the game and in the top cam.

Peter
Hi again

I've changed my mind a little on this.
I still like the idea but I keep any edges around bunkers at 0 sharpness and the edges around the bottom of any bumps at 0 too. You do need to walk around thee fairways to make sure everything is tickety boo.
I think it looks better though and plays fine.

Peter
linkster
Posts: 95
Joined: June 13th, 2022, 1:12 am

Re: St Andrews The Old Course 2022

Post by linkster »

The .dem file format that the APCD can import is from the USGS and dates back to the 90's. It is designed to use integer values of meters for elevations and grid coordinates. Early on when I started messing around with importing terrains in APCD I thought the process was not helpful due to the coarse differences in whole meter elevations. Then one evening I had an idea, do an elevation exaggeration of x10 and scale back 1/10th in APCD to get an extra decimal point for the terrain elevations. Google Earth has the option for up to a 3x elevation exaggeration for landscape viewing. Once I got the APCD scaling figured out and saw how accurate the results produced a terrain for a golf course, I had to share it with the community here. Having a golf course terrain with elevations accurate to 0.1m (10cm or 4in) is about the error range for LIDAR surveys.
linkster
Posts: 95
Joined: June 13th, 2022, 1:12 am

Re: St Andrews The Old Course 2022

Post by linkster »

I like using sharpness=1 for all edges of the fairways, greens, and tees. Biggest problem I encountered is the seam blends. When everything is sharpness=0, the "size" of the alpha texture transition of the seam blend dictates how the seam blend looks. As soon as the edges are sharp, it seems like the spacing of the seam blend verts dictates how wide the seam blend transition is. When the seam blend is a simple line gradient the difference is small (green to fringe seam blend) but when the seam blend is detailed (rough to grass or a bunker edge seam blend) the difference can be significant. Does anyone have any thoughts on this?
User avatar
Adelade
Posts: 1346
Joined: August 27th, 2019, 10:24 am

Re: St Andrews The Old Course 2022

Post by Adelade »

linkster wrote: August 23rd, 2022, 10:31 pm I like using sharpness=1 for all edges of the fairways, greens, and tees.
Are you sure its appropriate for the greens? Any small amount of blocky-ness in the surface will be noticeable to players when its on the greens. Or are you perhaps talking about the perimeter edges instead of the interior ones now?
linkster wrote: August 23rd, 2022, 10:31 pmWhen everything is sharpness=0, the "size" of the alpha texture transition of the seam blend dictates how the seam blend looks. As soon as the edges are sharp, it seems like the spacing of the seam blend verts dictates how wide the seam blend transition is. When the seam blend is a simple line gradient the difference is small (green to fringe seam blend) but when the seam blend is detailed (rough to grass or a bunker edge seam blend) the difference can be significant. Does anyone have any thoughts on this?
Maybe I have some, can you show in pictures an example? Im not fully sure Im imagining the correct situation, but it sounds familiar to something that I might have a few tips about. It depends so much on the alpha textures, and they can often be swapped or edited in an image editor to achieve what one wants. Not all courses have simple line gradients between fringe and green, and some courses have simple line gradients between rough and fairway.
Finished Courses - Main: Amedal (fictional), Nine Bridges (real)
Other: Austin, Sheshan, Kauri Cliffs, Le Golf Nat. Updates: Whirlpool, Royal Lytham, Royal St George's, Chicago, Chambers Bay, Munchen Nord E
Working on: 2 fictional courses + a couple things...
ponkey
Posts: 74
Joined: April 5th, 2020, 10:28 am

Re: St Andrews The Old Course 2022

Post by ponkey »

Hi Linkster

Havent been able to upload a dem yet. Keep getting wrong format error messages.

So my original data is a Lidar DTM 1m, 2 tiles which I merged.
I created a grid with horiz and vertical spacing 2m.
Translated it 1m horiz and vertical.
Sampled it.
Opened Attribute layer and multiplied left, top, right, bottom and sample_1 columns by 10 and turned them into integers and saved all edits.
Is this correct upto here?
Now I'm not sure how to get the buffer ring, or how to save the whole thing as a raster in the right format.
I hope you can help me here.
Many thanks
Peter
linkster
Posts: 95
Joined: June 13th, 2022, 1:12 am

Re: St Andrews The Old Course 2022

Post by linkster »

Hi Peter

Sounds like you are well on your way in QGIS! If your LIDAR DTM is 1m, the grid should be translated 0.5m horizontal and vertical to get the centre of the raster pixel. You only need to multiply the Sample_1 data column by 10, I usually make a new table column for it. When the grid is done, go to rasterize (vector to raster) and use the new table column for the burn in value.

Working with rasters can be frustrating but here is how I get the most consistent results. Create a new constant value raster (0) with the extent about 100m bigger than the grid extent (ends up being 50 more pixels at 2m). Then go to raster calculator and add both raster layers together. If the raster calculator spits out minimum float values instead of zeros for the buffer, go to reclassify by table and turn all values less than 0 to 0. That should give you your terrain raster, then save as a .tif. Last step is to convert to a .dem. If the conversion throws an error at you, you likely are not working in a UTM projection (British National Grid is not UTM). Simply override the projection for the output file and tell it it is a UTM grid. The resulting .dem will not be properly georeferenced but the APCD does not care.

Let me know if this works for you or you find another way!
ponkey
Posts: 74
Joined: April 5th, 2020, 10:28 am

Re: St Andrews The Old Course 2022

Post by ponkey »

Thanks Linkster
I'll give it a whirl.

Peter
Post Reply