Getting Started With Designing...

Share your designing tips with other Designer's. Find answers to your problems using the APCD.
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wojo
Posts: 66
Joined: August 2nd, 2020, 4:17 pm

Getting Started With Designing...

Post by wojo »

I've worked with a couple of architectural rendering programs over the years... AccuRender and Lumion. In those programs you assign various JPG materials to AutoCAD "layers" and all objects on that layer get wrapped by whatever JPG you chose.

Is building a CRZ golf course anything like that?

Is there a tutorial somewhere that you can recommend?

Can you change the appearance of terrain elements in an existing CRZ golf course... for instance, I really like the appearance of the sand on one course and would like to assign that appearance to another course.

Thanks.
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Stephen Sullivan
Posts: 314
Joined: August 26th, 2019, 8:42 pm

Re: Getting Started With Designing...

Post by Stephen Sullivan »

I can recommend the sticky post above yours https://linkscorner.org/phpBB/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=49

and this which has just become available for free https://linkscorner.org/phpBB/viewtopic.php?f=16&t=652

Will tell you lots you need to know. Then just ask more questions of you are stuck :thumbup:
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Adelade
Posts: 1346
Joined: August 27th, 2019, 10:24 am

Re: Getting Started With Designing...

Post by Adelade »

I dont know AccuRender / Lumion but if I interpret your description of them correctly I would say APCD designing for the most part is different, although some specific (and mostly optional) parts of CRZ making are probably very similar to what you speak of - such as making/editing Panoramas, Textures, 2D Objects and some other graphical elements of a course. I say optional because there is a pretty good selection of such already created by others that one can use if one wants to keep it simple.

Taking a sand texture from one course and putting on another course is covered in some of the relatively early videos in the video tutorial series linked by Stephen above, can look for videos with the word 'texture' in the title. However it can only be done if the course with the desirable sand texture is not locked, often the courses with the prettiest textures are locked.
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...
wojo
Posts: 66
Joined: August 2nd, 2020, 4:17 pm

Re: Getting Started With Designing...

Post by wojo »

Hey, Thanks... Looks like great tutorial material. I heard in one of the videos that Lez Marwick did not import DEMs as a starting point for building a course. Is there a tutorial anywhere for how to import DEMs (or better yet) LAS files?

For my architectural projects, I've downloaded building project sites from this website… www.opentopography.org. I then use a little program that I purchased from a website… www.lidarwidgets.com to create DXF terrain meshes that I load into AutoCAD. The result can be pretty impressive when you load that terrain information into an AutoCAD DWG, and then plop a 3D model of the building you want to render. Here's a link to a Lumion animation of one of my houses… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyJcUn4n7GQ

I just learned about APCD yesterday. I'd like to try building a CRZ for a golf course at the Oregon coast called Salishan. Does starting from LAS or DEM information sound like the best way to start?

(Really cool that APCD and the Marwick videos are free!)
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Stephen Sullivan
Posts: 314
Joined: August 26th, 2019, 8:42 pm

Re: Getting Started With Designing...

Post by Stephen Sullivan »

I think Art does mention DEM's in his instructions, and there is one attached.
wojo
Posts: 66
Joined: August 2nd, 2020, 4:17 pm

Re: Getting Started With Designing...

Post by wojo »

Did you mean to attach a link?
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AJ Allen
Posts: 170
Joined: May 12th, 2020, 9:43 am
Location: Victoria Australia

Re: Getting Started With Designing...

Post by AJ Allen »

wojo wrote: August 4th, 2020, 4:41 pm Did you mean to attach a link?
You will find that (and a lot of other stuff) in the download forum. Here is a link to the one mentioned. https://linkscorner.org/phpBB/viewtopic.php?f=16&t=652

Cheers, AJ
wojo
Posts: 66
Joined: August 2nd, 2020, 4:17 pm

Re: Getting Started With Designing...

Post by wojo »

Thanks again... I guess it's a good idea to wait about 20 years before trying to learn a new software. By that time, somebody has taken the time to show you how to use it! (Now if I only had some time on my hands... Oh, wait! I haven't left my house in five months!)

Wojo
wojo
Posts: 66
Joined: August 2nd, 2020, 4:17 pm

Re: Getting Started With Designing...

Post by wojo »

I download some terrain information files for an existing golf course from a website called Open Topo. What I asked to receive from them was a DEM file of some sort. What they sent me had a .GZ file format. I found out that I could unzip that file and get it to a .TIF format (which I think is a GeoTiff format). APCD only accepts .DEM files, so I went to another online converter and made a file with a .DEM file extension. When I try importing that to APCD, I get an error message that it's the wrong format. I'm guessing that because APCD is about a 20 year old program, that .DEM file format may be different now compared to what is was around 2002? Anybody out the encounter anything like this and did you figure out how to get it to work?

Thanks.
Wojo
wojo
Posts: 66
Joined: August 2nd, 2020, 4:17 pm

Re: Getting Started With Designing...

Post by wojo »

I think I figured it out... APCD only accepts an outdated DEM format that you can still download via a website called ArcGIS. That old format was retired around 2005. I managed to get APCD to load what I got at ArcGIS. Now I need to figure out where I'm looking and whether the info is useful enough. It may be a set of points too far apart to be really useful.

Thanks for listening!
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