Early clubhouse pic

Pat sent me an early pic of the clubhouse today. Still lots to do but we've been working on the textures together and I think it's looking great so far.

Here's the pic:

I'll update the blog when there are more pics of the CH and various other objects around the course.

Building construction underway

Pat now has the Pilgrim Trails file and is busy making some cool 3d buildings for it. When I get the course file back I'll post a few pics of them along with more of the course as it continues to be fine tuned.

Bunker edges and shaping

Here's a close up picture of the bunker edges and styling on the hole 9 green complex. It highlights some of the texturing and virtual 'shaping'.

Although people generally refer to the apcd as C.A.D. (computer aided design) software. There's nothing 'aided' about the design at all! To me, that acronym conjures up a picture of the computer doing some advanced technological maneuvers in order to create a good looking and realistic rendering of a bunker or some such aspect of the course. Unfortunately or fortunately depending on which way you look at it, that's simply not the case.

It would be akin to giving credit to the digging machine manned my a real life 'shaper' as helping to design a bunker on a real course. To the shaper on a real course, the mechanical digger is just a tool. To an artist, the pencil and brush are his tools, the computer is my tool which I used to create something from my imagination. Like any other tool, it takes practice - lots and lots of practice to get the hang of it. It helps to be a student of golf course architecture too!

More Pilgrim Trails

Here are a few more images as fine tuning continues:

Below is the green complex of the testing par4, 10th hole. The fairway is split into two with the tighter and more risk laden left route offering a much straighter line into the green.

If you take the safer route down the right side from the tee, you will have to deal with a bad angle of approach and a very tricky shot to get close to the flag.

The 11th tee area, note the bunker next to the tee which wraps around from the back of the previous hole's green. It's a chilling reminder that no less than 7 bunkers lie in wait on this hole should your long game desert you. It's a par 5 though, so there is always the opportunity for an eagle to get your score back on track.

Below is the green which sits close to a pond, seen here separating the 'B' nine from the 'C' nine. You can see a green and bunkers from the other nine hole loop across the pond.

The 12 hole is one of the more difficult greens to master. It's inspired by the 14th Green at Augusta national and pitches and rolls this way and that.

Legend has it that after a soul destroying 4 putt, a frustrated golfer scaled the rock outcrop that you can see here and jumped to his doom.
On completing their round his playing partners complained that the delay had done nothing for their games over the closing few holes.

The green at the short par 3, 14th hole is surrounded by trouble.

The 17th hole is a par 3 with an unusually long green. Depending on which tee and pin position

you are playing to, the hole can require anything from a short iron to a wood.

Course pics

As promised, here are some work in progress pics of Pilgrim Trails. I think even if I released it right now it would probably be the best looking course I'd created and the good news is, it will only get better! Playability and fun are the major factors now being worked on in testing. Moving lots of pins tweaking green slopes etc. This is the most fun part for the designer too as he gets to see his hard work come to fruition.

You can view larger version of the pics below by clicking on them.

Shoot me now because If I live to be 110, I don't think I'll be able to improve on this pic.
Hole one is a medium/long par 4 up a slight gradient. The front of the green is open, allowing you to run the ball up onto it even if you have missed the fairway. The front right positions are the trickiest as this bunker lies in wait if you slip up.

If you hit into position 'A' from the tee on hole 5, this is the view you'll have. This green is devilishly difficult and is probably the trickiest on the course.

This is a close up of the green, as you can see the front fall off is severe and you cannot afford to be short. There is a higher tier off to the right where some of the more difficult pins are set. Shouldn't be too hard to get close as all you have to do is pick the correct club in the swirling wind, carry over the canyon of a bunker to the elevated green, and then spin the ball to a stop before you topple off the back into another bunker - no sweat. Thankfully, some pin positions are easier! This green is loosely modelled on the 2nd hole at Wentworth (Burma Road course) I know first hand the amount of trouble you can get into on that little hole.

Below is the view from the tee at the stroke 1 hole, number 6. This tough par 4 slides around the corner to the right and your tee shot must do the same. The a golf club entry road lies to the left so don't double cross yourself or you'll be out of bounds. The good news is that it's a nice big wide fairway to aim at. It's hard to miss it....honest.

Below is a view from a mid tee on the par 3, 7th hole. It's only a short iron from here so perhaps a chance to make up lost ground with a birdie is on the cards. The big waste bunker looks more fearsome than it actually is.

A closer look of the green, with the worn pathway leading through the trees towards the next tee.






I have a bunch more pics of the back 9, that I'll post tomorrow - stay tuned

Phase 1 approaching alpha testing

I've been quite busy this last few days getting the course ready for alpha testing . At this stage, the first phase of 18 holes will be playable, planted and most of the major textures and seam blends mapped. Bunkers are now fully mapped with a minimum of 6 multiples, log tees are placed, mapped and shadowed. There are 4 tee options on each hole to add a bit of variety to the play and so far in private testing, the different hole lengths have proved successful in bringing different opportunities and hazards into play on each hole.

The course has had the 'first pass' of planting done but it needs refining with tree clone removal, and improved grass and bushes etc. All 18 pins are planted at their correct difficulty settings although testing and tweaking of these will be ongoing throughout the whole test process.
I dropped a 'work in progress' panorama as a course backdrop for the time being. I like it because it offers glimpses of the distant terrain beyond the course limits which really makes the course 'fit' and is exactly the look I was hoping for. Daniel has kindly offered to make me a full panorama for the course when the time comes and although I'm pleased with this one for the time being, maybe Dan will be able to come up with something even better or tweak this one for a better fit.


Things that will need to be done between alpha and beta testing include the majority of the 3d structures such as clubhouse, housing, shelters, bridge, and some smaller stuff like drinking wells. Pat Auge has stepped in to create these, and there is no-one better. Also, there needs to be some fine tuning of the textures, course sounds. plantings, the addition of things like worn spots, the 'de-tiling' of fairways and rough areas,

So far so good, the course is proving a blast to play with some friends who have had access the playable file, although some lame accusations about my 'local' knowledge giving me an unfair advantage have surfaced as I seem to keep winning the matches haha :)

I'll go into game and post a few screenshots later today.

On golf paintings...

Just while I wait for my course file to save, I thought I'd post a few notes about some of my favourite golf artists.

I own a book called Hallowed Ground which contains wonderful paintings of golf courses from around the world. They're done by Linda Hartough of whom I'm a big fan.

http://www.hartough.com/

Unless you're on your way to your second million you might want to skip buying her originals, they often go for several hundred thousand dollars but she has some prints for sale and you could always buy the book which contains many of them. The composition of her paintings and her flair for capturing the essence of a golf hole are unsurpassed. Check her site out.

Graeme Baxter is another amazing painter with a keen eye for detail. I was lucky enough to meet him several years ago at the British Open and he was kind enough to discuss some of the techniques he uses to create his works of art.

http://www.baxterprints.com/

Michael Miller takes a different approach to his paintings preferred by many people. Although I do like his paintings I prefer the detail and technique of the above painters.
When I look at a golf painting I want to feel like I could jump in and play the hole and although Mr Millers paintings are wonderful in their own right, somehow I never get that feeling when I look at them. Still, he produces some wonderful work and his book is very, very good with some superb paintings and very informative text by Geoff Shackelford

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Art-Golf-Design-Michael-Miller/dp/1886947309

Birds, insects and bugs!

A while back I posted on the forums at both Links corner and at apcd-courses to see if I could find a sound expert to help me with a 'global' sound that would play throughout the course. I lack the know how and software to manipulate the .wav files the way I wanted them.

Chad and Grooch stepped up and mixed me a few wav files to try. I don't want the birds and insects to drive people mad so the idea is that they will be muted but still give the impression of being outside surrounded by nature in all it's glory. I know some people have their ambient sounds turned off due to some of them being overly repetitive and downright annoying.

First impression on listening to these wav files is that they sound great and it's just a matter of trying to decide which one is best. I will of course be adding various stand alone sounds as well throughout the course.

Talking about being surrounded by nature - I did discover a very annoying 'bug' which took me the best part of a day to isolate and fix. When looking in one particular direction on one particular hole I was experiencing a crash to desktop - NOT GOOD!

I retraced my steps to try and find out which backup was the last one without the problem and then I had to go through each subsequent file step by step taking note of all the alterations I'd made. I finally traced the crash down to one of two problems, a seam blend on a large complicated bunker and a few path mappings around the clubhouse area where some of the paths join and intermix. I redid the seam on the bunker and simplified some of the path joins and the crash went away... SPLAT - another bug bites the dust!

It just shows the value of backup files though. It always amazes me when I hear people sometimes don't bother backing up their files and simply just save their hard work to the same file name over and over. It's only a matter of time before you either lose all their work with a corrupt file or they develop a bug in the course that they can't trace or fix. Always use multiple backups and always save your file to a different name each time. I've used this system for many years and it works well and makes it much easier to trace problems as they may arise.

The first 18 holes on the resort is now in what I would call 'pre-alpha' stage. The course itself is fully playable and for the most part textured and planted. The bunkers are being constructed with 4 texture path mappings per bunker and 6 multiples. The more complicated ones have more than that so it's quite time consuming to map them all. I would estimate that 80% of the bunkers are now fully mapped and all but one or two fairways have the basic mappings and seam blends in place. I'll be using more blends in the fairways and rough to break up any tiling and add some irregularity to the overall look. Old Sandwich on which the course 'look' is based, is very much sand based and fairly dry in areas. Therefore the mown grass tends to have a weathered look to it which looks very natural. I'm attempting to recreate that look and so far, so good, I'm enjoying the way the course is coming along.

As the complex will have 4 loops of nine when fully constructed you can see some of the various holes from other loops as you play the course. On the outskirts of loop 'B', you will be able to see many holes from loop 'C' and so I've been designing and constructing these too. Here's a pic from the scenic downhill par 3, 8th hole from loop 'C' This won't be full 'playable' until I release the future stages of the complex which will include the other 9 hole loops and the practice facility.

Rendering times are still good with the longest render time being approx 6 second from the 10th tee. Most of the other holes are rendering in 2 - 4 seconds - pretty good considering the amount of detail on the course