Golden Horseshoe Gold Course

[andersnm]

Wade - I have taken a look at the course - and stopped a bit at the retaining walls:

My advice is - use shorter wall-pieces some places. This makes it much easier to get them smooth round - if that is how it is in real life. I notice on the pictures that there are some jagged edges in real life as well as they have used long boards so this is actually not bad - but for instance on PGA Catalunya, the walls are very smooth in real life so I needed to use the shortest wall that are available in the designer on many parts.
Also - I measure from google earth where the walls actually are - because with lidar data, walls and vertical things in the terrain gets a bit messy and inaccurate. I needed to plant the walls well inside land in PGA Catalunya - as you can see from my picture in that thread.
I also use the double water on every wall. And looking at videos and pictures of this course - I would advice to do so here as well. A trick is to place the lower water body not too low, and not too far in. It is kind of hard to explain, but I place the body right on the edge of the wall. If there are green or fairway next to the wall, the body needs to be placed a bit further out in order for it to be good.

I looked at the fly-over video on the course, and on the 2nd - there don't seem to be walls to the left of the 2nd green?

For the first tee - the tee looks in the flyover to be a bit more narrow and don't go over the edge to the slope. I would either make it a bit more narrow to avoid that, or just flatten the tee.
Also - putting in heavy rough texture on the course where you see a mower has cut the grass is a good advice. Makes it a bit more polished and you avoid bare-patches - for example on the island green.

I think your planting is spot on Wade - great job!
Green speed 163 is the same as Fast. I would advice to make it in-between medium and fast or fast and very fast so you have one more option

Unfortunately I have not time to play the course today - but will do so later.

[Deleted]

Feb 3, 2021 22:19:06 GMT andersnm said:

Wade - I have taken a look at the course - and stopped a bit at the retaining walls:

My advice is - use shorter wall-pieces some places. This makes it much easier to get them smooth round - if that is how it is in real life. I notice on the pictures that there are some jagged edges in real life as well as they have used long boards so this is actually not bad - but for instance on PGA Catalunya, the walls are very smooth in real life so I needed to use the shortest wall that are available in the designer on many parts.
Also - I measure from google earth where the walls actually are - because with lidar data, walls and vertical things in the terrain gets a bit messy and inaccurate. I needed to plant the walls well inside land in PGA Catalunya - as you can see from my picture in that thread.
I also use the double water on every wall. And looking at videos and pictures of this course - I would advice to do so here as well. A trick is to place the lower water body not too low, and not too far in. It is kind of hard to explain, but I place the body right on the edge of the wall. If there are green or fairway next to the wall, the body needs to be placed a bit further out in order for it to be good.

I looked at the fly-over video on the course, and on the 2nd - there don't seem to be walls to the left of the 2nd green?

For the first tee - the tee looks in the flyover to be a bit more narrow and don't go over the edge to the slope. I would either make it a bit more narrow to avoid that, or just flatten the tee.
Also - putting in heavy rough texture on the course where you see a mower has cut the grass is a good advice. Makes it a bit more polished and you avoid bare-patches - for example on the island green.

I think your planting is spot on Wade - great job!
Green speed 163 is the same as Fast. I would advice to make it in-between medium and fast or fast and very fast so you have one more option

Unfortunately I have not time to play the course today - but will do so later.

Thanks Anders! I will work on what you mentioned. I will play with the double water trick and see if I can figure out what you said. 

You are correct about the retaining wall on hole #2. Not that I doubted you lol. The retaining wall stops just past the left side of the green. Not sure where I saw it going all the way down. Geez that could have saved me a lot of work if I saw it correctly the first time lol. 

[Leon]

To be fair wade, going off that real life pic you posted, the colours do look very bright green! (And sort of "manicured" style.)

I find everything on the game looks too much that way, like edging towards "fake." There's little you can do to completely get rid of that, but I have seen (eg Paddy's courses) good attempts to move away from that, by finding good colour combos for green/fairway/rough.

And, again, your Hawaii course looked GREAT so you obviously have the eye for it...

Personally, I liked the delta look, of those you posted. The slightly "washed out" nature moves it away from the "fake" thing I was talking about. (All just my opinion of course!)

But these are minor things! It plays great and, as others have said, your planting is top notch.

Just have an experiment and go with what you feel 👍

[Deleted]

Feb 4, 2021 0:16:05 GMT Leon said:

To be fair wade, going off that real life pic you posted, the colours do look very bright green! (And sort of "manicured" style.)

I find everything on the game looks too much that way, like edging towards "fake." There's little you can do to completely get rid of that, but I have seen (eg Paddy's courses) good attempts to move away from that, by finding good colour combos for green/fairway/rough.

And, again, your Hawaii course looked GREAT so you obviously have the eye for it...

Personally, I liked the delta look, of those you posted. The slightly "washed out" nature moves it away from the "fake" thing I was talking about. (All just my opinion of course!)

But these are minor things! It plays great and, as others have said, your planting is top notch.

Just have an experiment and go with what you feel 👍

Thanks again Leon, I agree with you. I like the natural look. It makes it look real. I would say maybe Augusta and a handful of others should have the manicured look. When I look at Golden Horseshoe from Google Earth it doesn't look anything like the pictures on the course website. I'm sure the pictures have been touched up to present the best image to the public. Paddy and Anders have a much better/artistic eye for the natural feel. I will play around with the Boreal and Delta look and go from there. 

[Deleted]

Silly question, is it better to create the water body first then retaining walls. Or Retaining walls then create the water body? 

[andersnm]

Feb 5, 2021 14:59:56 GMT @sirwade said:

Silly question, is it better to create the water body first then retaining walls. Or Retaining walls then create the water body? 

I create water before I make retaining walls. And I wait to put the double water until the sculpting and walls are finished. You will need to sculpt on water edges when you have lidar data - and I will also measure in google earth to see where the wall is - so it may be the wall is inside the land. Look at the 5th hole pictures I made in the Catalunya thread to get an example.
The first course I made that had retaining walls was Losby - and I did not measure and laid down the walls on the edges - could be more smooth, and even then I had to sculpt on the edges. Have got some practice since then, so if I did Losby from scratch, it would be much better.

[nonusehki]

Sorry didn't have the time to check this out earlier, just played it. I like the elevation changes in the course and views on some of the approach shots (1st and 11th for example). It would be an interesting course to play for sure. I can imagine how tough some of those approach shots are from sidehill lies, and to elevated greens. I agree about using shorter pieces of retaining walls, it would make the curves a lot smoother! There were some rows of bushes, that didn't have that much variation with the rotation & size (or rather looked like clones of themselves). Otherwise I think the surroundings looked really nice, but I think they stood out for me and broke the immersion a bit.

edit: I would take a super bowl sunday round anytime, after the last couple of days we currently have about 2ft of snow 

[Deleted]

Feb 5, 2021 18:45:13 GMT nonusehki said:

Sorry didn't have the time to check this out earlier, just played it. I like the elevation changes in the course and views on some of the approach shots (1st and 11th for example). It would be an interesting course to play for sure. I can imagine how tough some of those approach shots are from sidehill lies, and to elevated greens. I agree about using shorter pieces of retaining walls, it would make the curves a lot smoother! There were some rows of bushes, that didn't have that much variation with the rotation & size (or rather looked like clones of themselves). Otherwise I think the surroundings looked really nice, but I think they stood out for me and broke the immersion a bit.

edit: I would take a super bowl sunday round anytime, after the last couple of days we currently have about 2ft of snow 

Thank you for the feedback! I tried to rotate all the bushes but some of them look the same no matter how you rotate them. I will go through and double check that. 

So far they are calling for morning rain on Sunday. I would play no problem lol. It is half the price due to the tournament $75.00.

[Deleted]

I just published Golden Horseshoe GC Lidar.......unintentionally. The course is only about 85-90% complete. I changed the name to GHGC 4 but I must not have confirmed it. So when I published it I noticed the name never changed. Must be time for me to leave the designing to people that know what they are doing. 

[yeltzman]

Must be time for me to leave the designing to people that know what they are doing

No idea why you would say that only played 2 holes excellent so far......I think some designers think they never make a mistake i think you learn something new with every course you do,If you enjoy designing and by the looks of this course you do,never stop

just a little update that 16th hole is a wonderful hole.....Also plays and loads up wonderfully well on my old xbox always a lovely bonus with lidar.

[Leon]

Feb 9, 2021 19:01:57 GMT @sirwade said:

I just published Golden Horseshoe GC Lidar.......unintentionally. The course is only about 85-90% complete. I changed the name to GHGC 4 but I must not have confirmed it. So when I published it I noticed the name never changed. Must be time for me to leave the designing to people that know what they are doing. 

When you release the absolute final version could you call it "golden horseshoe lidar" or "golden horseshoe GC (L)"?

[Deleted]

Feb 9, 2021 19:30:04 GMT Leon said:

Feb 9, 2021 19:01:57 GMT @sirwade said:

I just published Golden Horseshoe GC Lidar.......unintentionally. The course is only about 85-90% complete. I changed the name to GHGC 4 but I must not have confirmed it. So when I published it I noticed the name never changed. Must be time for me to leave the designing to people that know what they are doing. 

When you release the absolute final version could you call it "golden horseshoe lidar" or "golden horseshoe GC (L)"?

I like Golden Horseshoe GC (L)

[Deleted]

Feb 9, 2021 19:07:06 GMT yeltzman said:

Must be time for me to leave the designing to people that know what they are doing

No idea why you would say that only played 2 holes excellent so far......I think some designers think they never make a mistake i think you learn something new with every course you do,If you enjoy designing and by the looks of this course you do,never stop

just a little update that 16th hole is a wonderful hole.....Also plays and loads up wonderfully well on my old xbox always a lovely bonus with lidar.

Thank you for the kind words Sir! I was just so ticked over publishing it with the intended name when completed. I have struggled with the ground connected to the retaining walls. I just can't get them to look nice. If I smooth the ground it pushes it out past and in front of the retaining wall. When I sculpt in front of the retaining wall it pushes it back and makes the ground uneven lol. 

[andersnm]

Feb 9, 2021 19:01:57 GMT @sirwade said:

I just published Golden Horseshoe GC Lidar.......unintentionally. The course is only about 85-90% complete. I changed the name to GHGC 4 but I must not have confirmed it. So when I published it I noticed the name never changed. Must be time for me to leave the designing to people that know what they are doing. 

We are all fortunate that you want to recreate courses Wade - you take care and produce better and better courses. And as yeltzman says - no one is perfect, and we can all do better - and I would say, we all do better and learn new things all the time.

As for the name-problem. This is known to me. You need to save and exit after you have changed the name, then re-enter the designer in the game before publish.

[Deleted]

Feb 9, 2021 21:47:20 GMT andersnm said:

Feb 9, 2021 19:01:57 GMT @sirwade said:

I just published Golden Horseshoe GC Lidar.......unintentionally. The course is only about 85-90% complete. I changed the name to GHGC 4 but I must not have confirmed it. So when I published it I noticed the name never changed. Must be time for me to leave the designing to people that know what they are doing. 

We are all fortunate that you want to recreate courses Wade - you take care and produce better and better courses. And as yeltzman says - no one is perfect, and we can all do better - and I would say, we all do better and learn new things all the time.

As for the name-problem. This is known to me. You need to save and exit after you have changed the name, then re-enter the designer in the game before publish.

Thanks Anders