Curves that are created by approximations are often represented by a linear curve with hundreds or thousands of points. This data is accurate, but often inefficient to work with. The Smooth/Reduce Curve command (available from the Curve wizard or the Construct menu) provides two methods for reducing these linear curves:
- Smooth spline approximation — This method approximates the curve with a smooth cubic spline curve. This method works best for three dimensional curves which are made up of many small linear segments.
- Arc/line approximation — This method approximates the curve with arcs and lines. It works best for planar curves that originally came from arcs and lines or piecewise linear curves from import, trim loop extraction or surface/surface intersection that are approximating arcs and lines. Arc/line works best when the arc/line tolerance is bigger than the original sampling tolerance. If you select Chain arcs/lines, the curve is approximated with lines and arcs and then chained into a curve.
See How to reduce curve data or How to approximate curves with lines and arcs for more information on uses of the Smooth/reduce curve dialog.