How does the Fit Curves to Vectors tool work in VCarve Pro & Aspire for cleaning up imported artwork?

Fit Curves to Vectors

Location: Edit > Curve Fit Vectors, or the Fit Curves to Vectors icon in the Edit Vectors section of the Drawing tab. It has no keyboard shortcut of its own (Ctrl+F is Zoom to fit selected objects).

Fits arcs, Bezier curves or straight lines to the selected vectors. The new vectors are approximated within a tolerance you set. It can help with smoothness for some toolpath options and simplifies data for modeling. It is the usual cleanup step for imported artwork that arrives as many short line segments.

Why it matters: DXF files and traces often describe a curve as dozens of tiny line segments. That gives rough toolpaths and bulky data. Fit Curves converts them back to clean, smooth geometry with far fewer nodes.

Fitting Type

• Circular Arcs: approximates the selected vectors with arcs. A good match for CAD geometry made of arcs and lines.
• Bezier Curves: approximates the vectors with Bezier curves. Good for visual smoothness and modeling, and the usual choice after tracing.
• Straight Lines: approximates with straight lines only, which removes micro-segments.

Tolerance

The new arcs, Beziers or lines are generated within plus or minus this distance of the original vector. A smaller value stays closer to the original but uses more points. A larger value is smoother and uses fewer points, but deviates more from the original. Start small, check the result, and increase if the node count is still too high.

Keep Sharp Corners

When ticked, corners where the angle difference is greater than the Max Angle you set are kept sharp. Corners with a smaller difference are modified within the tolerance.

Replace selected vectors

When ticked, the original vectors are deleted and replaced by the fitted ones. When unticked, the originals are kept and the new fitted vectors are added. The new vectors are always created on the currently selected layer.

Workflow

1. Select the messy vectors (for example after a DXF import or a bitmap trace).
2. Open Fit Curves to Vectors and choose the fitting type.
3. Set the tolerance, and tick Keep Sharp Corners if the design has real corners.
4. Apply, then check the result in Node Editing (N). The node count should drop dramatically while the shape stays accurate.
5. Run the Vector Validator afterward to confirm a clean result.

Joining open vectors is a separate tool. Join Open Vectors, Join with a Line, Join with a Curve and Join by Moving End Points have their own entry (joining, closing and welding vectors).