Save Material Assignments?

[Eric B]

Is there a way, other than creating a duplicate model, to save all material assignments?

I have a building with several radically different finish schemes and I would like to be able to adjust minor aspects of each scheme as the Client refines their considerations.

Reassigning entire finishes is cumbersome and I have never had to make such profound jumps back and forth between different assignment configurations.

* Normally my workflow is to adjust just one or two aspects of a model and render each iteration so I have never really searched out the limitations of the AR5 material assignments.

 

On a side note: Last week I did have a boss ask to strip off all the materials and render the model as a gray mass study - then go back and continue working as before. Apart from creating a duplicate model I would have been forced to remove all the materials and then reassign them all over again. Not the best of situations.

 

[Roy Hirshkowitz]

Not really.  You can create a template drawing with materials and layers.  Inserting your new drawing into your template might get you what you need.

 

There is a Use Materials checkbox for rendering an all gray model.

[Eric B]

Thanks Roy - Sorry to hear that we lack an AR3-AR4 mainstay that I used a lot.

The template "trick" could work but sounds like about as much work to do manually, especially if each version of the finishes is also changing.

Yes - I did find and use the "Use Materials" checkbox for the gray study model which saved me a good bit of time. Glad that is an option.

 

Another method would be to continue using AR4 to assign and save the various material assignments and then import the entire model into AR5 just for rendering each version. Slightly more efficient than maintaining "empty" template drawings for each finish scheme of the same model...

Here is a question - couldn't AR5 create the "empty template" models, e.g. all model content stripped out and just the materials and layers and then save that as an AR5 file type? Then a User could "save" material settings and reassign them via AR5 through an automated AR5 controlled import.

Thus a new button named "Save Materials to Template" just strips the model down and lets the User save it under a name. A second button named "Import Model into Template" would open the Template drawing and automatically insert the current model. Any unique layer of the model would retain its previous assignments so nothing would be lost.

Just an idea.

[Ros. Riha]

If you can use Autocad Architecture (ACA) instead of vanilla AutoCAD, you can use different Display themes or Display representations of your model. For example: our company standard consists of two basic Display representations:

Study = all white, only glass added

Project = full materials

 

Obviously:

1. you can tweak these basic settings to suit needs of a particular project
2. you can copy/add more such representations
3. If you use xrefs, you can override particular xrefs display settings, IOW: you can render the whole environment as a study and only the building you put focus on as a project

preliminary setup is quite painful, but once you got it, subsequent changes are very fast.

attached example shows the rendering of some 30 xrefs, rendered is "study" setting, where only one (groundworks or parterre) was rendered as a "project"

[Roy Hirshkowitz]

Really nice stuff-- upload some examples to the Gallery when you get a chance.

[Eric B]

I only have access to vanilla AutoCAD so I appreciate your suggestion however it is not an option.

 

Nice plants by the way. Are some of them RPCs? The office has not invested in RPC's either so I have to do everything by brute force.

[Ros. Riha]

"Nice plants by the way. Are some of them RPCs?"

No, all of them are nXt plants.

[Paul Peters]

Ros. Riha

 

I would sure like to know how you setup the display representations for various rendering results.  I use MEP, basically the same steps as Architecture for Display reps... Clicking a display rep, say "nXt-Renderings" and rendering my results would save tons of time... Do i need to go into the materials definitions and re-define all the surface renderings to use Accurender materials?  I'm trying to understand how i could tie this to a new display rep and hold those values.... Any help would be appreciated. 

[Ros. Riha]

Exactly as you have guessed - first step is to have nXt material definitions present in your drawing. Then you can use either existing or create new display representation, then go to the Style Manager where you create new/use existing material definitions and attach them to styles of your elements. Final step is to go to the material definition, where you choose nXt material to be used for rendering.

[Sampdoria]

Hi Roy, any chance we'll have the Save Material Scheme function in one of your updates? :)

I really appreciate your trouble-shooting and regular updates on the software. The shift to Nxt this year has been the single most progressive move for me in terms of Quality and Speed.

 

The Portable feel of each DWG carrying its own set of materials like a sort of DNA has been fantastic.

[akinlolu olugboji]

What I do is to import the layer via Design Centre (Cntr + 2). This brings in the materials as well.

Missed the Save /Import material button of AR3/4 too.

[Eric B]

Sounds like I need to brush up on Design Center controls in AutoCAD 2008. Did not know there was an import layer - will the material assignments displace layers that are already in the model?

[akinlolu olugboji]

NO!