dwg file import questions

[matramurena]

Hello everybody,

I make drawings of cabinets in AutoCAD which I import into MAX to make a nice render of it. I model in Acad because when the customer orders the cabinet I have my model ready to make it into the contructive drawings I need.

What I do now, is that I have nemed layers for each material. So I have a layer 'floor' 'ceiling' etc etc. In MAX I saved my materials with the same name as the names of the layers I always use in ACAD so I can attach that material to the layer with the same name and I quickly have the room and cabinets set up to look nice.

My question is however what the best way is to go when I have to make changes. Now I delete the layer in which changes are made from my MAX file and import the layer again from the Acad file. It would be handy if the layers would be updated every time I make changes to thet layer in the Acad file.

Another question: Is it possible to have MAX automatically assign materials to layers? So that every time that I import a file all materials are assigned with just one click??

[Cad64]

Instead of Importing your Acad file into Max, use the "File Link Manager". This works just like an xref in Acad, so any changes made to the Acad file will automatically update the Max file. You can find the File Link Manager in the File pull down menu.

I'm not sure what you mean by "assign materials with one click"?

[matramurena]

How I do it now is that I select the material from my saved library, then assign it to the layer I want it to be on. And this I do for every layer. (always the same material to the same layer)

So I wonder if I can automate this using a script or something like that...

[spittle]

I didn't reallise you could do that in Max - assign a material to a layer, will have to try that later.