)| Toolbar: | Rendering > Materials () |
| Menu: | View > Rendering > Materials |
| Keyboard: | MATERIALS |
| Alias: | RMAT |
The Material Assignment window allows you to specify the material that will be assigned to different surfaces in the drawing and how those materials will be mapped to the surface. A number of predefined materials are available that include different color patterns and surface finishes. In addition, a Materials Editor is available which allows you to modify the predefined materials or create new ones.
Materials can be assigned to either individual drawing entities, to drawing layers, or to drawing colors. When rendering an entity, first material properties are retrieved for that entity if they exist. If no material assignment has been made for that entity, then material properties are retrieved for the layer on which that entity resides. If no material assignment has been made for the layer, then material properties associated with the drawing color are used. Finally if no material properties have been assigned to that color, then the entity is rendered using the DEFAULT material properties and the drawing color that it has been assigned.
The Material Assignment window includes two different tabbed worksheets and a preview area as illustrated below. The first tab is entitled Material Library and allows you to select from among a variety of predefined materials. The second tab is titled Material Mapping and controls how the material is mapped to the surfaces in the drawing.
After you issue the Materials command you will be prompted to choose whether you'd like to specify materials for a set of drawing entities, for a particular drawing layer, or for a particular drawing color. The prompt line, as shown below, will read "Assign materials to: <Selection>/Layer/Color/Browse:" You can either type in Selection, Layer, or Color; or you can click on the corresponding options on the popup menu that will appear (you can type the letters 's', 'l', or 'c' as shortcuts for selection, layer, or color). The default value is Selection, so if you would like that choice, you can just press enter. The Browse option allows you to look at and edit the materials library without affecting any material assignments.
To assign materials to a selection of drawing entities, you must designate to which entities you'd like to make the assignment. If any entities are already selected when you issue the materials command, the materials will be assigned to those entities and the Materials Properties window will appear immediately. If no entities are selected, then a prompt, "Select entities:," will appear and allow you to select an entity or group of entities. Once you have selected one or more enties, you can then type the "Enter" key to confirm your slection and then the Materials Properties window will appear. After you have made your material selection using the Materials Properties window and then click on the OK button, your material selections will be applied to all of the drawing entities selected.
To assign materials to a layer, you must choose to which layer you'd like to make the assignment. A selection dialog box as shown below will appear and you can select a layer by clicking on the layer.
Once you have clicked on the layer of interest, the Materials Assignment window will appear and enable you to assign the desired material to the chosen layer. Once you've done that you will return to the Select Layer dialog again. When you have completed assigning materials to the various layers in the drawing, you can click the Done button to return to the drawing.
To assign materials to a drawing color, you must choose to which color you'd like to make the assigment. The color chooser, shown below, is similar to the normal IntelliCAD color selection dialog and allows you to click on one of the 256 different IntelliCAD drawing colors.
Once you have clicked on the color of interest, the Materials Properties window will appear. When you are finished assigning materials to the various colors you can click the Done button to return to the drawing.
The quickest way to get started with materials is to select from among the predefined materials available on the Material Library tab. The available predefined materials are shown in a file selection box on the left-hand side of the window. Folders in the file selection box can be opened or closed by clicking on the plus or minus sign to the left of the folder name. Individual materials can be selected by clicking on the name (ending in ".tex"). Once you click on the material name, a preview image will be shown in the right-hand-side area, and the properties for that material will be loaded. You can then click on the "OK" button to accept the properties, or you can click on the Material Mapping tab to adjust the way the material is mapped to the surface.
In addition to the normal OK, Cancel, and Help buttons, a Clear Assignment button is provided at the bottom of the dialog box. This button will clear the material assignment for the selected entities, layer, or color, and will close the Material Assignment window. This is useful for example if you have assigned a material to a particular entity, but then wish to have the entity drawn using the material selected for the layer. In this case you can select the entity, then issue the materials command to open the Material Assignment dialog and then click on the Clear Assignment button. The material selection will then be removed from that entity and the next time it is rendered it will use the material selection for the layer.
Material selections are stored in the drawing.