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458 Chapter 20: Managing Scenes and Projects
components that appear as Linked Geometry on
the Modifier panel. Blocks or sub-blocks, that
appear as VIZBlocks in the Modif y panel, do not
have rendering properties because they are not
renderable.
Note: AchangetothedrawinginAutoCAD
isreflectedin3dsMaxwhenyoureloadthe
linked model. Changes made in 3ds Max do not
propagate back to AutoCAD.
Block and Modifying Linked Geometry
Linked objects show up as linked geometry objects
in the mod ifier stack. These objects don’t allow
access to sub-object levels where minor editing
canoccuratVertexorFacelevels.Youmustfirst
add an Edit Mesh modifier to the object in order
to access sub-object levels where yo u can perform
operations like welding vertices or deleting faces.
If you add a modifier to a block, the modifier is
applied to all instances of tha t block. Likewise, any
sub-object level editing to the originally selected
block propagates to all other instances.
Note: Any modifiers you apply to a block or block
component in 3ds Max are preserved if you reload
thefilewiththeFile Link Manager (page 3–422).
If you move, rotate, or scale blocks or block
components in 3ds Max, their new transform is
preserved even if the link ed model is reloaded
from AutoCAD. Transforms applied to linked
geometry in 3ds Max are relative to the t ransforms
applied to the same objects in AutoCAD. Further,
the transform propagates to all instances of that
block or component. For example, if you move the
Chair componen t of Desk1,theChair component
of all Desk1sinthescenewillbemoved. Ifthe
transform is undesirable, you can use the Reset
Transform button (page 3–442) on the Modify
panel to put the block or component back to its
original position.
Whenamodifierisappliedtoablockorblock
component, it propagates thr oughout all instances
of the block or block component in the scene.
Limitati ons of B lock s
Blocks have some limitat ions when you link a
drawing to 3ds Max.
• You cannot change the structure of actively
linked blocks or their components in 3ds Max.
In order to delete a block or component, you
will hav e to bind the file, breaking the link.
• You can only access rendering properties
for block components that appear as Linked
Geometry on the Modifier panel. Blocks or
sub-blocks, that appear as VIZBlocks in the
Modify panel, do not have rendering properties
because they are not renderable.
Block s and Materials
When assigning a material in 3ds Max to an
instance of a block or block component, all the
instances of that block or component are assigned
the same material automatically. This is called
automatic material propagation.Thisfeaturehelps
align 3ds Max behavior with that of Architectural
Desktop.
If you find that a material you’ve assigned to
a block or block component is not what you
wanted, you can undo the material assignment by
choosing Edit menu > Undo or pressing
Ct rl +Z .
If you undo a material assignment, the undo will
propagate to all instances of the objects to which
you assigned the material.
Note: When assigning a material to a block or
block component, you are not prompted to accept
or cancel the material propagation. You can only
control propagation of materials by toggling
Propagate Materials To Instances (page 2–1432) .
For more information about working with
materialsandassigningmaterialstoblocksin