Reapplying materials to an imported model

[Santiago Molina]

Hi all:

 

Im currently evaluating cinema as a renderer for my sketchup models.

Everything is ok, xcept when i want to change my initial model, have to reexport it to 3ds, reimport it in cinema and reapply my already defined materials. It is kind of boring, when you have more than 10 materials in your scene. I guess there has to be an easier way.

For example, in lightwave, all you have to do is paste the updated model in another layer of the original model, erase the original and that's it.

 

Any help will be appreciated.

thanks

[STRAT]

why not just re-import the changed bits instead of all the model?

 

anyway, it can work similar to LW.

 

just re-import the new bits over the existing old (already mapped) bits, then just drag and drop the old bit's material onto the new. the material, mapping co-ords and textures will automatically fit fine.

then just delete the old bit

[Ace_Face]

What Strat said.

[Santiago Molina]

Thanks strat and aceface.

 

I'll give cinema another shot. I guess, it's hard to break old habits. I like cinema's structured workflow, and also it's ortographic and multiple parallel projections (something unheard of in lw).

 

Strat, it's hard to import just a part of the model, since it comes from sketchup, via 3ds as either one huge mesh, or multiple unnamed meshes, already uv mapped; so separating the model would imply some serious mesh editing. (something i'm trying to avoid).

What I woluld really like to know is if there is some kind of file linking, or referencing, so that if you changed the original model, cinema's scene would update accordingly.

Thanks for your time

 

S

[STRAT]

yes, importing straight from sketchup to 3ds creats loads of objects. i use 2 methods -

 

either group all objects together first in sketchup BEFORE importing into c4d, or imports the model into cad (ie, acad), tidy up a bit in there, then export into c4d.