This command serves to manually assign a material to certain triangles on the current surface, with the aim of improving its presentation in the Terrain Route and Road Route commands. The Viewer is launched on closing the window.
Each triangle in the MDT surfaces file is associated to a triangle type indicator. When the program creates a surface, all the triangles or of Normal type. However, when the Earthworks or Obtain Modified Terrain commands are executed, they are assigned with another triangle type corresponding to the new triangles generated if the current surface is modified. Additionally, when one inserts a geo-referenced image using the Insert Image command, the program creates a new triangle type associated to the image and assigns it to all normal-type triangles on which the image is projected.
The following kinds of triangles are differentiated according to the command with which they are generated.
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Type
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MDT Command
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Normal
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Create Surface
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EWSubgrade
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Earthworks
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EWCut
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Earthworks
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EWFill
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Earthworks
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Median
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Modified Terrain
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RoadBed
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Modified Terrain
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Ditch
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Modified Terrain
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Cut
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Modified Terrain
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Fill
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Modified Terrain
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This command allows one to consult or modify the information about a surface’s triangle types. Firstly, a message appears enabling us to select the type of surface representation, 2D solids or polylines; we recommend working with 2D solids in order to take full advantage of the different colors of the materials.
The image below illustrates a line of command and MDT8 - Maps > Materials/Objects (hereinafter, AutoCAD 2010) on the options ribbon with the different options for the assignment of materials:
Materials: Shows a text box enabling the user to select different materials and conduct different operations.
Edit: enables us to change the color and / or texture of a type of triangle.
The Description of the material is for informational purposes. It describes the type of triangle in which the material is to be used
The Color of the material is used in case of not using the option to assign materials under the Draw Solids command. In this case the execution of the command is faster.
The Texture indicates the type of texture to be used in the material in the model.
Replace: enables us to change material for another.
New: enables us to create a new type of triangle for use with one of the assignment options.
Delete: removes the types of triangle which have not been predefined.
Statistics: covers the current surface and shows a list of the types of triangles assigned.
Designate: Enables us to designate a triangle on the surface to use the material of the selected triangle.
Apply: Enables us to see the changes in the drawing when applying texture using any of the following options when the mode of model selected is SOLID 2D.
Objects: enables us to select the triangles to be modified by selecting entities of the 3DFACE, 2DSOLID or POLYLINE type.
Boundary: we need to select a closed polyline which delimits the triangles to be modified.
Segment: requests a segment file used to generate an internally modified terrain and copies the types of triangles (Median, Platform, etc.) to the current surface.
Properties: enables us to select one or more triangles and features a text with the name of the material in a dropdown list on which we can select another material and replace the triangles selected with the new one.
Polyline: we need to select a polyline and apply the material to all the triangles whose edges cut that line.
All: applies the material selected to all the triangles.
The Surfaces > Represent As command is used to change the way of representing the surface.
To see all textures supplied with the installation, consult the Textures section in the customization manual.
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Assigning images as texture
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Having a surface in the drawing and an image inserted enables us to select this image and assign it to the surface as a texture.
TcpMDT
