CHE

No, Mesh Items are the equivalent to layers. Group Locators are what their name suggest, groups. You can nest several mesh items into another mesh items if you wish. Group Locators come in handy whenever you want to translate several items together. Other than that they help to organize your file.

Attached Images

ItemList.jpg (86.9 KB, 8 views)

RyanSpaulding

Cool. Thanks for shedding some light on that.

As for modeling completely in Modo...baby steps on that one. First, I need to see render quality...and if I end up liking the look and performance, I'll slowly migrate perhaps.

Just need some material and outdoor lightings tuts and tips now...

CHE

Here are some Material presets:

http://www.vertexmonkey.com/presets_collections.php

and a tutorial on how to use them:

http://www.nullinstitute.com/web/Nul...B5EDB99E8.html

Shader Tree Tuts:

http://www.vertexmonkey.com/tutorial...shaderTree.php

Tutorials on lighting and rendering:

http://www.vertexmonkey.com/tutorials_lighting.php
http://www.vertexmonkey.com/tutorials_rendering.php

RyanSpaulding

Che, you're the man!

CHE

No problem. I hope you find a way to incorporate Modo into your work flow.

RyanSpaulding

GETTING 2D CAD DATA INTO MODO (Via MicroStation XM + Deep Exploration 5.0)

USEFUL LINKS:
http://forums.luxology.com/discussio....aspx?id=13431
http://forums.luxology.com/discussio....aspx?id=13233

DWG to DXF Workflow Option
In Export Settings: Entity Mapping > Convert All to 'Polylines' when possible
Condense levels as much as possible until Modo 301
Drop All Elements to linework
Found some translations when put into Modo via X's DXF get flipped, such as with arcs
Anything not dropped does not translate
Open In AccuTrans
Save As a large LWO file
Fast and Accurate

DWG to LWO Workflow Option
CAD Version of Deep Exploration used for DWG > LWO
DWG to LWO Export
Sometimes loses line color data in translation
Computer Inensive

DWG to DXF to LWO Workflow Option
CAD Version of Deep Exploration Used for DXF > LWO
Same as above, with line color maintained
Computer Intensive


GETTING 3D CAD DATA INTO MODO (Via MicroStation XM + Deep Exploration 5.0)

MicroStation XM > U3D > LWO
CAD Version of Deep Exploration Used
Level Structure Does Not Remain after Save of LXO File
Must go through each level (mesh), find greyed out levels (meshes), delete these (do not delete child objects)
Then Move geometry that collapsed to ouside of tree to the inside of the level (mesh) desired
Right-Click > Convert to 'Group Locator'
Now the LXO file will reopen with selectable levels (meshes)

RyanSpaulding

Ok, I'll update here as well, but I've created a small site called MicroStation to Modo. i'll have more in depth and better formatted stuff here. It's specific to MicroStation, but a lot of the info is general for you Autodesk users.

http://www.ryan-spaulding.com/cad_to_modo/

A WIP, but we, the arch viz crowd, need this.