Page 191 - Mastering SolidWorks

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160 CHAPTER 5 Using VisUalization techniqUes

Figure 5.19
editing or creating
custom materials

Understanding Appearances
Appearances are made up of a combination of color, illumination properties, a surface finish
image, and image-mapping settings. You can control all these options in the Advanced interface
of the Appearances PropertyManager, as shown in Figure 5.20. To access this interface, click the
Appearance icon in the Heads-Up View toolbar, and click the Advanced button at the top of
the PropertyManager.
You can adjust the default appearances that install with SolidWorks when you apply them to
your models. For example, you can apply a shiny, reflective appearance such as Stainless Steel
and then adjust its color to blue or red. You could apply a cast-iron appearance and then increase
the roughness. You might apply a brushed-aluminum appearance and change the direction of
the brush lines. You could apply a reflective-glass appearance and then reduce the reflectivity
and increase the transparency. You might apply a knurled-steel appearance to a cylindrical
part and adjust the mapping so the knurled image does not smear improperly across a face.
Figure 5.21 shows the contents of the Color/Image, Mapping, Illumination, and Surface Finish
tabs of the Appearances PropertyManager, where you can adjust all these settings and more.

Understanding Overrides
Keeping track of colors and appearances in SolidWorks can be difficult. Many users have
difficulty understanding when one color overrides another color and how to remove layers of
applied colors or appearances. This functionality is called Overrides.
Here is the hierarchy that SolidWorks uses when applying colors (appearances), listed from
lowest priority to highest:
◆ Default
◆ Part