Understanding XRefs and materials

- [Instructor] An xref, or external reference,…is a 3ds Max scene file…that is loaded into another 3ds Max scene file.…So you can have nested files that reference one another.…In this course, we'll use xrefs…in order to save disc space.…Because we're just working with materials…and not versioning our models, we can load the same model…into many 3ds Max scene files and not incur…any disc storage penalties for that using xrefs.…I've got a very simple scene here with nothing in it.…

All I've done is set the units and customized unit setup.…I set it to centimeters…and I've set up the grid spacing as well.…I can right-click on any one of the magnets…and go to the home grid tab.…And I've set the grid spacing to ten centimeters.…To see how xrefs and materials interact,…lets load in a couple of xref objects.…Go to the file menu and choose reference.…You have two options here:…xref scene…and xref objects.…

We want xref objects.…The scene option here will not allow you…to change the materials.…Let's choose xref objects.…When the dialogue launches, we can go up to the toolbar…