For example, you can populate several rooms simultaneously with the same furniture arrangement. Similarly, if you import a CAD file that contains 2D symbols that represent chairs in a conference room, you can use Clone And Align to replace the symbols with 3D chair objects en masse.
The distributed objects can be copies, instances, or references of the current selected object. You determine the number of clones or clone sets by specifying any number of destination objects. You can also specify position and orientation alignment of the clones on one, two, or three axes, with optional offsets.
You can use any number of source objects and destination objects.
You can pick objects within an XRef scene as destination objects.
With multiple source objects, Clone And Align maintains the positional relationships among the members of each cloned group, aligning the selection center with the destination's pivot.
To use the Clone And Align tool:
3ds Max opens the Clone And Align dialog.
The Clone and Align tool takes the form of a non-modal dialog; it remains open while you work in the viewports. While the dialog is active, the results of the current settings appear as a preview in the viewports. Because of the dialog's non-modal nature, you can change the selection of source and destination objects on the fly and see the results immediately in the viewports.
When the dialog focus is lost by activating another dialog or clicking in a viewport (that is, its title bar is gray rather than blue), the preview no longer appears in the viewports. To make the cloned objects permanent, click Apply when the dialog is active.
Designate source objects by selecting them in a viewport. If you do this with the Clone And Align dialog open, the dialog loses focus; click the dialog to regain focus and update the settings.
This read-only field shows the number of destination objects. To change this value, use Pick, Pick List, and Clear.
When on, each object you click in the viewports is added to the list of destination objects. Click again to turn off after picking all destination objects.
To qualify as a valid destination object, an object must:
Opens the Pick Destination Objects dialog, which lets you pick all destination objects simultaneously, by name. In the dialog, highlight the destination objects, and then click Pick.
Removes all destination objects from the list. Available only when at least one destination object is designated.
This read-only field shows the number of source objects. To change this value, keep the dialog open, make sure Pick is off, and then select source objects in the viewports. When you click the dialog, the field updates.
Links each clone as a child of its destination object.
These settings let you determine the type of clone to create, and, if appropriate, how to copy the controller. For details, see Clone Options Dialog.
The Align Position and Align Orientation group names are followed by the current reference coordinate system, in parentheses, which they use as the coordinate system for positioning and aligning the clones. When the View coordinate system is active, alignment uses the World coordinate system.
The Offset parameters always use each destination object's Local coordinate system.
Use the X Axis, Y Axis, and Z Axis options to match the scale axis values between the source and destination.
This matches only the scale values you'd see in the coordinate display. It does not necessarily cause two objects to be the same size. Matching scale causes no change in size if none of the objects has previously been scaled.
Returns all settings in the Align Parameters rollout to their default values.
Generates the clones as permanent objects. After clicking Apply, you can use Clone And Align to generate additional clones, using the results of previous clonings as source or destination objects if you like.
Aborts the current cloning operation and closes the dialog.