[Visualize] Importing Appearances into Visualize

When creating a project in Solidworks Visualize, you’ll have to import or create a model. During Import, you’ll have the ability to import appearances, appearances with textures, and appearances without textures.

You can control these import parameters by using the import options dialog box, shown below:

You can choose to “Ignore texture references” by checking the appropriate checkbox, you can choose to not import any appearances whatsoever in Visualize by unchecking the “Appearances” tab itself, or you can leave the options alone to import the model with all appearances and textures.

You can also instruct Visualize to automatically search for missing textures that appeared in the source model by adding the correct “Texture Auto-Search Path” to the appropriate field. You can also toggle the auto-search behavior on an off with a checkbox, and you can instruct Visualize to allow you to search for missing textures if the need arises manually.

Differences between imports with Textures, without Textures, and no Appearances

To see a comparison of each type of import style, let’s take a look at the image below:

Above, we can see that the original file had a wood texture applied to it during Import. We can see that when imported into Visualize with the texture included, the model looks as expected: with the wood texture applied correctly.

Without textures, an appearance is still applied to the model. However, there are no wood textures imported. If we were to look at the appearance’s properties, we would see that it’s still named correctly. However, the “Color” texture that would give it its texture is blank:

If we compare the property managers of both the model that did and did not have its textures imported, we can see that the only difference is the “Color” parameter in each appearance’s texture parameters. As such, textures (whether imported or not) can be edited and swapped out at any given time.

If you are having trouble importing your textures and appearances into Visualize from Solidworks, feel free to contact Hawk Ridge Systems Technical Support at 877.266.4469 (US) or 866.587.6803 (Canada).