2008

XRef Objects
File menu > XRef Objects
Externally referenced objects, XRef objects, appear in your master (current)
scene, but are actually referenced from external 3ds Max files. As a result, the
source objects are protected from modifications you make to the XRef objects.
Updates or changes made to the source objects are also updated in the master
file when the source scene is reloaded. However, if an XRef object’s entities
are merged, the controls are local and can be modified. Therefore, they no
longer reference the original attributes.
For example, if you selected XRef or Ignore in the Modifiers group of the XRef
Objects dialog
on page 6737 , the only entry in the modifier stack will be “XRef
Object.” You can add additional modifiers to the object, but you cannot access
the original ones unless you merge the XRef object into the scene. If you merge
the modifiers into the master scene, you can edit them in the stack. However,
changes that you make to the modifier stack in the master file have no effect
in the source file.
An externally referenced object can be animated in the master file only if its
transform controller has been merged. In other words, no animation can be
added or blended with an XRef controller. However, an offset can be added,
but it then applies to the whole animation, and the offset cannot be animated.
NOTE The XRef behavior of world-space modifiers is different than the object-space
modifiers. World-space modifiers are not externally referenced. They are always
merged.
Transforms and manipulators in your source file will be treated according to
the Merge Transforms and Merge Manipulators setting in the XRef Objects
dialog.
6732 | Chapter 21 Managing Scenes and Projects