SolidWorks users have benefited for years from the various Add-In products provided with SolidWorks Professional and Premium levels of their product. And if you've ever played around with some of them, you may have used their photorealistic rendering Add-In entitled "PhotoWorks." This Add-In allows the user to take their designs and (potentially) make near-realistic images suitable for the Web, catalogues, or print.
One aspect of PhotoWorks that I use frequently are "decals." Simply put, a decal is any image file that one wishes to use as a label or "sticker" on their model. Classic examples include bar codes, warning labels, and screen shots but decals can also be used for textures and fake light sources. Here's an example of an image taken from a manufacturer's Website and applied to my design.
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The "sticky" part of decals is WHEN they should be applied and then, HOW they should be applied. Even more stickier is the case when more than one decal needs to be applied to the same part. What should you do? We'll look at the example of a frame consisting of three identical sub-assemblies containing three identical panel boards. Different "posters" need to be used for each panel board but only top-level assembly will be used for the finished rendering.
When applying a decal, just as when applying a material/appearance, there is a heirarchy to the selection and application. For example, if I were in the top-level assembly and I inserted a new decal, when I select the face of the panel board I can choose to apply this at the part or the component level.
Part? Component? What's the difference?
Because appearances and decals can be applied at different times, one to the part file and another to the part file but whilst in use in an assembly, SolidWorks users need to differentiate between the two; a "part" is when a part is being in use by itself and not in an assembly. A "component" is the use of a part (or sub-assembly) within an assembly. It's a selection thing.
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If I apply the decal to the component within the assembly and I proceed to apply different decals to the remaining components, you'll note the result in the below images.
View this photo But the correct application doesn't lie in selecting "Part" either. The results are the same. The problem isn't due to WHAT you are selecting but, rather, which one you are selecting. Take a look at the following two images:
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Once rendered, you'll note that although different decals were applied, they render only as if one decal is used.
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The correct approach is to utilize CONFIGURATIONS. If you think about it, a configuration is a variation on a theme. For this example, our "theme" is a panel board that must host various "posters." In order to facilitate this, we construct a different configuration of the panel part for each decal we wish to use. The decals are applied configur-centric (I made that word up), meaning that for each configuration of the panel we apply the appropriate decal. But it doesn't stop there. At the top-level assembly we're using the panel three different times AND within three different sub-assemblies. So, the correct method is to employ configurations at the sub-assembly level as well. The results tell it all:
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Note the correct decal for the correct instance of the parts.
Decals may be sticky, but their application within PhotoWorks doesn't have to be!
