CompuServe Messages

Merlin, As Dietmar has said, your real problem will be dealing with how the Acad modeler has built the model. Layer organization is one aspect you will need to work out. The default for 3DS is to convert an entire layer into a single object. Good if you planned it this way, bad if you didn't. If the Acad modeler is using 3Dfaces to model surfaces chances are that many/most/some will have their normals facing the wrong way. You can try using 3DS to automatically fix the normals. If the model was done correctly on all other respects this will probably work. If not, then it could get worse. The other modeler may not be snapping endpoints to each other, just going by what looks cloe on the screen. When you bring this into 3DS and weld the vertices, they may not weld. I have even had clients give me a wireframe that was exactly that. They had used 3Dlines to trace out the edges of the building. No surfaces, just lines. I had to go into Acad and trace over the lines with faces. A real time waster! I suggest you have them send you a sample file ASAP so you can see what they are doing and make plans to correct or deal with such problems. Good luck. Terry Gilbert Forcade & Associates