Interactive Imprint Mode

In this mode you must manually add faces and edges to the Source and Destination groups before executing the merge or imprint.

The Interactive imprint mode is useful when you want to select the faces or edges manually in the graphics window.

The following image shows the Merge/Imprint tool in Interactive imprint mode.

  1. To use the Merge/Imprint tool in Interactive mode, first select Faces or Edges from the Mode menu for both the Source and Destination.
    The tool allows any combination of face and edge imprinting. You can select the source and destination faces and edges using the Selection Controls.


  2. To select faces or edges for the Source and Destination sets, use one of the following methods:
    • Select a set of edges or faces in the graphics window and click the respective button in the panel (depending on whether the selection is added to Source or Destination). You can repeat this action multiple times for different sets of edges or faces.
    • With nothing selected in the graphics window, click the respective button in the panel. The object selection dialog appears, from which you can choose part faces or edges.
    In the Graphics window, faces or edges added to the Source appear green, and the faces or edges added to the Destination appear red.
  3. You can remove faces or edges by selecting them in the display, and clicking for the source or destination.
  4. To remove all faces from the source or destination, click .
  5. If you select the opposite group of faces for source and destination, you can swap them by clicking .
  6. For Part Mode, you have two options:
    • Single Part — allows you to merge or imprint two or more overlapping (co-planar) surfaces from the same part. For more details on the options, see Single Part Options.
    • Multi-Part — allows you to merge or imprint two or more overlapping (co-planar) surfaces from two parts. For more details on the options, see Advanced Parameters for Multi-Part Imprinting.

      In this mode, you can create an imprint operation in the simulation tree to include all the inputs and settings that were used in the surface repair tool. For more information, see Create Operation.

      While working in this mode, you can switch to the Automated imprint mode or vice versa to accelerate the imprint process and find the best imprint result.

  7. Click Merge/Imprint to carry out the operation.
    When complete, the Output window shows feedback from the operation.

    In situations where the merge was unsuccessful, the following error message appears.

    In this instance, try reversing the selections that you made for the source and destination faces or edges. In cases where a relatively large distance separates the faces or edges, having finer triangulation for the items improves the merge, as increasing the tolerance value.