Overview

Material Definition is a solution that lets you define materials, apply them to objects, and explore them. A material consists of a default set of properties and domain definitions that are used to determine material-related characteristics.

The Material Definition User's Guide is intended for users who need to become quickly familiar with the product.

Material Definition in a Nutshell

Materials in Version 6 define physical matter as a collection of properties and domains. In PLM, materials are modeled as reference objects. Materials are stored in the PLM database and can be applied to an object to simulate visual and physical characteristics of the object. Materials are identified by (core materials) and (covering materials).

A material consists of a default set of properties and domain definitions. Depending on the configurations and products you installed, the following material domains are available:


  • Rendering
  • Drafting
  • ELFINI linear elastic
  • Composite
  • Simulation

When a material is applied to an object, the properties and domains associated with that material are used to determine material-related characteristics, such as the color and mass of the object. For more information, see About Applying Materials.

The Material Definition product consists of the Material Editor workbench, the Material Navigator, and the Apply Material tools, which are available outside of the Material Editor workbench.


  • The Material Editor workbench allows you to create materials, modify material properties, and add or modify material domains.
  • The Material Navigator workbench allows you to explore material references and their associated material domains, materials references from material domains, and catalogs and folders from material references. In addition, the navigation window allows you to perform standard PLM operations on material objects (material references and domains).
  • The Apply Material tools allow you to associate a material with a geometry object.

Before Reading this Guide

Before reading this guide, you should be familiar with basic Version 6 concepts such as document windows, standard and view toolbars. Therefore, we recommend that you read the Infrastructure User's Guide that describes generic capabilities common to all Version 6 products. It also describes the general layout of Version 6 and the interoperability between workbenches.

Getting the Most Out of this Guide

To get the most out of this guide, we suggest that you start reading and performing the step-by-step user tasks, which cover all product functionalities.

The Interface Description section, which describes the commands that are specific to Material Infrastructure, and the Accessing and Customizing Settings section, which explains how to customize settings, will also certainly prove useful.