Page 4 (May 9 '03) As I wrote, we can't use pasting-with-Material-Editor-open trick in Universe 5 (as of April, 2003). Here's one possible workaround (though not so good one, rather tedious). Now that we have Universe 5.0.4, this trick seems irrelevant, but if you like to use Master Material to change all pieces with ease, it might help. (update: May 21, 2003)

For this movie, I linked eight cubes to a Texturer. And set up material using the Texturer, then made it Master Material (click "Create New Master" then click "Update Master"), but keep "Live Material" checkbox disabled. Then, using "Animated Visibility" checkbox, turned off visibility for all groups including the Texturer (of course by using control+click feature;-). This way, all models won't be rendered. I used this group for mapping purpose only.

Next, I duplicated the Texturer group, and turned on the duped Texturer's "Live Material" and "Animated Visibility" checkboxes. And changed label color of all child groups. After that, duplicated this Texturer seven times. Then, for dupe 1, enable Block 1 model's "Animated Visibility", and changed label color. Repeat this process to dupe 2's Block 2 model. Continue from dupe 3 to dupe 8.   Live Material Visibility Master Texturer.plm Group off off Child Groups of Master Texturer.plm Group - off Duped Texturer.plm Groups on on Red Blocks - on Gray Blocks - off

view by Hierarchy	Visibility channel

view by Material

For animation, do not use Block groups (because textures won't be sticked to child groups as shown in page 3). Instead, animate their parent Texturers. While tweaking your animation, even invisible (Visibility-disabled) models are shown in preview window. So, use label color or selection set, turn off show/hide checkboxes for all the gray-labeled Blocks (but before final rendering, don't forget to unhide them, otherwise their textures would be centered, not properly offset). If you need to tweak material, unhide Master Texturer.plm Group and its child groups. Open Material Editor for Master Texturer.plm Group, and tweak as you like and click "Update Master" button. Download: Universe 5 project file (Texturer is required) Olbicard (to download Texturer) Note: I believe this trick also works in Universe 4 (but of course you have to set "Visibility" in Keyframe view using its cell) Update: I forgot to mention a little variant, non-Master-Material method. If you won't tweak material later, you don't need to use Master Material (and visibility for gray Blocks, if you want). After duplicating Master Texturer.plm Group, you can delete all the gray-labeled Blocks. But if you have to change material setting later, that would be a pain. You must start from duplicating Master Texturer. To avoid this problem, just hide gray models, not delete. To change material setting, unhide all the gray models and work with one of Texturers. After tweaking, copy the material, select all the duped Texturers (in Project Window or World Window), paste the material with Material Editor closed or background (before pasting, make sure that all the Gray models are not hidden. It's crucial), then hide gray models. This also seems irrelevant, but with this procedure, you can paste to all the cubes at the same time. On the other hand, pasting-with-Material-Editor trick limits you to pasting one by one. (update: May 22, 2003) Update: If you don't like such a cluttered Project Window... ...of course you can replace each sibling groups of gray-labeled Blocks with one 20*20*20 master block like this.

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