Clip Mask

To clarify - you have a reference attachment. You would like to mask (hide) part of the attachment, but in the middle of the masked portion, you would like a "window" to show a portion of the reference?

I don't think that can be done. I've never found a way to do it. Whenever I've needed that, I either do some VERY creative shapes for my mask fence, or I just create a secondary copy of the attachment, clipped to just that part I need to show within the mask. I have never found a way to punch a hole in the mask.

Opps I was wrong.  Looked back at the file this morning and the clipping did not happened as I thought.  Guess I will have to be "VERY" creative.

Thanks for replying too.

The colored shapes above are reference to a sheet model. I then placed the rectangle and the circle in the sheet model. Using the Create Region tool I used the following settings.

I think this may give you what you desire.

thats just the way I do this stuff all the time... Eg. dont want to show existing contours crossing over into the proposed road design...and make it hard to see the proposed road design...but want a feel for the lay of the surrounding land ...

Using the filled shapes is an easy way to do this. I use this quite often the other way around - I have to highlight pipe trenches within all the surrounding topography, cables, sewers etc. The only difference is that I make it transparent so I don't have to think too much about update sequences etc..

If for some reason your filled shape covers other references that shouldn't, you can also either adjust this (in addition to what the others proposed) through the reference update sequence (reference manager -> properties -> update sequence) or if that doesn't work use priority settings for the reference itself (right click in the reference title bar and activate "priority").

Hi John Frampton.

I think for the sample poster showed, then  that is wrong tool it should be the second button from the left locate internal shapes ( ie make holes)

the one you selected seems to be create alternating shapes.... holes inside holes... never found a good use for that one...

Hi Lorys,

Gotcha, the buttons I used (posted) created the image I posted. I think the button selection in the posted image would provide them the results they desire, if not  the point is that he can get there by using a different method other than Clip mask for a reference. At least now the user know where to hunt and try.

Hi Lorys,

Gotcha, the buttons I used (posted) created the image I posted. I think the button selection in the posted image would provide them the results they desire, if not  the point is that he can get there by using a different method other than Clip mask for a reference. At least now the user know where to hunt and try.

Thanks to all of you for the input.  Getting use to MicroStation and learning new ways to do things.  For this project masking using a shape is the way to go vs clip mask the reference.

I would use that mask shape BG Fill as a ref file so I can control it better and also find it when needed

Yes that makes sense.  Can also use the mask shape in other files as needed to.  Thanks because I haven't done that yet with this project.