Scene Management - Part 1

1. Scene Management - Part 1

2. Blender can be used to create something as simple as a single scene or image, or scaled up to an entire movie. • A single Blender file is organized and set up to be able to contain an entire movie. • Each blend file can contain multiple Scenes. • A scene is a bunch of objects, organized into layers • Each scene is shot on a set, stage or location and it is a set of action sequences where the actors act • Each sequence, or shot, usually lasts a few seconds. • Sometimes, a single shot lasts several minutes: its a "sequence shot", which might even be a complete scene on its own. • As you progress through the creative process, you use a set of window screen layouts specifically designed to help you work efficiently through the creative process: • model the objects and create the props, • clothe the actors and dress the set (assign materials), • define the action (animation), • render the video, and • produce the movie.

3. Planning Your Timeline • Shots within a scene are accomplished by moving a camera and/or actors through the scene for a few seconds. • Time in Blender is measured in frames, and typical video has 25 or 30 frames per second (fps), and film is 24 fps. • For a five-second shot then, you allocate up to 150 frames for that shot (30 fps x 5 seconds). • You can have multiple cameras in a scene, used for different shots, and select which one is active when rendering the shot.

4. Current Screen Layout and Scene • Scenes are a way to organize your work. • Scenes can share objects, but they can, for example, differ from each other in their rendered resolution or their camera view. • The current window layout and scene is shown in the User Preferences window header, usually shown at the top of your screen: • Window type icon • Menu • Screen Layouts • Scenes • Version of Blender currently running (Click the Blender icon to the left to show splash screen)

5. Loading the UI with • File->Open • Inside each Blend file, Blender saves the user interface layout - the arrangement of screen layouts. • By default, this saved UI is loaded, over-riding any user defaults or current screen layouts that you have. • If you want to work on the blend file using your current defaults, start a fresh Blender, then • open the file selector (F1) • Turn off the "Load UI" button located in the file browser header, and then • open the file.

6. Working with Scenes • Select a scene to work on by clicking on the up-down arrow next to the Scene name. • Scenes and the objects they contain are generally specific to the project you are working on. However, they too can be saved in their current state to be re-used by pressing Ctrl U. They will then appear the next time Blender starts or when the user selects File->New. • Blender comes with one default scene, which contains a camera, a lamp, and a box. • Scenes are listed alphabetically in the drop-down list. If you want them to appear in a different order, start them with a numerical ordinal, like "1-". The internal reference for a scene is the three-letter abbreviation "SCE".

7. To add a scene, click on the scene list button, and select Add New. While you are adding a new scene, you have these options: • Empty: • Create a completely empty scene. • Link Objects: • All objects are linked to the new scene. The layer and selection flags of the Objects can be configured differently for each scene. • Link ObData: • Duplicates objects only. ObData linked to the objects, e.g. mesh and curve, are not duplicated. • Full Copy: • Everything is duplicated. • Usually, for your first scene, you make a full copy of the default. • Alternatively, you can just start with the default, and start editing the cube that is usually hanging around waiting for you to do creative things. Get Blending!

8. Naming a Scene • By Shift LMB clicking on the Scene Name (usually Scene.001), you can change the name of the scene. For example, "BoyMeetsGirl" is usually the first of three acts. • Linking to a Scene • You can, at any moment, link any object from one scene to another. • Just open the scene where these objects are, • use Ctrl L and select “To Scene...” and • chose the scene where you want your objects to appear. • Those will be linked to the original objects; to make them single user (independant, unlinked...) in a given scene go to that scene, select them and use U. You will be presented with a few options that allow you to free up the datablocks (Object, Material, Texture...) that you want. • Removing a scene from the file • You can delete the current scene by clicking the X next to the name.

9. Outliner window • The Outliner Window is used for easily navigating a complex scene. There are two views: • the Outliner view and • the OOPS Schematic view. • The OOPS Schematic and Outliner give you a • 2d representation of your complicated 3d world. • Use these views to find things in your scene. • For example, suppose you sneeze while moving an object; your mouse flies off your desk and the object is hurled somewhere off screen into space. Do the following: • Make sure nothing is selected in the 3D window niew • Go to the outliner view • Select the object that you lost in the screen • Go back to the 3D view • Click somewhere in the middle of your screen where you want the object to appear • In the object mode, do Object  snap  selection -> cursor

10. Outliner view • Another more practical example is to evaluate the impact of a change on related datablocks. • Suppose you are looking at your TableTop object, and it doesn't look right; the Wood material doesn't look right; you want it to look more like mahogany. Since the same material can be used by many meshes, you're not sure how many things will change color when you change the material. • Using the OOPS Schematic, you could • find that material and trace the links that • it has to every mesh in your scene. Outliner View

11. The Outliner is a kind of list that organizes related things to each other. In the Outliner, you can: • View the data in the scene • Select and deselect Objects in the scene (RMB on the object) • Hide or show an object in the scene (the eye image) • Enable or disable selection to make an object "unselectable" in the 3D Window (the pointer image) • Enable or disable the rendering of an object (the render image) • Select data like materials and textures directly (they show up automatically in the Buttons Window!) • Delete objects from the scene (RMB on the object) • Unlink data (equivalent to pressing the "X" button next to the name of a datablock) (RMB on the object) • Easily select which RenderLayer to render • Easily select which render pass to render (for example, you can choose to render just the Specular layer).

12. Object-Oriented Programming System. (OOPS) • The OOPS schematic view in the Outliner window. • The OOPS schematic is a kind of picture that shows how things are linked together. • Look at relationships between objects (for example, which objects use the same texture) • The main difference is that the OOPS schematic shows you all available things (datablocks) in your blend file, organized by type of thing: scenes at the bottom, objects in the middle, materials toward the top. The Outliner shows you things in use within your blend file, organized by parent object with their children as indents.

13. Using the Outliner view • Each row in the Outliner view shows a datablock. You can click the down-arrow to the left of a name to expand the current datablock and see what other datablocks it contains. • You can select datablocks in the Outliner, but this won't necessarily select the datablock in the scene. To select the datablock in the scene, you have to activate the datablock. • Selecting and activating • Single selection doesn't require any pre-selection: just work directly with RMB inside the name/icon area. • Toggling selection of a datablock.

14. Click LMB on the mesh data of the cube to activate Edit Mode. • Activate the datablock with LMB on the icon or the name of the datablock. • Activating the datablock will automatically switch to the relevant mode or Buttons context. • For example, activating the mesh data of the cube will select the cube and enter Edit Mode (see right).

15. Context menu for the Cube object. • Show the context menu for a datablock with RMB on the icon or name. • Depending on the type of datablock, you will have the following options (Note: some datablock types will not have a context menu at all): • Select: selects an object • Deselect: deselects the object • Delete: deletes the selected object • Toggle visible: toggles the visibility of the object • Toggle selectable: toggles the selectibility of the object. It means either the object becomes selectable or none selectable in any mode • Toggle renderable: makes the object either renderable or non renderable • Expand one level with NumPad + or clicking LMB on the triangle . • Collapse one level with NumPad – or clicking LMB on the triangle . • Collapse/Expand all levels with A Toggling visibility Toggling selectivity Toggling rendering

16. Toggling object-level restrictions • The following options are only available for objects: • Toggle visibility by clicking the 'eye' icon for the object on the right-hand side of the Outliner. • Useful for complex scenes when you don't want to assign the object to another layer. (Hot Key is “V”) • Toggle selectability by clicking the 'arrow' icon. • This is useful for if you have placed something in the scene and don't want to accidentally select it when working on something else. (Hot key is “S”) • Toggle rendering by clicking the 'camera' icon. This will still keep the object visible in the scene. It will be ignored by the Renderer. (Hot key is “R”)

17. Searching • To do the search, first you need to be in the outliner view • Then you can use the following commands to start searching: • you can search the file for datablocks, either • by using the Search menu in the header of the Outliner, or • by using the hotkeys

18. Filtering the display in the outliner view • Outliner Display dropdown in the header of the outliner window has a field to let you select what the outliner should show in the outline. • By default, the outliner shows All Scenes. You can select to show only the current scene, datablocks that have been selected, objects that are on currently selected layers, etc. • All Scenes - Shows everything the outliner can display (in all scenes, all layers, etc...) • Current Scene - Shows everything in the current scene. • Visible Layers - Shows everything on the visible (currently selected) layers in the current Scene. Use the Layers buttons to make objects on a layer visible in the 3D window. • Groups - Lists only Groups and their members. • Same Types - Lists only those objects in the current scene that are of the same types as those selected in the 3d window. • Selected - Lists only the object(s) currently selected in the 3D window. You can select multiple objects by Shift RMB • Active - Lists only the last selected object.

19. Using the OOPS Schematic • Layout of the OOPS Schematic • In this view, the window has a clear background that, by default, shows the OOPS Schematic and a header: • Outliner Window in OOPS Schematic mode • OOPS: Schematic: The schematic picture • Menu: Menus with the basic functions: View, Select, and Block • Zoom: A zoom control that allows you to focus on a certain area of the schematic. • Display Select, Visible Select - A number of buttons that toggle what kinds of datablocks are displayed in the schematic. • Currently selected datablock: The name of the currently selected datablock. The datablock is also highlighted in the OOPS schematic.

20. Making sense of the OOPS Schematic • The schematic is a sort of map that shows the connections between datablocks. Each datablock is shown as a colored box. Boxes (datablocks) are connected by lines. Common types of connections between datablocks are: • Parents :One datablock, let's say an object called "TableTop", is held up by four other objects "leg.001", leg.002", etc. The TableTop would be the parent of each of the legs, so that as the table top moves, the legs move as well. In the schematic, four lines would be shown going from the TableTop to each of the Legs. • Material Use: Datablock can share the same material. In our Table example, the TableTop and each of the legs might share the same material, "Wood", so that they all look the same. In the schematic, there would be a box called "Wood" with five lines connecting it to each of the mesh datablocks TableTop, Leg.001, Leg.002, Leg.003 and Leg.004. • The schematic uses different colored boxes for each type of datablocks: green for scenes, grey for objects, taupe for text, sea green for materials, etc. to help you visually distinguish between types of datablocks.

21. The OOPS Schematic Header • View: Handy functions include switching between the schematic and outliner view. Also, you can change the size of the boxes, so more can fit in the window. • Select: Key functions include finding users and links between connected boxes • Block: Scales (S) the distance between multiple selected datablocks, and grabs/moves (G) an datablock or set of selected datablocks around the schematic - very useful for arranging and organizing your schematic.

22. Zoom controls • As you can imagine, depending on what you have selected and your scene complexity, these schematics can start looking like the piping diagram for a nuclear power plant. The schematic header provides two buttons to help you zoom in. • Hold down LMB over the button and move your mouse up and down (forward and backward) to zoom your view in and out. • Click on to start a border select. Select a region in the window, and your window view will be zoomed to that region. • The window, like any Blender window, can be panned by clicking the middle mouse button while your cursor is in the window, and moving the mouse.

23. Visible Select • The series of icons in the header allow you to select what type(s) of datablocks are visible in the schematic. They are, left to right: • Layers: Only show the datablocks from the shown layers. • Scenes - Your stage, a set, where action occurs. • Objects - Cameras, empties, and other misc items • Meshes - The main things you model, not to be confused with Objects. e.g. One Mesh can be used in multiple objects and is displayed accordingly in the schematic. • Curves, Surfaces, Fonts • Metaballs - Mathematically calculated meshes that can mush together. • Lattices - Deformation grids • Lamps - All types of lights. • Materials - Colors, paints. • Textures - Color maps or gradients used commonly in materials and other places. • Ipos - Actions, • Images - Imported pictures • group datablocks • Library datablocks

24. Datablocks • The base unit for any blender project is the datablock. It may be a simple image of a sphere floating over a plane or a full featured film. • Scene Datablock • Each "scene datablock" contains a scene. "Scene datablock" is the parent of the rest of the datablocks. • Object Datablock • Each "object datablock" has the properties of Scale, Location and Rotation and is the 'meeting place' for other datablock that define the other properties of that object when they are linked to it. • An object can be linked to other datablock that determine its nature: mesh, curve, camera, lamp or armature datablock are a few examples of such datablocks. Other datablocks, will define the material, the texture, the animation... for that object.

25. ObData Datablocks • These datablocks are such datablocks that are always connected to "Object datablock" in a way or another. • Curve Datablock • "Curve datablock" may contain NURBS curves or circles, Bezier curves or circles, or Text objects. It may also be linked to a "material datablock". • Camera Datablock • "Camera datablock" contains a camera. • Lattice Datablock • "Lattice datablock" contains a lattice. • Lamp Datablock • "Lamp datablock" contains a lamp.

26. Metaball Datablock • "Metaball datablock" contains a metaball. • Mesh Datablock • Each "mesh datablock" contains a mesh. "Mesh datablock" may contain link to one or more "material datablocks". • Material Datablock • "Material datablock" contains a material. It may contain links to "texture datablocks". • Note that "material datablocks" can be linked to "object datablock" instead if desired. You can set this in the "User Preferences" window below "Edit Methods". • Texture Datablock • "Texture datablock" contains a procedural or image texture.