Step 2. Scene Assembly- Reference Manipulation:

Once your Mesh library is complete, it is time to begin the assembly of the main environment.

There are several components to the Reference Section (section 2).

1. The selection list. This is an interactive list of all referenced objects in a scene. Click on one or more entries in the list to select the actual reference in the scene.
2. The Select All Button (The topmost button in section two, with an arrow and selection marquee) This selects ALL references in a scene.
3. The Select Copies Button. (the second button from the top) This button selects all references of the same file that you selected. That is to say, if you select a rock (which references rock_unlit.ma) this button will select all the references to rock_unlit.ma in the scene.
4. The add reference button (the button with an addition sign). This references a file from your mesh folder and places it into the scene.
5. The Duplicate Reference button (with two Rs back to back). This introduces a new reference of the same object that is currently selected.
6. The Kill Reference button (with the international “no” sign). This removes all selected references from the scene.
7. The Refresh List button (with a pair of curved arrows). This button re-iterates the selection list.

Once your Geometry Library has all the meshes required to create your scene, It is time to start assembling them into a coherent whole.

Workflow:

1. Start a new, empty maya scene. Open Candela, if it isn’t already, and click on the Add Reference button.
2. Select the mesh you wish to reference, and place it in your scene. If you need more than one copy of your mesh, use the duplicate button (The new reference will appear at the origin).
3. Continue to Add, duplicate and position the references, using either the selection list or the mouse to pick references, until all the geometry is assembled.
   
   Lighting Notes.
   
   Light the assembly scene with standard, non-ambient lights; point, spot, and area lights work the best. Note that just as with rendering a frame, the more lights you add to the scene, the slower the render will be. Set the Render Globals to suit your needs: Most of the standard Mental Ray options are available to Candela. Final Gathering and Global Illumination settings apply to baked lightmaps just as much as to a standard render. Ray-traced shadows are also available and adjustable to a Candela scene.
   

Candela is copyleft 2009 under the GPL v.1. Developed by Jack Turner.