Cameras

Every Asset type comes with a default camera to display what is shown in the viewport.

Cameras can be added to a Scene by right-clicking in the Scene Hierarchy and selecting Add Camera, or by way of the Creation Panel Camera button.

Once added to a Scene, Transformations (Move and Rotate) may be used to position the Camera appropriately.

Cameras may also be imported from FBX files to either Scene or Model Assets.

Importing Vray Physical cameras is also possible through the import of vrscene files, but this option will only extract the camera information when choosing to import the vrscene as a Scene asset. See the VRay workflow for more information.

Camera Properties

Camera

Projection

Perspective (Default) -- Perspective cameras simulate object foreshortening; objects will appear bigger or smaller in size, depending on their distance from the camera.

Orthographic -- Orthographic projections shoot parallel rays from the camera. As a result, all objects appear the same in size, despite their distance from the lens. Orthographic projections come in handy for precise measurements when creating architectural and engineering renderings.

View Control

Field of View and Focal Length (mm) - control your camera's depth projection to simulate a realistic lens effect. Selection between Field of View and Focal Length changes the panel view. Selecting Field of View exposes a Field of View slider. Selecting Focal Length exposes Film Size and Focal Length (mm) Both parameters are dependent and work hand in hand. Increasing the Field of View value will automatically decrease the Focal Length value accordingly, and vice versa.

Viewport

Aspect Ratio

Controls the proportional relationship between width and height of your camera view. The most common Aspect Ratio for HD widescreen television is 1.78 (16:9). Older standard definition televisions use an Aspect Ratio of 1.33 (4:3), while a traditional cinema screen is 1.85:1.

Clipping

Every camera comes with two visibility clipping planes. One controls the visibility of objects closer to the camera (Near Clip), the other controls the visibility of objects farther away (Far Clip).

Acceptable order of Magnitude

Do not use a magnitude greater than 2 between near and far clipping planes. For example, if the near plane clips at 0.2, the maximum setting for the Far Clip should be 20.

Mode

Orbit This is the default mode of the Camera. Used in conjunction with Target Node, everything, including the background, orbits around the target.

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First Person In first-person mode, only the camera moves, the objects and environment remain static.

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Node (Turn - Table) In Turn Table Mode, the Target Node rotates on the x-axis while all other scene elements remain static. In the scene below, the bottom book has been set as the Target Node

Target Node

Regardless of Camera orientation, selecting any node from a scene will guarantee that the camera frames that node once the scene is loaded in the player.

Keep Player Changes

When setting up multiple cameras, it can be useful to take control of the camera in order to frame the shot effectively. If this boolean is set to true, whatever changes (zooming in/out, changing the cameras orientation, etc.) made while the artist is viewing through said camera will be retained. If set to false, the artist is free to view the scene via the camera, but its settings will be reset to the original settings, regardless of the actions taken by the artist while viewing the scene.

Display

Show Frustum

Setting this Boolean to true makes visible the Camera's frustum. This exposes a color picker to adjust the color of the Frustum as well as a Boolean to show the near and far clip of the camera.

Show Camera Frustum

Show Clipping

Displays the Near and Far clipping within the visible Frustum

Constraints

Longitude, Latitude, and Zoom Distance may all be constrained. Upon adding a camera to a scene, all constraints are disabled by default.

Below is the Scene with no constraints on the Camera, in default Orbit Mode.

Longitude

Setting Longitude to Enabled (World Space) allows for setting minimum and maximum values for longitudinal rotation of the camera

Latitude

Setting Latitude to Enabled (World Space) allows for setting minimum and maximum values for latitudinal rotation of the camera

Zoom Distance

Setting Zoom Distance to Enabled (Relative Distance) allows for setting the Minumum and Maximum Distance Offsets.

Properties

Selectable When set to true, the camera is selectable within the scene. When set to false, it is not selectable within the scene.

Visible When set to true, the selected camera is visible within the scene. When set to false the camera is not visible within the scene.

Switching Cameras

Switching Viewport Camera

While in Editor Mode, for scenes with multiple cameras, the Camera button in the Viewport may be used to switch between cameras.

Switching Viewport Cameras

Please note that once the viewport camera has been set to a custom camera, any changes made by your viewport navigation using the mouse and keyboard shortcuts will apply to that camera's transform. There is no way to lock the camera in place and not allow it to be transformed in the viewport.

Switching Player Camera

To switch between cameras in the player you must use the set active camera action inside a scene asset.

In order to switch to a camera that exists inside a nested asset, this can only be accomplished using a custom script action inside a scene. Here's the snippet of code you could use for this purpose:

// Search for a specific camera node in the hierarchy, and set it as the active camera
api.evaluate().then(() => {
    const camNode = api.scene.findNode({hierarchical: true, from: api.instanceId, type: 'Camera', name: 'MyCustomCamera'});
    if (camNode) { api.setActiveCamera(camNode); }
})

Make sure to change the MyCustomCamera name to your own camera's name. Alternatively, you can also use a regex expression to search for Camera node names that match a specific pattern, such as the Camera node whose name starts with Front_. In this case, simply change the 'MyCustomCamera' entry with /^Front_/.

For more detailed reference of the JavaScript API available for this purpose, please visit the developer documentation here.