Scene Quick Start & Tool Guide

Use Scene to sketch lighting, framing, equipment clearance, and performer blocking. Results are planning evidence: always read the visible confidence class before treating a value as measured.

Start Studio Scene Start Location Scene Back to Scene Register

FRAME 02 / CORE WORKFLOWINPUT → PLAN → EXPORT

Studio workflow

Start a Studio scene or a lighting preset.
Select the camera and set focal length, aperture, ISO, and framing.
Set room dimensions, performer position, and the primary camera view.
Add at least a key, fill/bounce, and rim or background light.
Add modifiers and grip such as a softbox, V-flat, flag, or negative fill.
Use Orbit and Top Plan to check clearance, aim, and stand placement.
Inspect confidence and analysis overlays, then save a version.
Export the lighting diagram, equipment manifest, still, or project bundle.

Single-photo Location workflow

Start Location (Photo) and open Calibrate Photo.
Import a location image and review available EXIF.
Confirm the horizon and floor.
Set one known real-world dimension.
Review the generated proxy and safe-camera limits.
Add the performer, camera, lights, and grip.
Keep inferred geometry and weak-relighting warnings visible.
Save and export a planning reference.

FRAME 03 / TOOL BREAKDOWNWHAT EACH CONTROL DOES

Hierarchy: Selects cameras, performers, lights, modifiers, grip, and environment objects. The selected object drives the inspector.
Camera View: Shows the active production camera framing.
Main Camera inspector: Controls the taking and still-export view, not merely the safe-frame box. Focal length and sensor gate change perspective framing; position and pitch/yaw/roll change viewpoint; aperture, shutter and ISO change preview exposure; focus distance updates depth-of-field telemetry; Safe Frame shows the selected output boundary.
Key Light inspector: Controls the primary illumination. CCT and tint change color; lux and dimmer change output; modifier and grid change emitter size, loss and beam; position, aim target and distance lock change direction and falloff. The photometric readout shows the resolved physical units after modifier, grid, dimmer and IES profile: luminous flux (lm), peak candela, lux at 1 m and at the aim target, beam angle and the emitter shape. A Relative light shows stop deltas only and never claims lux or candela.
IES Profile / Upload IES: Replaces the analytic beam cone with an LM-63 angular distribution. Built-in profiles (Fresnel spot, open-face reflector, softbox through grid, bare bulb) are own-authored and therefore ESTIMATED; an uploaded manufacturer file with [MANUFAC] and [TEST]/[TESTLAB] headers resolves to CALIBRATED. The upload is stored with the project and survives save/reload; a malformed file is rejected with the parser reason and the previous profile stays active. Both render tiers sample the same profile.
Emitter W × H: Overrides the modifier's emitter dimensions; the emitter shape (rect, disk, spot, sphere) follows the modifier and sizes the soft-shadow penumbra and the Tier 2 area sampling.
Contribution: Normal, Solo or Mute per light for analysis: any solo light mutes every other light; a muted light keeps its authored power and reports 0 lx at the target.
Grip inspector: Grip type (V-flat, bounce panel, solid flag, silk diffusion frame, net scrim), position, yaw, panel size, V-flat fold angle and per-side materials. Materials carry reflectance and transmission (white foamcore 85 %, black velvet 4 %, silver foil 92 % specular, 1-stop silk 50 % transmission, single net 71 %, solid flag opaque) and act as real occluders and bouncers in both render tiers; scrims and silks pass light stochastically in the path tracer.
+ Add Grip / Flag, Duplicate: Adds a solid flag near the subject; Duplicate (button, inspector button or Shift+D) copies the selected light, grip object or camera 0.4 m to the side with its modifier, aim, photometry and materials, then selects the copy.
Orbit: Moves around the scene for placement and clearance checks.
Top Plan: Shows the overhead lighting-diagram view.
Light POV: Looks from the selected light toward its aim target.
Move / Rotate / Scale: Selects the transform operation. Use G, R, or S to choose a mode, then use arrow keys and Page Up or Page Down. Scale applies to performers, grip, and light emitters; cameras report that scale is unavailable.
Focus: Centers the orbit target on the selected scene object. Shortcut: F.
IRE False Color: Displays exposure-analysis colors. Treat the result according to its confidence class.
Confidence: Colors scene geometry by calibrated, estimated, inferred, or unknown status.
Wireframe: Isolates the compiled proxy surfaces with a diagnostic grid. It is a planning aid, not native mesh-edge rendering.
Safe Frames: Shows the selected output aspect ratio inside the viewport.
Render Quality bar: Tier 1 fidelity toggles above the overlay bar. Contact adds screen-space contact shadows (hair, neck, feet, grip edges) on top of the per-light shadow maps; IBL replaces flat fill with an image-based studio ambient derived from the lights, so muting the key light removes it; SSGI adds screen-space bounce and occlusion on WebGPU and is badged unavailable on WebGL2; Denoise filters the Tier 2 result. Disabled toggles state why instead of silently doing nothing.
Evaluate (Tier 2): Starts the progressive path-traced evaluation of the current view (WGSL compute, 256 samples by default). Any drag or camera change pre-empts it and restarts after the 150 ms rest. The badge reports TRACING n/256 SPP, CONVERGED, OVER BUDGET or SERVER RENDER. The pass selector switches between beauty, direct-only, indirect-only, shadow-only, per-fixture (selected light) and performer-only; the same passes are exportable from Export Assets → Rendered Stills → Render Pass.
Server Render: Submits a quota-aware Fast Focus Pro compute job for the current pass when local compute is unavailable (WebGL2 fallback, no WebGPU compute) or when the projected time to the sample target exceeds the 60 s local budget. The job id and status appear in the badge and in Diagnostics.
Inspector: Provides exact photographic and physical values for the selected object.
Timeline / Variants: Stores A/B lighting states, motion frames, and wipe comparisons.
Save Version: Flushes current edits and creates a recoverable project snapshot.
Export Assets: Creates stills, diagrams, gear manifests, and portable .ffscene bundles.
Diagnostics: Shows the measured renderer backend and current runtime diagnostics. It must not be used as proof when the editor reports an error.

FRAME 04 / CONFIDENCE & RECOVERYREAD BEFORE EXPORT

Confidence labels

Calibrated: supported by explicit measurements or governed equipment data for the stated value.
Estimated: useful planning estimate with incomplete measurement evidence.
Relative: ratio or stop relationship without an absolute exposure claim.
Inferred / Unknown: reconstructed or missing information that requires caution.

Recovery checklist

If the viewport reports a startup error, reload once and read the persistent error message.
If WebGPU fails, Scene should identify the WebGL2 fallback rather than claiming WebGPU success.
If saving fails, keep the tab open; the status must remain Local Draft or Error until synchronization succeeds.
Use Save Version before major changes and export a project bundle for portable recovery.
For an interrupted Location upload, resume the existing capture session rather than creating a duplicate project.
Diagnostic URL switches for reproducible checks: ?renderer=webgl2 forces the fallback, ?shadows=off disables shadow maps, ?contact=off, ?ibl=off, ?ssgi=on, ?denoise=off preset the quality bar, ?compute=off forces the Tier 2 server-escalation path, ?tier2=on starts evaluation on load and ?trace_scale=0.25 lowers the Tier 2 internal resolution.
If Tier 2 never leaves TRACING 0/256, open Diagnostics: the Tier 2 row shows whether the device reports WebGPU compute and the last measured time per sample.