You can use selection constraints to quickly select a group of components.
When the Modeling Toolkit power button is off, the selection constraints in the Modeling Toolkit do not filter your selection. The following options use propagation, expanding your selection to other components on the same mesh.
- Angle
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When on, moving your cursor over a mesh automatically highlights contiguous components that fall within the specified angle tolerance. Clicking a highlighted area selects it. Marquee selecting when the Angle selection constraint is on selects all of the components inside the marquee and expands the selection to all components outside of the marquee that are within the specified angle tolerance.
In Maya 2015 and earlier versions, selecting a single component automatically expands the selection to other components within the specified angle tolerance. If you marquee select multiple components, any components that are outside of the marquee, but are within the specified angle tolerance, are also selected.
Note: When faces are selected, the angle of each face normal is compared to determine if it falls within the specified angle tolerance. When edges or vertices are selected, the selection is first converted to its associated faces, and then the angle of each face normal is compared. - Border
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When on, moving your cursor over a mesh automatically highlights existing borders. Clicking a highlighted border selects it. If you make a marquee selection and it contains border components, all of the components inside the marquee are selected, and then the remaining border components outside the marquee are also selected. To filter non-border components from your marquee selection, turn on the Border selection constraint, and then open the Selection Constraint window (Select > Select Using Constraints) and set Constrain to All and Next and Location to OnBorder.
In Maya 2015 and earlier versions, selecting a single border component automatically expands the selection to other border lying components. If you make a marquee selection and it includes a border component, all non-border components are filtered from the selection and then the selection expands to other border lying components.
- Edge Loop
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When on, moving your cursor over a mesh automatically highlights edge loops. Clicking a highlighted edge loop selects it.
Marquee selecting when the Edge Loop selection constraint is on selects the edges inside the marquee and any associated edge loops. You can also add and remove edge loops while making a marquee selection (See Add and remove components from a selection.).
Note: The Edge Loop selection constraint is only available when Edge selection mode is on. - Edge Ring
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When on, moving your cursor over a mesh automatically highlights edge rings. Clicking a highlighted edge ring selects it.
Marquee selecting when the Edge Ring selection constraint is on selects the edges inside the marquee and any associated edge rings. You can also add and remove edge rings while making a marquee selection (See Add and remove components from a selection.).
Note: The Edge Ring selection constraint is only available when Edge selection mode is on. - Shell
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When on, moving your cursor over a mesh automatically highlights existing shells. Clicking a highlighted shell selects it. This option is useful for objects made from a series of individual pieces, like meshes that are created using Mesh > Combine.
In Maya 2015 and earlier versions, selecting a single component or marquee selecting multiple components expands the selection to all other components on the associated shell(s).