Activity 4: Change environment settings

In this activity you adjust the environment settings for the Render workspace by choosing the environment, changing the background color and turning on effects.

The environment settings control the lighting, background color, and visual effects in the Render workspace. In Fusion, an environment dome with an environment image map (called a high dynamic range image or HDRI) is attached to it constantly.

Before applying environmental settings (top) and after (bottom)

Prerequisites

• Ensure you have assigned different materials to the utility knife and the decal is added.
• Ensure you are in the Render Workspace.
• Ensure the Utility knife model is open.

Steps

1. Set the scene environment to Warm Light with a rotation of -50 degrees.

   1. Click Setup > Scene Settings.

   2. Click the Environment Library tab.

   3. Rotate the knife to approximately the position shown below.

      

   4. Double-click the following environments to make them the Current Environment to see how they are different.

      1. Cool Light
      2. Grid Light
      3. Rim Highlights
      4. Soft Light
      5. Sharp Highlights
      6. Warm Light

   5. Ensure Warm Light is the current environment.

   6. Click the Settings tab.

   7. Click the Position icon.

   8. Move the Rotation slider through its entire range. Notice how the reflections on the knife changes as the rotation changes.

      

   9. Set the Rotation to -50 degrees.

   10. Click the Position icon to close the position controls.

2. Set the background color to white.

   1. Ensure the Scene Settings dialog is open on the Settings tab.

   2. Ensure the Background field is set to Solid Color.

      

   3. Click the color swatch for the Color field to open the color selector.

   4. Set the color numbers to 255, 255, 255, to set the color to white, and click OK.

3. Turn on Ground Plane and Reflections to cast a shadow on the ground. When rendered, a shadow is cast on the ground when the ground plane is on.

   1. Ensure the Scene Settings dialog is open on the Settings tab.

   2. Click the arrow next to Ground to open the Ground section if necessary.

   3. Check the Ground Plane box.

   4. Check the Reflections box.

   5. Set the Roughness to 0.1.

      

   6. Click Close.

Activity 4 summary

In this activity, you modified the render workspace’s lighting, background color and visual effects.

Before applying environmental settings (top) and after (bottom)