Managing objects by grouping

The ability to group objects may not be something you are aware of when you start using Bryce but it can be very useful when working with a lot of objects in your scene.

Grouping objects will help manage multiple object editing - groups can be selected and moved or resized rather than having to select each individual objects. This is helpful if you have small or difficult to select objects. Groups can be ungrouped very easily, and each object in a group can still be edited individually if required by selecting the object as normal.

Groups can be renamed to anything you want, just like individual objects and can be organised by colour making it easy to differentiate and therefore select and use different groups in a scene. Here's how to do it:

1. Select the objects you want to group and click the 'G' from the object menu. This will group the object and give it a basic name which will appear in the selection list (accessed via the selection palette). To ungroup click the 'U' which will appear instead of 'G' in the menu.

Once the group is made you can change the name by clicking the 'A' from the object menu to access the object attributes and change it there.

2. Once your groups have been made you can organise them by colour by selecting the group and then clicking on the grey square from the object menu. Choose and apply a 'Family' colour fro the colour option window that will appear.

In my example I have chosen pink, so the square in the object menu is now that colour:

The wire frames for the groups will now also be coloured the family colour that has been applied. In the example below I have 3 groups, each with a different 'family' colour (pink, green, light blue).

The bounding box will also be displayed in the family colour chosen for other display modes (see the tutorial  Customising the Bryce Interface). In the example below I am using the Smooth Shaded display mode but you can see still the family colours.