Blocking the scene was for this step: capture what the camera sees and take it back to the canvas as a reference image. DOTV's Previz has three ways to shoot — one frame of the current view, one at each of four angles around the point you're looking at, or a tight ring of twelve — and the captures go straight onto the canvas, ready to be wired into an image node. This section covers the three ways, where the captures land, and what makes it into the frame and what doesn't.
The three buttons at the bottom of the toolbar differ in how many frames they take, top to bottom.
| Which one | What you get | When to use it |
|---|---|---|
| Capture this view | The one frame you are looking at | The composition is settled and this angle is the one you want |
| Capture 4 angles | An even ring around the point you're looking at, one frame at each of four angles | One scene, a few camera positions to choose between |
| Capture 12 angles | The same ring, packed to twelve frames | Multiple angles on one character or one prop for reference |
The two ring captures only change the horizontal angle — the elevation and the distance stay as your current view has them — so none of the twelve come back pointed at the sky or the floor. For a ring that is higher or further out, set the view first, then press.
Captures live in the cloud, not on this machine. Open the same project from another device and the images are still in the camera panel.
Captures go straight onto the canvas, one image node each (the two ring shots arrive together as one storyboard grid). With an active camera (the one whose panel button reads Active), a copy is also kept in the camera panel, so you can place it again from there later.
Two buttons sit at the bottom right of every image:
The two buttons at the top handle the whole set: Add all to canvas (everything this camera shot goes over) and clear.
A capture is not quite what you see in the viewport, and the differences are deliberate:
| In the viewport | In the capture |
|---|---|
| The lines of the grid floor | Not included |
| Camera models, transform gizmos, the axes | Not included |
| The name label over a character's head | Included — turn it off under Toggles in the scene panel if you do not want it |
| The dimmed band outside the aspect frame | Not included; the image is cropped to what is inside the frame (see 8.3) |
| Hidden objects (eye closed in the scene tree) | Not included |
So for a clean reference image, check two things before you press capture: that the aspect is right, and whether the character labels are off.