All images from The Official Luxololgy modo Guide, Version 301 © Course Technology.

This month, VFXWorld continues excerpting a series from the Thomson Course Technology book The Official Luxology modo 301 Guide, which will give VFXWorld readers a chance to build, layer, model, animate, texture and render with modo. Skills are taught using projects that take the reader from simple modeling to complex tasks, taking advantage of various tools and options along the way.

So far what you've done is fairly straightforward. You've not modeled anything outrageous or award-winning. But what you have done is build in layers, which is a key operation for just about anything you do in modo. Each layer is part of an overall scene, and that means you'll need to reference the other layers to line things up for the final render. This section will quickly show you how to work with multiple layers as reference.

• With the Post-it Note object selected in the Items tab, your background object should be the original corkboard object. It most likely appears as a black outline. Instead, change it to a solid by first pressing the o key while your mouse hovers in the viewport.

• Pressing o calls up the viewport shading options. Toward the top of the panel is an option for Background Item. Change it from Wireframe to Same as Active Mesh.

• Now that background objects are solid shaded, you'll have an easier time aligning other objects in the scene. From the Items tab, select the Post-it Note mesh.

• Press y on the keyboard to select the Transform tool. Then click the various control handles to rotate and position the Post-it Note on the corkboard. Place it so that the top end (which would be the sticky part of the note) is touching the corkboard. Figure 2 shows a similar setup.

[Figure 2] Using the Transform tool is a great way to position objects