In FBX, a scene is a container for all the meshes, NURBS, cameras, lights and other scene elements that make up a 3D scene.

Each element in the scene is called a node. The data structure used to organize all the nodes in a 3D scene is commonly called the scene graph. In FBX, the scene graph is specifically a tree:

• The root node of the scene graph has no parent.
• Every other node in the scene graph has exactly one parent.
• Every node can have zero, one, or many children.

Here is a diagram showing an extremely simple scene containing a camera, a light, a ball, a hoop, and a stick figure of a basketball player:

Notes on FBX scenes:

• An FBX application must have a root node. But the root node is never saved in an FBX file. Accordingly, do not use the root node to represent anything “real” in the scene that you may want to save in a file.
• The scene object points to the root node of the scene. Each node, including the root node, points to its children. Accordingly, with the scene object as a starting point, you can traverse the entire tree.
• An FBX application can have more than one scene. But an FBX file can store only one scene.