Art of illusion

Select Lighting > Use All Lights Hot key: 7.

This lights up the scene view only with lights you’ve created, not with default lighting. If you later

want to see the scene view with default lighting again, select Lighting

Use Default Lighting Hot key: 6.

When you render the scene, by default, Maya uses all lights you’ve created.

If you don’t create any lights, Maya creates a temporary default directional

light for you and then deletes it when the render is complete.

Shadows are the darkened areas that appear on a surface when an object gets

in the path of a light source. Shadows are cast onto the area of a surface that

doesn’t directly receive light. Shadows ground the objects in your scene and

aid in defining their three-dimensional appearance.