2009
Table Of Contents
- Contents
- Overview
- Maya Basics
- Polygonal Modeling
- Introduction
- Preparing for the lesson
- Lesson 1: Modeling a polygonal mesh
- Introduction
- Setting modeling preferences
- Using 2D reference images
- Creating a polygon primitive
- Modeling in shaded mode
- Model symmetry
- Selecting components by painting
- Selecting edge loops
- Editing components in the orthographic views
- Editing components in the perspective view
- Drawing a polygon
- Extruding polygon components
- Bridging between edges
- Adding polygons to a mesh
- Splitting polygon faces
- Terminating edge loops
- Deleting construction history
- Mirror copying a mesh
- Working with a smoothed mesh
- Creasing and hardening edges on a mesh
- Beyond the lesson
- NURBS Modeling
- Subdivision Surfaces
- Animation
- Introduction
- Preparing for the lessons
- Lesson 1: Keyframes and the Graph Editor
- Lesson 2: Set Driven Key
- Lesson 3: Path animation
- Lesson 4: Nonlinear animation with Trax
- Introduction
- Open the first scene for the lesson
- Creating clips with Trax
- Changing the position of clips with Trax
- Editing the animation of clips
- Reusing clips within Trax
- Soloing and muting tracks
- Scaling clips within Trax
- Open the second scene for the lesson
- Creating clips from motion capture data
- Extending the length of motion capture data
- Redirecting the motion within a clip
- Beyond the lesson
- Lesson 5: Inverse kinematics
- Introduction
- Open the scene for the lesson
- Understanding hierarchies
- Viewing hierarchies using the Hypergraph
- Creating a skeleton hierarchy
- Parenting a model into a skeleton hierarchy
- Applying IK to a skeleton hierarchy
- Creating a control object for an IK system
- Constraining an IK system
- Limiting the range of motion of an IK system
- Simplifying the display of a hierarchy
- Applying parent constraints on an IK system
- Planning an animation for an IK system
- Animating an IK system
- Beyond the lesson
- Character Setup
- Polygon Texturing
- Rendering
- Introduction
- Preparing for the lessons
- Lesson 1: Rendering a scene
- Introduction
- Open the scene for the lesson
- Creating shading materials for objects
- Refining shading materials for objects
- Maya renderers
- Rendering a single frame using IPR
- Rendering using the Maya software renderer
- Batch rendering a sequence of animation frames
- Viewing a sequence of rendered frames
- Beyond the lesson
- Lesson 2: Shading surfaces
- Lesson 3: Lights, shadows, and cameras
- Lesson 4: Global Illumination
- Lesson 5: Caustics
- Dynamics
- Painting
- Introduction
- Preparing for the lessons
- Lesson 1: Painting in 2D using Paint Effects
- Lesson 2: Painting in 3D using Paint Effects
- Introduction
- Preparing for the lessons
- Brushes and strokes
- Rendering Paint Effects strokes
- Paint Effects on 3D objects
- Creating a surface to paint on
- Painting on objects
- Using turbulence with brush stroke tubes
- Using additional preset brushes
- Mesh brushes
- Converting mesh strokes to polygons
- Modifying a converted polygonal mesh
- Beyond the lesson
- Lesson 3: Painting textures on surfaces
- Expressions
- Scripting in Maya
- Index
It takes a little practice to be able to predict exactly where a curve will be
positioned when you click CV positions with the CV Curve Tool. Once
you’ve learned the technique, you’ll be able to create and edit curves with
graceful symmetry. By default, you must click at least four points to create
a curve with the CV Curve Tool.
For some advanced operations in Maya, you need to know the meaning
of the start of a curve and the curve direction. The start of a curve is the first
CV you create when you draw the curve. It is indicated by a small hollow
box at the first CV, visible as you create the curve. Curve direction is
shown on the second CV after the start of the curve, indicated by a small
u icon as you create the curve.
Creating a revolve surface
With the Revolve surface tool, a curve is rotated about an axis to create a
surface. The user can define the axis of revolution.
To create a revolve surface
1 With the curve selected, select Surfaces > Revolve. This creates the egg
holder surface from the revolved profile curve. Examine the results in
the perspective view.
Maya does not delete the profile curve. In a subsequent step, you’ll edit
the profile curve to alter the shape of the surface.
2 Select the surface and rename it Eggholder in the Channel Box.
3 With the pointer in the perspective view, press 5 (for Shading > Smooth
Shade All).
This displays the egg holder as a shaded surface rather than a wireframe
in the perspective view.
Press 1, 2, and 3 to switch between the different degrees of display
smoothness. (These hotkeys correspond to the menu items under Display
> NURBS menu item (Rough/Medium/Fine).
The finer the smoothness, the greater the impact is on interactive
performance when you work with complex models.
The smoothness display only affects the scene view. Rendered images
display with high quality smoothness regardless of this setting.
Creating a revolve surface | 139