Datasheet

Chapter 1 Customization and MEL Scripting

It’s possible to adapt the MEL script of a tube brush, although it’s a bit more tricky. As an

example, the first line of the

willow.mel brush, found in the trees brush folder, looks like this:

brushPresetSetup();bPset “time” 1;

bPset “globalScale” 0.3186736972;

bPset “depth” 1; bPset “modifyDepth” 1;...

This is only a small portion of the first line. If printed out in full, it would fill an entire

page. Fortunately, you can decipher it. Each item in quotes, such as

“depth”, is an attribute.

The number after the attribute is the attribute setting. Each attribute corresponds with an

attribute in the Paint Effects Attribute Editor tab. For example,

“depth” corresponds to the

Depth check box in the Channels section. Digging deeper,

“color1G” corresponds to the Color G

channel of the Color1 attribute in the Shading section. The following number, 0.6470588446,

is the color value written for the 0-to-1 color range. As a third example,

“flowers” corre-

sponds to the Flowers check box in the Growth section. A 0 after

“flowers” signifies that

Flowers is unchecked.

Obviously, you would not want to write a tube brush from scratch. However, it’s fairly

easy to copy an existing brush and adapt it. If you’re not sure what each attribute does, a

detailed list can be found in the “brush node” Maya help file.

Creating Notes for Your Fellow Animators

Communication is important to professional animators, so there are a number of techniques

available for making notes within Maya.

Every single node that can be loaded in the Attribute Editor has a Notes section. Any-

thing you type into these sections is saved with the Maya scene file. On occasion, Maya uses

these areas to add documentation notes that have

not been included in the regular Maya help files.

For example, the Make Motor Boats tool adds such

a note.

You can create a 3D note by selecting an object,

choosing Create

➔ Annotation, and entering text

into the Annotate Node window. The text appears

in all the workspace views with an arrow pointing

to the object’s pivot point.

The Notes area for the Make Motor

Boats tool

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