Maya Tutorials

Each video in this course is a self-contained lesson centering on one of the commands found in the Constrain menu in Maya. This means that these lessons can be viewed in any order you wish, allowing you to jump straight to the content that is most relevant to you. Over the course of these lessons, we'll take a detailed look at each of the Constrain commands and how each of them can be used to speed up our workflow.

Film and commercial projects often require very high-resolution, highly detailed vehicle models. However, these models are not appropriate for games or other real-time applications because of the large number of polygons. So in order to be able to rig, animate, or integrate these models into a game engine, we first have to convert the model to a much lower resolution. Using a motorcycle as our example, we'll use Maya to reduce the resolution of many of the pieces. We'll then use TopoGun to create new topology for the very detailed meshes like the engine or radiator. We'll cover methods for baking normal and color maps from within Maya as well as in TopoGun. These techniques will allow us to create a much lower resolution model that is visually very close to its higher-resolution counterpart. Once we're done, you'll have a good grasp of several of the tools we can use to create game-resolution vehicle models and you'll have the knowledge you need to apply those techniques to your own models. If you're interested in building the high resolution motorcycle from start to finish, please check out the Motorcycle Modeling Techniques in Maya course which will take you through that process.

We'll first explore the planning phase of this project, and then dive right in and built the performance from start to finish, learning skills that can be applied to any character. We'll also create very simple but useful mel scripts to select controls faster, discuss the benefit of choosing suitable rotation orders for control objects, and learn ways to overcome gimbal lock interpolations. By the end of this tutorial, you will have attained the set of skills needed to animate fun and believable character interactions.

From a reference picture to the finished shader, these videos will show how to choose the shading models and surface parametrizations to use. We will go over the math and physics involved and how to derive a shader implementation. We will address the issues caused by using raytracing as well as animation whithin the shader and support for use of the shader with Maya's particle system.

We will begin the tutorial by learning how to set up a realistic outdoor illumination source, and how to simulate physically-accurate light behavior within our scene. We will then discuss the importance of incorporating a proper linear workflow into our pipeline, which includes using gamma-correction on our textures and materials within Maya. We will also see how we can use a post application like Photoshop to add some finishing touches to our final render with a minimal amount of effort. By the time you complete this course, you will be much better prepared to overcome many of the common challenges faces when rendering an outdoor environment in Maya.

We will begin these lessons with the final result from the Creative Development: Modeling a Cowgirl Character in Maya and Silo with Antony Ward tutorial. We will continue on with our cowgirl character and take her to the next level. By adding color, light and texture we will bring her to life all while sharing some essential time-saving tips. Starting in Maya, we will explore how to light the scene before we apply and adjust a series of shaders to add a splash of color. We will then output the various render passes we need to move into Photoshop and enhance the overall image. Finally, we will work in some finer details as we apply layers of texture before we complete her look by painting in her hair and adding a background. By the end of this tutorial you will have a good understanding of lighting and rendering in Maya, along with working with render passes and image-based lighting. You will also be confident in taking a render into Photoshop to enhance its look without the use of UVs or complex shaders.

Throughout these lessons we will be learning some of the MEL commands needed to add HIK to a character rigging pipeline. Along the way we will look at some of the limitations with the HumanIK toolset and how we can work around them. By the end of the this tutorial, you will comfortable with HIK whether you are an animator with no rigging experience or a TD looking to add HIK to your rigging pipeline.

Throughout these lessons we will focus on creating a polished image of a cartoon nature. Doing still images for your personal portfolio is important because this builds a library of techniques that can be used later for production. By the end of this tutorial we will have gone through all the steps required to learn the importance of each part so that our image is appealing in the end.

We will start by referencing our game document, which will be our guide through the process of creating our Unity game. We can find information on the look of our models but also on the desired resolutions of the models and textures. We will concentrate on creating game topology for our two characters and two weapon models. We will also cover map generation and texture painting as part of the process. In the end we will have models ready to be rigged and animated or plugged directly into the game engine. We will use a variety of software packages from Maya, to TopoGun, to ZBrush and Mudbox in order to prepare our assets so there will be a lot of back and forth. This course references some pre-made assets and covers methods for modifying and prepping those assets for this particular game. In most of these cases, if you'd like to learn to build these assets from start to finish, there is a tutorial that will fill your need. For instance, in this course we look at the steps we went through to modify the biker character from Creating High Resolution Characters in ZBrush 4 and Creating Game Characters with Maya 2011 and ZBrush 4. So if you'd like to build the character from scratch, those two courses will take you through the process. The same goes for the enemy tick creature, which is from the Introduction the Mudbox 2011, and the assault rifle from Creating Next-Gen Game Assets in Maya.

We'll start by taking a look into our rigging process. We'll learn about bone and influence limits that we should adhere to. We'll learn techniques for creating rigs with a sufficient amount of control, despite our limitations. We'll cover repurposing and optimizing control rigs to work more efficiently. In the end, we will have given the animator a very flexible rig with more than enough control to successful create appealing performances in the characters they've been tasked with. In animation, we'll learn some neat animation tricks and techniques to bring your game assets to life in an fun away; techniques that consist of: reversing an animated sequence, avoiding weightlessness, and tricks for animating a crawling creature with several legs. By the end of this course, you'll have a greater understanding of tools and techniques you can use to create exciting game animations; animations that can then be then handed off to programmers to start polishing the game's functionality.

In this course we will examine the process of creating the game level for our Unity mobile project. We will start by referencing our game document, which will give us a great deal of information, not only on the look of our models, but also on more technical aspects like geometry and texture resolutions. We'll talk about basic modeling techniques for creating the different parts of our game level and we'll concentrate on creating portions of the level that can be seamlessly tiled. We'll go over how we can break down our reference art and where we can add unique details to break up the repeating geometry. We'll finish by talking about methods for making sure all of the pieces match up properly and are saved out for uv and texture work. This course goes over the process for creating our game level and the thoughts behind the decisions but it is not a step-by-step modeling tutorial. If you'd like to get up to speed on modeling in Maya, I'd recommend the Introduction to Modeling in Maya which goes over the tools we use here in greater detail. If you want a more step-by-step look at game-type environments in general, try Creating Low Resolution Environments in Maya and Photoshop.

Throughout the tutorial you will learn techniques for re-purposing rigs to save time in your character setup pipeline. We'll start by merging a completed rig into our character's scene. At that point, we will start modifying the rig to match the proportions of our character. Moving on from there, we will then add controls that are necessary to accommodate any new accessories that require controls. We'll also learn techniques for rigging hair and belts, and use Mel scripts, to help us to cut time on repetitive tasks. By the end of this tutorial, you'll learn how to reuse your own rigged assets, to, in the end, be more productive to your team.

Throughout the tutorial, we'll cover all of the hidden details that are needed to use HDR imagery for lighting in Maya. We'll start with physically based lighting, world scene scale, color management, proper render preview and verification of valid floating point linear color images. Once the rules for using HDR images are clearly laid out, we will take a look at how you can create your own HDR images at home using a DSLR camera, tripod, nodal head and software. Lastly, we'll go over examples of using and editing these images for a variety of indoor and outdoor lighting situations as well as covering light extraction and making HDR kooks from an HDR photo of a light.

We will start the training by taking a look at our game development document as well as the artwork that we have. These will give us a better idea of the technical aspects of our models and their look. We'll talk about building the geometry and creating texture maps for pieces of our level like old oil drums, boards and lights. We'll also cover workflows between Maya and Mudbox for modeling, sculpting, and painting bits of organic debris to illustrate the enemy infestation. We'll finish up by talking about dressing the set temporarily in Maya as a guide for the final dressing in Unity. This course goes over the process for creating props and set dressing and the thoughts behind the decisions but it is not a step-by-step tutorial. If you'd like to get up to speed on modeling in Maya, I'd recommend Introduction to Modeling in Maya which goes over the tools we use here in greater detail. If you want a more step-by-step look at creating assets in Mudbox, we have a variety of training available, including Introduction to Mudbox 2012 which will get you started very quickly. So over the next hour and a half or so, we'll talk about creating the pieces necessary to dress our set and give it a realistic, aged and worn look.

We'll start by learning how Maya's Trax Editor can be used to retarget animation. We'll then take another approach and utilize MEL to accomplish the same thing. Finally, we'll work with Maya's intuitive Human IK toolset to retarget from a performance-captured animation to a custom skeleton. We'll also cover techniques for optimizing and correcting animation after it has been remapped. By the end of this set of tutorials, you will be familiar with several tools you have at your disposal for re-purposing animation, to, ultimately, save production time.

We will start by talking about some steps for starting your UV layout process as well as some important concepts that you should keep in mind whenever preparing your UVs and your textures for use inside of Unity. We will talk about the importance of hiding UV seams on your geometry, planning texture layouts on your objects to maximize efficiency, you will learn UV layout and geometry modification tricks that can dramatically enhance the use of your UV texture space, and we will spend time in Photoshop learning how the textures in our level were created.

This series takes an in-depth look into Maya's Animate menu set.

We will begin with an explanation of the linear workflow process, and help to clarify exactly why a linear workflow is needed is order to get lighting results that are much more realistic. From there, we will learn the various steps for setting up a linear workflow in Maya, including the use of Maya's Color Management features, gamma-correcting images and textures to be rendered and displayed correctly, maintaining a proper linear workflow during the compositing phase, and many additional tips and techniques that will help you get much more realistic lighting results with significantly less effort.

Throughout these lessons we'll delve into the animated growth of a tree branch as a time-lapse video. We'll learn everything from modeling, texturing and shading to the animation and final compositing. By the end of this tutorial, you'll have a better understanding of how you can employ efficient and productive techniques for a time-lapse video that can be used when up against a tight deadline.

We will be introduced to a few tools and techniques to create photorealistic material that is suitable for commercial design projects. By the end of this tutorial, we will have touched on modeling, lighting, shading, animation, scripting and rendering for efficiency and quality.

Throughout these lessons we will explore the use of subdivision surfaces to help us quickly create a stylized cowgirl character. We will begin with a base mesh before posing her and adding clothing and detail. The result will be a highly detailed model ready for textures and rendering that can be used in an illustration or even animation. Although we will primarily be using Silo throughout the tutorial, the techniques taught in these lessons can be followed along using any subdivision surfaces software.

Sculpting applications like ZBrush are great for creating extremely detailed models, complete with surface texture and color. But to be able to rig, animate, or integrate these models into a game engine, we first have to convert the model to a much lower resolution. TopoGun is a great tool for taking our detailed meshes and allowing us to very intuitively redraw this new topology. In addition, it will allow us to project all of the mesh's detail onto maps. In this way we can use a lower resolution version of the model, while it still appears very detailed. We will start the tutorial by preparing and exporting our dense meshes from ZBrush and then bring those into TopoGun as references. We'll use several tools in TopoGun to literally draw new base geometry right onto the high resolution meshes. We'll look at several of the tools available and how we can manipulate and change topology once it's been created. Once the topology is done, we'll create UVs for the new pieces and then generate maps for the detail and color information. Once we're done with the tutorial you'll have created your own game-type character from a very dense sculpt and you'll have the knowledge you need to repeat the process on your own creations.

This tutorial will go through all of the steps of the process of making a polished image of a creature character. We will learn the importance of each part to ensure that our image is appealing in the end.

Over the series of tutorials, we will use Maya's very robust and intuitive muscle system improve the overall realism of an animated character. We will start with an animated rig that has some major deformation problems that will need to be addressed. From there, we will start to strategically build an efficient muscle rig that will preserve volume in critical areas that are prone to collapse, like the shoulders and forearms. We'll learn how to customize Maya muscle shapes and follow-through effects to create the illusion of weight and realism! We'll also cover integrating blend shapes with Maya Muscle and file referencing to work smarter, not harder. By the end of this tutorial, you will be equipped with the knowledge you need to incorporate Maya Muscle into your own rigging pipeline.

Each video in this tutorial is a self-contained lesson centering on one of the commands found in the Create UVs menu in Maya. This means that these lessons can be viewed in any order you wish, allowing you to jump straight to the content that is most relevant to you. Over the course of these lessons, we'll take a detailed look at each of the Create UVs commands and how each of them can be used to speed up our workflow.

Throughout this detailed tutorial, we'll leverage the power of ZBrush and Maya to build a strong female hero character from start to finish. We'll use Zspheres to block in the rough shape of our model and then send our geometry over to Maya using the one-click GoZ functionality. In Maya, we can recreate the topology of any of our pieces, we can create new geometry to send back to ZBrush, or modify existing geometry. We'll be going back and forth quite a bit in order to use the tools most appropriate for building the character's clothing and accessories. In addition to the modeling tools in Maya, we'll also use many of ZBrush's built in modeling functions including Shadowbox, mesh extraction, and the topology tools. Once we're done, we'll have a finished high-resolution character that can be painted or prepared for rigging, and you'll have the knowledge to repeat the process on your own character.

The topology or edge flow of our models is an important consideration for many reasons. Over the course of the these lessons, we'll look at how topology can affect the shape of our models. We'll looks at ways of finding and cleaning up n-gons and triangles. We'll also talk about how the topology affects smoothing and edges of our models, and how much animation and deformation depends on good topology. Many of the lessons in this tutorial were created to address specific issues students have had in dealing with the topology of their models, so hopefully you'll be able to pick up a few tips to add to your Modeler's Toolbox.

In this Maya tutorial, Boston based artist Farley Chery will lead the viewer the unusual yet intuitive technique of multi-mesh skinning, a process created in his last production. The entire rigging process can be long and arduous, so great work flow is essential to speeding up the process. Multi-Mesh is an unorthodox method which allows the user to use the best possible initial settings throughout the body and blending them into a a seamless mesh. This eccentric approach allows for skinning most body parts in seconds and problem areas such as the clavicle and shoulder regions in minutes. The artist will show some of his best techniques in efficiency and troubleshooting into this amazing tutorial.

We will begin this tutorial with the simulation of our RealFlow assets, and discuss some important RealFlow settings to keep in mind as we prepare our assets to be used within Maya. Once we bring our RealFlow assets into Maya, we will explore topics that include setting up shaders and materials for realistic water, controlling the rendered appearance of RealFlow splash particles, rendering Hybrido foam and whitecaps in Maya, incorporating mist into our renders, and we will learn how all of these things can be accomplished without having to rely on the RealFlow RenderKit for Maya. By the time you complete this tutorial, you will have a better understanding of how to render your own Hybrido simulations using Maya.

While this series of tutorials is not a step-by-step guide, they instead offer an in-depth look at the key aspects of production that goes into creating realistic-looking shots that would otherwise be difficult to shoot without the aid of computer graphics. These tutorials will cover everything from the concept sketches and visualization to modeling, texturing, rigging, animation, rendering and final compositing of the photorealistic shots. While the tools used in this series of tutorials are primarily Maya and modo, the techniques discussed are easily applicable to other mainstream applications.

We'll start the process by setting up reference images so our results match more closely. We'll look at how to start blocking in the main elements of our android model. We'll explore methods for cutting geometry apart to use as the various pieces. We'll use smoothing methods to get nice contoured shapes and learn a few ways to create hard, beveled edges to get a machined look. We'll use polygon geometry for the most part, but we'll also use NURBS for a few specific pieces. By the end of this Maya tutorial, you'll have a completed android model that you built from scratch, but more importantly, you'll be familiar with the tools and techniques used so you can apply them to your own projects.

Throughout the tutorial we’ll focus on setting our creature up with creative and intuitive controls. We'll learn how to set up Mel scripts to cut down time on repetitive tasks. We'll learn how to create a proficient vertebrae rig. We'll create an automated overlapping tail system that can be blended into an FK control rig. We’ll also explore skinning techniques to reduce the time it takes to edit weights. By the end of this Maya tutorial, you’ll have the knowledge you need to create your own aquatic creature rigs, with techniques that can be used on a wide variety of creatures and characters.

We're going to be covering many topics, such as why we break Maya scenes into layers, getting the most information out of Maya for high dynamic range composites and how to process EXRs for much faster interaction in NUKE. From there we'll examine some render pass and layer workflows that will eliminate errors and give us much more flexibility in NUKE. Finally we'll jump completely into NUKE and look at some compositing techniques for CG renders and finally unravel the proper premultiply workflow.

In this series of tutorials, our objectives include understanding a character's emotions and thoughts through their eye patterns. We'll cover techniques and workflows for animating believable eye jitters and eye darts. We'll dissect various eye animations and discuss WHY they move a certain way. Overall, we'll learn how to animate the eyes and brows to feel organic and life-like.

These video lessons will introduce a compositing workflow that emphasizes efficiency. We'll look at a variety of color correction methods, depth and height-based haze, and faked camera effects such as depth of field and motion blur. Throughout, we'll develop a visual style for our comp that will be easy to replicate and re-use for later shots.

Mudbox and Maya are very complementary packages. Maya gives us the ability to build up our models, rig and animate them, and render them. But Mudbox allows us to use a much more artistic approach to shaping and sculpting our models. It also allows us to paint textures very quickly and with a lot of power. By leveraging these two applications together, we can really create a solid workflow. In this tutorial we'll look at ways to get geometry and textures back and forth between Maya and Mudbox. We'll talk about new "Send to" features that make this process even easier. We'll also cover some of the practical scenarios you may encounter when working with these two applications. In the end, you'll have a good understanding of the great advantages you can get by using Maya and Mudbox in tandem.