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Using the Maya Web View

You can now fit Digital-Tutors web site inside your Maya application. This lesson will show you how you can take advantage of the web browser built into Maya. (for Maya versions 6 and up). All of our training videos for Maya have been reformated to fit inside of the Maya Web Browser. We call this new addition to our site DT App View. Now you an take your learning one step further by watching our video tutorials directly inside of Maya.

Rated: with 1256 hits  Added on: Jul 06, 2006

Align and Snap Tools

This small addition to Maya's tool set has sped up the work flow of thousands of animators and modelers. We will show you how to use Maya's Snap and Align tools to quickly align, orient and snap multiple objects together. This video looks at the Snap and Align tools that can be used to very quickly align, orient, and snap together multiple objects of different sizes. This tool uses a very different manipulator and takes a little practice to get used to, but in no time, you'll realize the power of this awesome tool and it will be one you will use daily. Use this tool to orient multiple objects onto one object. This tool can also snap objects together Take a few objects and align them together

Rated: with 3148 hits  Added on: Jul 06, 2006

Annotate Node and Notes

When working with dozens of nodes, they can start to blur together. Using the Annotate Node and the Notes feature to help organize your scene will save tons of time when working on projects. This tutorial explores the Annotate Node and the how to use the notes feature to help keep your scenes organized and speed up production workflow. An annotate nodes adds a small piece of text and an arrow pointing to the object you added to the node. This is great because it can help you find your objects really fast. The notes feature of Maya is a great feature attached to every node in your scene. Take the time to note and modify the notes in your projects so you can easily find out about a scene or where the scene is in the production pipeline. An annotation node will display a piece of text which is aim constrained to the camera so it is always facing you. A very practical use for this could be connecting an annotation node to the pelvis node of your character or creature. Every node in Maya has a notes section in the Attribute editor. You don't need to do anything special to save the data in the notes area of the node. They are all saved when you save the scene.

Rated: with 780 hits  Added on: Jul 06, 2006

Using Incremental Save Feature

One of the most useful features of Maya is one of the most hidden features. We will show you how to use the incremental save feature to keep multiple copies of your work. This video will show you how to turn on Maya's incremental save feature to keep multiple copies of your work and to avoid saving over a working copy of your file. Often times when working, it is a good idea to keep multiple copies of your work to revert to if an error occurs in your file. Maya's incremental save feature is great for this purpose but is hidden and out of the way. Once turned on, you will be able to save time and effort when saving every step of your project. When saving your work for a project, it is a good practice to have multiple copies of your work so you can go back to any step and repair or modify your file. When using the incremental saves feature, be sure to set a reasonable limit on the number of copies to keep. Otherwise, you might run into the possibility of running out of disk space.

Rated: with 1033 hits  Added on: Jul 06, 2006

Managing / Creating Layers

This video covers how to use the layers feature to better organize your scenes in Maya. This includes creating new layers, assigning objects to layers, selecting all objects assigned to a layer, changing the wireframe color of objects assigned to layer and setting layers to template or reference mode. This is a fundamental video all new users of Maya should view: Remember when working with layers they are not in a stacking order. What I mean is if one layer is listed above another layer it will not appear to be above the layer in space. It is just a label or container for the object (s). You can just double click on the layer name to change the name or change the color of the wireframed objects in that layer. To add an object or set of nodes to a layer, just select the objects or nodes and right-click on the layer then choose add selected objects from the pop up menu. Templating the layer will turn the layer into a light gray wireframe display that has a setting that will not allow you to select the contents of the layer. Referencing is similar to templating but the difference is, instead of a wireframe display, you will see a shaded or textured display.

Rated: with 1248 hits  Added on: Jul 06, 2006

Advanced Heat Dynamics

This lesson will discuss using Maya Fluids to realistically simulate the heat dynamics of a combustible fluid.

Rated: with 2954 hits  Added on: Jul 06, 2006

Pin Constraint

This lesson will teach you how to use the pin constraint to create an object hanging from a character's necklace. We will also teach you how to create a collision object from a skinned character.

Rated: with 1946 hits  Added on: Jul 06, 2006

Creating Pressure Curves

You will learn how to create an interactive curve that represents your pressure settings. This visual representation of the pressure settings can be deformed using any of the normal deformers, which in turn will drive the attributes set in the pressure mapping settings.

Rated: with 1129 hits  Added on: Jul 06, 2006

Simulating Soft Surfaces

This lesson discusses how Maya Fluids can be used to simulate soft surfaces, like mud and snow, that other objects in your scene can interact with. In this lesson you will learn about: Using Height Fields in a 2D Fluid container The Difference between a Static and Dynamic grid Altering the look and feel of a 2D Fluid container to get a soft mud surface

Rated: with 2005 hits  Added on: Jul 06, 2006

Shatter Effect Overview

Using the shatter effect to break up the objects can save you lots of time. Instead of breaking apart an object by hand, you can automate the process with a built-in script. With certain shatter effects, you can set the shattered pieces to behave as dynamic objects like rigid bodies. However with this, you may run into interpenetration issues. In this lesson you will learn about: The Shatter Effect and its types: Surface, Solid and Crack Setting attributes for the different shatter types

Rated: with 7106 hits  Added on: Jul 06, 2006

Working with Goals

Using Goals is a common practice for shaping the particles. Think of the bees forming an arrow right before they swarm a person. We'll show you how to use goals and animate their properties. In this lesson you will learn about: Particles and using Goals with them Setting Goal weights to define which goal attracts particles the most Some dynamics settings such as Conserve Mass

Rated: with 1909 hits  Added on: Jul 06, 2006

Working with Soft Surfaces like Snow (part 1)

This lesson is one of the 3 lessons on creating snow. We will throw a snow ball to the ground and push it in the snow. This would be a similar technique for sand, mud or any other soft surface. In this video we will learn how to use dynamics in a scene by: Creating soft bodies Learning about the conserve mass attribute Using passive rigid body objects as a proxy

Rated: with 3442 hits  Added on: Jul 06, 2006

Working with Volume Emitters

Volume emitters can offer a number of advantages over the other types of emitters. Some of them are along with axis, around axis, and away from center. In this lesson you will learn about: Volume emitters and volume shapes Using the volume sweep to alter the volume shape Different Volume Speed Attributes

Rated: with 1361 hits  Added on: Jul 06, 2006

Maya 6 - New Particle features

This raygun lesson will teach you how to use the new particle features in Maya 6. The interactive playback and the ability to use non-linear deformers on particle systems has pushed the Maya particle engine into a whole new level. You can how use these powerful deformers to push and pull your particles into the shape you want. In this lesson we’ll discover some particle features such as: Altering particles with non-linear deformers Interactive playback of particles Shading of particles

Rated: with 1516 hits  Added on: Jul 06, 2006

Maya Hair - Re-using Collision Objects

When creating Hair Systems in Maya the collision sphere is a valuable tool to help you control your hair. But what happens when you need multiple sets of Hair Systems to interact with the same collision sphere? This video explains. One thing that can save you tons of time is to reuse the collision spheres in your Hair Systems. There isn't a menu option to do this but rather a direct connection. I am sure you could easily create a mel script to handle this for you but to make life easier you can watch this video for more details.

Rated: with 1539 hits  Added on: Jul 06, 2006

Working with Per Particle Attributes

This video will show you how to create ramps to control each particle, based on it's lifespan. Per Particle attributes let you define or use a unique property for each individual particle. With such attributes, it is possible to detect the position of each particle and even its collision information. In this lesson you will learn about: Per Particle Attributes and how to add some to your Particle Shape Driving particle colors using ramp values driven by particle age

Rated: with 1222 hits  Added on: Jul 06, 2006

Particle Collision Effects

Learn how to emit new particles when one particle collides with a surface. In this lesson you will learn about: Colliding particles with geometry objects Various collision factors like resilience and friction Creating Particle Collision events for consequential particle behavior

Rated: with 1773 hits  Added on: Jul 06, 2006

Rendering Hardware Particles

This video walks you through the process of setting up your hardware render globals. This is the process used to render particles that are not software rendered. In this lesson you will learn about: Hardware Rendering and the Hardware Render Globals Rendering images with the Hardware Render Buffer Multi-pass rendering

Rated: with 1901 hits  Added on: Jul 06, 2006

Fur Basics: Randomizing Fur Attributes

Learn how to alter each of the hairs so they are random in length, color, roll.. ok you get the point. Everything is randomizable. In this lesson you will learn about: Adjusting the noise amplitude and frequency of the Base Color to get different colored fur strands Adjusting the noise values of the length to get random fur length Fur is fun but remember, wearing animal fur in real life is so not cool.

Rated: with 1295 hits  Added on: Jul 06, 2006

Fur Basics: Shading the Fur and Shadows

Learn how to connect the fur description to the light so you can access the fur shading options in the light. In this lesson we will learn more about fur and how to: Shade fur and connect it Have various lights affect fur Use Shadow Maps with fur

Rated: with 1134 hits  Added on: Jul 06, 2006