Introducing Autodesk Maya 2015

Dariush Derakhshani is an award–winning visual effects and CG supervisor, author, and educator. He has worked on movies such as RED and Pan s Labyrinth, TV shows such as Game of Thrones, Falling Skies, and South Park, as well as countless commercials and music videos. He teaches story and 3D animation, and is the author all the Introducing Maya books, as well as coauthor of the Autodesk 3ds Max Essentials series of books.

Introduction xvii
Chapter 1 Introduction to Computer Graphics and 3D 1


A Preview of the CG Process 2


The CG Production Workflow 2


Digital Images 4


Summary 8


Chapter 2 Jumping into Basic Animation Headfirst 9


You Put the U in User Interface 10


Project: The Solar System 14


Creating a Project 15


The Production Process: Creating and Animating the Objects 17


Hierarchy and Maya Object Structure 28


The Solar System, Resumed 30


Outputting Your Work: Playblasting 37


Summary 38


Chapter 3 The Autodesk® Maya® 2015 Interface 39


Navigating in Maya 40


Exploring the Maya Layout 40


Building a Decorative Box 50


Mapping the Box s Reference Planes with Hypershade 53


Organizing Workflow with the Layer Editor 57


Modeling the Decorative Box 58


Editing the Decorative Box Model Using the Shelf 63


Continuing the Decorative Box Model 67


Finishing the Decorative Box Model 71


Summary 78


Chapter 4 Beginning Polygonal Modeling 79


Planning Your Model 80


Polygon Basics 82


Poly Editing Tools 84


Putting the Tools to Use: Making a Cartoon Hand 93


Creating Areas of Detail on a Poly Mesh 101


Modeling a Catapult 115


Summary 142


Chapter 5 Modeling with NURBS Surfaces and Deformers 143


NURBS for Organic Curves 144


Using NURBS Surfacing to Create Polygons 151


Converting a NURBS Model to Polygons 153


Using Artisan to Sculpt NURBS 154


Creating a Pair of Glass Candle Holders 154


Modeling with Simple Deformers 161


The Lattice Deformer 166


Animating Through a Lattice 170


Summary 174


Chapter 6 Practical Experience! 175


Evaluating the Toy Plane 176


Building the Landing Pontoons 178


Oh, What a Body! Modeling the Body of the Plane 194


The Rear Stabilizers 198


You Spin Me Right Round The Engine and Propeller 201


The Plane s Wings 206


Assembling the Plane 215


Summary 217


Chapter 7 Autodesk® Maya® Shading and Texturing 219


Maya Shading 220


Shader Types 220


Shader Attributes 223


Shading and Texturing the Toy Plane 227


Textures and Surfaces 232


Textures and UVs for the Red Wagon 240


Photo–Real Mapping: The Decorative Box 274


Toon Shading 291


For Further Study 294


Summary 294


Chapter 8 Introduction to Animation 295


Keyframe Animation: Bouncing a Ball 296


Throwing an Axe 307


Replacing an Object 318


Animating Flying Text 320


Animating the Catapult 324


Summary 329


Chapter 9 More Animation! 331


Skeletons and Kinematics 332


Skeletons: The Hand 348


Inverse Kinematics 362


Basic Relationships: Constraints 366


Basic Relationships: Set–Driven Keys 371


Rigging the Locomotive 375


Creating a Simple Character Rig 382


For Further Study 391


Summary 391


Chapter 10 Autodesk® Maya® Lighting 393


Basic Lighting Concepts 394


Maya Lights 398


Light Linking 405


Adding Shadows 407


Raytracing Soft Shadows 411


mental ray Lighting 412


mental ray Physical Sun and Sky 414


Lighting Effects 418


Assembling and Lighting a Scene 422


Further Lighting Practice 430


Tips for Using and Animating Lights 430


Summary 432


Chapter 11 Autodesk® Maya® Rendering 433


Rendering Setup 434


Previewing Your Render: The Render View Window 443


Setting the Default Renderer 445


Reflections and Refractions 446


Using Cameras 448


Motion Blur 456


Batch Rendering 456


Rendering the Wine Bottle 458


mental ray for Maya 461


Render Layers 467


Final Gather 478


Ambient Occlusion 482


HDRI 490


Displacement Mapping the Decorative Box 493


Rendering the Scene with mental ray 504


Summary 516


Chapter 12 Autodesk® Maya® Dynamics and Effects 517


An Overview of Dynamics and Maya Nucleus 518


Rigid Bodies 518


Rigid Body Dynamics: Shoot the Catapult! 522


nParticle Dynamics 530


Emitting nParticles 530


Animating a Particle Effect: Locomotive Steam 538


Introduction to Paint Effects 547


Getting Started with nCloth 551


Customizing Maya 557


Summary 561


Where Do You Go from Here? 562


Index 563