Wiley Learning Autodesk Maya 2010: Foundation
Contents
1. Edit Project window e Click the Accept button when done 3 Make anew scene Select File gt New Scene This will create a new scene in the current directory when you save it Build the environment Every scene you create in Maya software will most likely contain objects such as surfaces deformers skeleton joints or particle emitters For this scene you will build a throne room but first you will need a large outdoor environment To start you will build a ground plane surrounded by a large sky dome These first objects will be a primitive polygonal plane and a primitive NURBS sphere You can view the finished scene to get an idea of what you are about to create by opening the file called 01 room_o1 ma 1 Launch Maya software PROJECT 01 LESSON 01 PRIMITIVES rr D N N O O o lt D NN 2 Change menu sets There are five main menu sets in Maya software Animation Polygons Surfaces Animation Dynamics and Rendering These menu sets are used to access related tool sets From the drop down menu at the left edge of the Status Line Toolbar select Polygons Dynamics As you change menu sets the first six Rendering menu items and the Help menu item nD yn amics along the top of the viewport remain the same while the remaining menu items change to reflect the chosen menu set Surfaces Customize Menu set pop up menu 3 Create a polygonal plane A primitive pl2. In Project One you are going to learn the basics of object creation along with the fundamentals of animation shaders and textures This will give you the chance to explore the Maya workspace while building your scene You will start by creating a room similar to the throne room from the Delgo movie You will then fill it with simple models in order to learn how to create move and modify objects Then you will explore the rudiments of hierarchies and animation by creating a simple door After that you will experiment with shaders and textures which will allow you to render your scene These lessons offer you a good look at some of the key concepts and workflows that drive Autodesk Maya software Once this project is finalized you will have a better understanding of the Maya user interface and its various modules Primitives This lesson teaches you how to build and transform primitives in 3D space in order to create a rudimentary environment in which you will set up some animation shown in this book You will explore the Maya user interface UI as you learn how to build and develop your scene In this lesson you will learn the following e How to set a new Maya project How to create primitive objects e How to move objects in 3D space e How to duplicate objects How to change the shape of objects How to delete polygonal faces How to use the Maya view tools How to change the display of your objec
3. S AIHWId LO uoss Polygon context menu Move the Perspective view to look at the ceiling from inside the room Tip Ifyou are having a hard time moving the perspective inside the room you can use the same trick you used for the sky dome to have it not displayed as double sided in the Attribute Editor e Select the polygon by clicking on the blue square located in the center of the face Notice that when you move your cursor over the face s center the face turns red to specify the face that will be selected Once selected the face gets highlighted Press the Delete key on your keyboard to delete the selected face To exit the Component mode RMB on the roof to pop up its contextual radial menu P yee and select Object Mode PROJECT 01 LESSON 01 PRIMITIVES The cathedral ceiling 3 Create a decorative drape Now that you are getting familiar with the Component mode you will use this knowledge to create a decorative drape e Select Create gt NURBS Primitives gt Plane Rename the plane to drape In the Channel Box highlight the makeNurbPlanei node and set Patches V to 4 Set the following for the drape object Rotate X to 90 Scale X to 2 Scale Z to 20 Move the drape up so it interpenetrates with the center of the ceiling 4 Change the shape of the drape e Go into Component mode by pressing the F8 hotkey This is just another way of going into Component mode besides using t
4. is a way of seeing inside the sky dome even when the camera is outside of it To do so you will have to change the way the geometry is displayed The following actions are somewhat more advanced than what you will undertake in this project but they will allow you to see inside the environment more easily Select the skydome Select Window gt Attribute Editor The Attribute Editor is similar to the Channel Box but with many more accessible attributes Expand the Render Stats section by clicking the small arrow button This section controls how the models are displayed in the viewports and render time Disable the Double Sided attribute This tells Maya to hide the sides of the geometry facing away from the camera Enable the Opposite attribute This tells Maya that you want the geometry to be displayed inside out Mi E Seeing inside the environment PROJECT 01 LESSON 01 PRIMITIVES rr M N N Q O oi lt D NN Create the room Now that you have established a proper sky dome and ground plane you will create the actual throne room In this example you will build the room from primitives 1 Create a polygonal cylinder Here you will use the hotbox as an alternative method for accessing tools e Press and hold the spacebar anywhere over the interface to display the hotbox File Edit Modify Create Display Window Help View Shading Ligh
5. selected press the f hotkey to frame it in the view In the Status Line located at the top of the interface click the Component Mode button Working in this mode will display the components of the currently selected geometry You can then select and transform the points defining a surface s shape Polygon points are called vertex vertices and NURBS points are called control vertices or CVs From 1 a ELO 7aousvot The Component Mode button e Click drag around vertices in the viewport to select them e Select only the two rings of vertices in the middle of the column i Tip When selecting components hold down Shift to toggle the new selection hold down Ctrl to deselect the new selection and hold down Ctrl Shift to add the E7 selection to the currently selected group of components PROJECT 01 LESSON 01 PRIMITIVES e Select the Scale Tool then hold down the Ctrl key and click drag on the Y axis Doing so will equally scale the vertices about the X and Z axes Let go of the Ctrl key then click drag on the Y axis to make the central geometry as follows Shaped column e Click on the Object Mode button in the Status Line to exit the Component mode Parsons zj A wa Gl Baa me Object mode 2 mtoa 8 IKI 9 Make more columns Instead of always starting from a default primitive object you can duplicate an existing one preserving its position and shape Select
6. My Documents maya projects project Ss EAD ocuments and Settings username My Documents mayasprojects project sce Look in scenes f e e 2 g a a File name fot room_01 ma z Files of type mayadscii ma v Cancel Set Project Options Windows Save As dialog box e Click the Save button or press the Enter key More details Now that you know how to place objects and interact with the Perspective view you will add more details to the inner room by making a cathedral ceiling and adding decorative drapes coming down from it 1 Create a roof The last thing missing to complete the room is a roof e Select Create gt Polygon Primitives gt Cone Rename the cone to roof Translate the roof up on the Y axis to about 25 units Scale the roof up on the Y axis to about 6 units e Scale up the roof in both the X and Z axes by holding down the Ctrl key to about 30 units LEARNING AUTODESK MAYA 2009 FOUNDATION 2 Delete a polygonal face If you move the Perspective camera inside the throne room you will notice that the polygonal cone used to create the roof has a cap polygon covering its base It would be nice to remove this face in order to get a cathedral ceiling e Select the roof RMB on the roof to pop up its contextual radial menu and select Face Vertex Face ff roof Select Select Hierarchy DG Traversal Inputs Outputs Faint
7. ane will be used as a large ground plane on which you will build the house It will be built using polygonal geometry Throughout this lesson and in the next project you will learn more about this geometry type e Disable the interactive creation mode of models which is enabled by default by selecting Create gt Polygon Primitives gt Interactive Creation From the Create menu select Polygon Primitives gt Plane A small plane is created at the origin Perspective view of pPlane1 LEARNING AUTODESK MAYA 2009 FOUNDATION 4 Change the plane s dimensions The plane is a procedural model This means that it is broken down into parts called nodes One node contains its positioning information one contains its shape information and another contains input information that defines the plane s construction history using attributes such as width height and subdivisions You can edit this Input node s attributes in the Channel Box in order to edit the plane s basic shape The Channel Box is found at the right side of the screen and lets you make changes to key attributes very easily Note f your Channel Box is not along the right side of the screen you can access it by selecting Display gt UI Elements gt Channel Box Layer Editor From the Channel Box s Inputs pPlanel cei objec section click on polyPlaner Translate x 0 J Translate yO This will make several new attributes lineaz M PA Rotate 0 availab
8. anipulator handle to scale the floor along all axes to about 30 units Note You will notice that as you are dragging the manipulators the corresponding values are getting updated in the Channel Box e Click drag on the green manipulator handle to scale down the floor along the Y axis until the floor is just a little thicker than the ground plane You will notice that the manipulator handle turns yellow to indicate that it is active PROJECT 01 LESSON 01 PRIMITIVES O me e MS 0 The floor geometry Tip Each cube at the end of the scale manipulator represents a different axis except for the central one which controls all three axes at the same time You can also hold down Ctrl and click drag on an axis to proportionally scale the two other axes 2 Create the wall You will now use a NURBS cylinder to elevate the wall of the throne room e Select Create gt NURBS Primitives gt Cylinder Rename the cylinder to wall Click drag on the center manipulator handle to scale the wall along all axes to about 28 units e Click drag on the green manipulator handle to scale down the wall along the Y axis to about 10 units Select the Move Tool or press w and then move the wall up on the Y axis by about 10 units The wall geometry LEARNING AUTODESK MAYA 2009 FOUNDATION 5 Adjust NURBS smoothness The display of NURBS surfaces in a viewport can be adjusted by increasing or decreasing
9. e move manipulator is limited to work in two axes You can move an object in these two axes at once by dragging on the center of the manipulator or constraining the motion along a single axis using the handles In the top view click drag on the square center of the move manipulator to move the column along both the X and Y axes Note f you click drag on the center of the manipulator in the Perspective view you will notice that it doesn t move along any particular axis It is actually moving along J the camera s view plane Tip Be sure to always refer to more than a single view to verify that the object is positioned properly Use the move manipulator to position the column in the background of the scene By convention a 3D scene is always facing at the positive Z axis This means that objects with greater Z axis values will be closer to the foreground of the scene and objects with smaller Z axis values will be further in the background Note You can refer to the view axis in the bottom left corner of the Perspective view to find the positive Z axis LEARNING AUTODESK MAYA 2009 FOUNDATION ae Foreground View axis a The column placed in the background 8 Change the shape of the column At this time the column is very round and could use some details Now that you are familiar with transforming an object you will learn how to modify the shape of an object SOAI IWId LO uoss e With the column
10. he button in the Status Line or the contextual menu LEARNING AUTODESK MAYA 2009 FOUNDATION From the side view click drag to select groups of CVs and tweak the shape of the drape as follows rr M N N Q O oi lt o T The shape of the drape Tip You might want to go into wireframe mode hotkey 4 in order to select components more easily p From the Perspective view RMB on the drape and select Hull Hulls define a continuous line of CVs By selecting a hull you can tweak the shape of several CVs at the same time e Click on the first hull along the length of the drape then hold down the Shift key and select the opposite hull Use the Move Tool to move the hulls up on their Y axis Doing so will give a nice dangling look to the drape 5 Place the drape correctly e Go back in Object mode e Rotate the drape so it is aligned with a column Tweak the shape of the drape in Component mode as needed so the drape almost touches the column PROJECT 01 LESSON 01 PRIMITIVES _ O me aa e b 0 The final drape shape Duplicate the drape The Duplicate Tool has options that allow you to duplicate multiple copies of the same object separated by a fixed translation or rotation value For example if you make one drape you can make many other copies separated by 45 degrees all in one easy step With the drape selected select Edit gt Duplicate Special gt U Se
11. iewing your scene as a wireframe model To better evaluate the form of your objects you can activate hardware shading 1 Turn on hardware shading To help visualize your objects you can use hardware shading to display a shaded view within any panel From the Perspective view s Shading menu select Smooth Shade All This setting affects all of the objects within the current view panel Smooth shaded view Tip You can also turn on Smooth Shading by moving your cursor over the desired panel clicking with your middle mouse button and pressing the 5 key The 4 key can be used to return the panel to a wireframe view 2 Hide the grid You can hide the world grid to simplify your view using one of two options From the view panel s Show menu select Grid to hide the grid for that view only OR From the Display menu deselect Grid to hide the grid for all views Moving inside the environment In order to have the feeling of being inside the environment in the Perspective view you need to move the Perspective camera inside the sky dome geometry You will soon realize that even if you can see inside the sky dome sometimes its geometry will appear in front of the camera while moving thus hiding the interior The following steps will prevent this from happening LEARNING AUTODESK MAYA 2009 FOUNDATION 1 Perspective inside the environment Change the sky s display To simplify your scene interaction there
12. ing Maya software You should now be able to easily navigate the different views and change the basic hardware display settings You should also be confident in creating duplicating transforming and renaming objects along with using the translation rotation and scale manipulators At this point you should also understand the difference between Component mode and Object mode As well be careful to save scene files In the next lesson you will explore in greater depth how to model objects and details PROJECT 01 LESSON 01 PRIMITIVES
13. its smoothness e Select the wall From the main Display menu select NURBS e Select any of the menu items between Hull Rough Medium Fine or Custom NURBS Smoothness These settings will affect how selected NURBS objects are displayed in all view panels Tip A NURBS object can have its smoothness set differently in each viewport using the following hotkeys 1 rough 2 medium Tne S 6 Create columns In order to create the large columns that will surround the throne room you will use polygonal cylinders e Select Create gt Polygonal Primitives gt Cylinder Rename the cylinder to column e Click drag on the green manipulator handle to scale up the column along the Y axis to about 10 units Note Since you have been scaling everything so far from the origin notice that your geometry is going through and underneath the ground plane Press the w hotkey to select the Move Tool e Click drag on the green manipulator handle to move the column up on the Y axis until the bottom of the column touches the top of the floor e With the column still selected highlight the polyCylinder2 node in the Channel Box Set the following Radius to 2 Subdivisions Axis to 20 Subdivisions Height to 5 Subdivisions Caps to 1 PROJECT 01 LESSON 01 PRIMITIVES rr D N N O O o lt D NN The column geometry 7 Repositioning the column When moving an object in an Orthographic view th
14. le for editing veh Rotate O e Type 100 in the Width entry field and Scales 1 press the Enter key Scale 1 Scale 2 1 e Type 100 in the Height entry field and ses on___ SHAPES press the Enter key PlaneShapet i INPUTS Now the plane is very large in the polyPlane1 Inputs Perspective view but this is intended width 100 section dont want T Height since you don t want to see any groun a En plane edges as you are working Subdivisions Height 10 Create Uws Normalize a Channel Box Note Another method for increasing the size of the plane would be to scale it In Maya you can often achieve the same visual results using many different methods Over time you will begin to choose the techniques that best suit a particular situation s 5 Rename the Plane node You should anam u existing Transform Tamea Ec oo Shoes node to make it easier to find later around e Click on the pPlane1 name at the top of Translate 0 the Channel Box to highlight it Translate 0 Type the name ground then press the Translate 0 Enter key Renaming the node in the Channel Box PROJECT 01 LESSON 01 PRIMITIVES rr D N N O O o lt D NN 6 Create the sky You will now create another object to be used as a large sky dome e Disable the interactive creation mode of models by selecting Create gt NURBS Primitives gt Interactive Creation Select Create gt NURBS Primitives gt Sphere 7 Modify the s
15. phere e With the pSphere still selected set the Scale X Y and Z in the Channel Box to 50 The sphere should now be as big as the ground plane Note You can dolly out in the Perspective view to see the entire scene by holding the eo Alt key and click dragging the RMB e Click on the makeNurbSpherei node in the Channel Box e Set the following End Sweep to 180 Sections to 4 By changing the sphere s input the sphere automatically updates The sphere is now half a sphere with fewer sections 8 Rotate the sphere e With the pSphere7 still selected set Rotate X and Y in the Channel Box to 90 degrees Doing this rotates the sphere so it covers the ground plane You now have a closed environment in which you will create the rest of the scene The ground plane with a sky dome 9 Rename the sphere e Rename the pSphere7 to skydome LEARNING AUTODESK MAYA 2009 FOUNDATION Viewing the scene When you work in 3D space it is important to see your work from different angles The different view panels let you see your work from the front top side and perspective views You can also use the view tools to change the views in order to reposition how you see your scene In some cases a view change is like panning a camera around a room while in other cases a view change might be like rotating an object around in your hand to see all the sides These view tools can be accessed using the Alt key in combination with various mou
16. se buttons 1 Edit the Perspective view You can use the Alt key with your mouse buttons to tumble track and dolly in your Perspective view e Change your view using the following key combinations Alt LMB to tumble Alt MMB to track Alt LMB MMB or Alt RMB to dolly You can also combine these with the Ctrl key to create a bounding box dolly where the view adjusts based on a bounding box This is useful when you want to dolly on a precise section of the view or quickly dolly out to get the general look of the scene Ctrl Alt LMB to box dolly Click drag from left to right to dolly in and from right to left to dolly out You can also undo and redo view changes using the following keys To undo views use To redo views use Alter your Perspective window until it appears as shown below Changed Perspective view PROJECT 01 LESSON 01 PRIMITIVES rr D N N O O o lt D NN _ O me A e b 0 Four view panels By default a single Perspective window is shown in the workspace To see other views of the scene you can change your panel layout At the top of the Perspective view panel go to the Panels menu and select Saved Layouts gt Four View You can now see the environment using three Orthographic views top side and front that show you the models from a projected view You can also see them in a Perspective view that is more like the everyda
17. t the Number of Copies to 7 In order to determine the proper rotation axis look at the view axis located at the bottom left corner of each view If you want the copies to be created around the positive Y axis enter a value in the second field of the rotate vector If you would like to create copies to be created along a translation axis enter a value in the fields of the translate vector Axis letter points toward its positive values e Set the second Rotate value to 45 and leave the others at o e Click the Duplicate Special button LEARNING AUTODESK MAYA 2009 FOUNDATION rr D N N O O a k u The duplicated drapes lt D T e Select Edit gt Undo or press z to undo the action and try again if the drape was not duplicated as expected From the top view make sure all the columns are properly placed behind each drape Save your work e From the File menu select Save Scene As e Enter the name o1 room_o2 ma and click the Save button Make sure you save this file since you will be continuing with it in the next lesson Note Throughout this book you will be using the final saved file from one lesson as the start file for the next unless specified otherwise Save your work at the end of each lesson to make sure that you have the start file ready Othewise you can use the scene files from the support files Conclusion Congratulations You have completed your first exercise us
18. ting Show Renderer Panels Lighting Shading Hotbox Controls Texturing Render Toon Paint Effects Fur Hotbox access to menu items In the hotbox select Create gt Polygon Primitives gt Cylinder gt 11 In the option window set the Normalize option to Off This option will make it easier for you to texture the floor later in the project e Click the Create button A small cylinder is placed at the origin Tip You can access all functions in Maya using either the main menus or the hotbox As you become more familiar with the hotbox you can use the UI options found in the Display menu to turn off the panel menus and therefore reduce screen clutter Q 2 Rename the cylinder e Click on the pCylinder1 node s name at the top of the Channel Box and type the name floor LEARNING AUTODESK MAYA 2009 FOUNDATION Scale the floor You can now use the Scale Tool to resize the floor in the scene e Select the Scale Tool in the toolbox on the left of the interface or press r r jr f i Wiik gi S SOAI IWId LO uoss Toolbox Manipulator handle Tip The transform manipulator has three handles that let you constrain your motion along the X Y and Z axes These are labeled using red for the X axis green for the Y axis and blue for the Z axis The Y axis points up by default which means that fe Maya is Y up e Click drag on the center m
19. ts e How to name your objects e How to save your scene Setting up Maya software The first step is to install the Autodesk Maya software Once that is done you should copy the Learning Maya support files to your Maya projects directory The support files are found in the support_files directory on the DVD ROM included with this book In order to find your projects directory you need to launch Maya software at least once so that it creates your user directory structure Here is where the projects directory is typically located on your machine Windows Drive Documents and Settings username My Documents maya projects Mac OS X Users username Documents maya projects Note To avoid the Cannot Save Workspace error ensure that the support files are not read only after you copy them from the DVD ROM When Maya software is launched for the first time and you have other Maya versions installed you will be asked if you want to copy your preferences or use the default preferences In order to follow the course you should be using default preferences If you have been working with Maya software and have changed any of your user interface settings you may want to delete or back up your preferences in order to start with the default Maya configuration Creating a new project Maya software uses a project directory to store and organize all of the files scenes images materials textures etc related to a particular scene When b
20. uilding a scene you create and work with a variety of file types and formats The project directory allows you to keep these different file types in their unique sub directory locations within the project directory 1 Launch Maya software 2 Set the project To manage your files you can set a project directory that contains sub directories for different types of files that relate to your project Go to the File menu and select Project gt Set A window opens that directs you to the Maya projects directory e Open the folder support_files e Click on the folder named project7 to select it e Click on the OK button This sets projecti as your current project LEARNING AUTODESK MAYA 2009 FOUNDATION Go to the File menu and select Project gt Edit Current Make sure that the project directories are set up as shown below This ensures that Maya software is looking into the proper sub directories when it opens up scene files a Oo x Name project Help Location C40 ocuments and Settings username sMy Docu _ Scene File Locations Scenes scenes Project Data Locations Images images Source Images Jsurcemages Clips aips Sound saund Particles particles Render Scenes lendeScenes Depth frendeData depth IFF Images renderata iplmages 000000 Shaders renderData shaders 000 Textures textures Mel mel SdPaintT extures 3dPaintTevtures mentalA ay renderD atasmentalRay Cancel
21. y 3D world This multiple view setup is very useful when positioning objects in 3D space View Shading Lighting Show Renderer Panels View Shading Lighting Show Renderer Panels SOS 29 a HE eee si Four view panels Tip Tapping the keyboard spacebar will switch from a single view panel to a four view 3 panel LEARNING AUTODESK MAYA 2009 FOUNDATION 3 Edit the view in the side view Orthographic views use similar hotkeys except that you cannot tumble by default in an Orthographic view In the side view change your view using the following key combinations Alt MMB to track Alt LMB MMB or Alt RMB to dolly e Keep working with the Orthographic views until they are set up as shown ELEA et eet ed We New Orthographic views 4 Frame Selected and Frame All Another quick way to navigate in the different views is to use the Frame Selected or Frame All hotkeys for the active view e Select the ground plane e While in the four view panels move your mouse over a view Press the f hotkey to frame the selected geometry in the view under your mouse Press the a hotkey to frame everything visible in the view under your mouse cursor Press the Shift a hotkey to frame everything in all views at once PROJECT 01 LESSON 01 PRIMITIVES rr D V V O O a k lt D N Setting display options The view panels let you interactively view your scene By default this means v
22. your column and select Edit gt Duplicate When using the duplicate function the new objects will be renamed to column1 Subsequent duplicates will be named columnz2 column3 Tip You can use the Ctrl d hotkey to duplicate the selected geometry without going 4 into the menu each time Duplicate the columns seven times and place them all around the throne room from the top view LEARNING AUTODESK MAYA 2009 FOUNDATION i i li The columns in place Tip Ifany pieces of geometry get in the way when you select and modify objects you can temporarily hide them To do so select the geometry to hide then select Display gt Hide gt Hide Selection To show the last hidden objects select Display gt Show gt Show Last Hidden To show all hidden objects select p Display gt Show gt All S AIHWId LO uoss 10 Move the columns In order to make it easier to select or move all the columns at once you will now group them e Click on one column to select it then hold down the Shift key and click the remaining columns one by one until they are selected Press Ctrl g to group them all together so you can move them all at once A PROJECT 01 LESSON 01 PRIMITIVES e Rename the group to columns Rotate the new group to see the effect of grouping geometry 11 Save your work e From the File menu select Save Scene As e Enter the name o1 room_o1 ma cD ocuments and Settings username
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