Godzila creature and Terminator digi double ZBrush modeling

Great presentation by MPC on Godzila creature and Terminator digi double ZBrush modeling.

Fish rig in Maya tutorial

Here is nice fish rig tutorial in Maya:

Maya shortest edge path command

In case you wondered which command will give you shortest edge path from 2 selected vertices, here is the example:

cmds.polySelect( 'pPlane1', shortestEdgePath=(10, 100) )

I was just solving one task involving search for centre vertex on arbitraty component of mesh and this edge path realled helped to add more topology constraints.

Pixar detailed demonstration of Presto

Pixar shows their tools built in Presto system and some of their pipeline on this nVidia demonstration. Very interesting for those interested in pipelines and generally in 3D animation tools and workflows.
http://on-demand.gputechconf.com/gtc/2016/video/S6454.html

 

Maya on Windows 10

I also questioned this - does Maya 2016 run on Windows 10? Especially because Windows 10 message about Upgrading keeps popping up almost every day on my desktop. But I always cancel.

And here is confirmation from the Autodesk forum below - Autodesk will support Maya from its version 2017. And in case you still think you will work on projects based on older Maya version, then you should wait even longer with the udpate in my opinion.

http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/maya-general/windows-10-upgrade-issues/td-p/5748566

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Eclipse installation

For users of Eclipse or those who are thinking about using Eclipse. I just tested new Eclipse installer and it just works great. No Error Code 13 and such things with Java. Saying that I had JVM (Java Virtual Machine) already installed. But this is the most simple installation. Tested on Windows 7 64 bit. Just follow this link:
https://wiki.eclipse.org/Eclipse/Installation

For those programming with Python choose C/C++ build and then once running Eclipse, go to Help / Install New Software to add PyDev extension. More about that here:
http://www.pydev.org/download.html
 

Kate text editor - remove new lines

Here is one tip in case you work with Kate text editor - commonly found on linux distribution of Kubuntu.

In case you want to remove all new lines "\n" - merge lines into one, just select the lines you want to merge and press Ctrl + j.

This is operation which can save you a lot of time. For example if you copy paste printed python list from Maya and want to put this result to a list defintion in your python script in Kate.

Maya menu show / hide

This is always handy to know, how to hide or show main Maya menus. Especially if you accidentally hide one.

Ctrl + m ....................... show/hide main Maya menus
Shift + Shift + m ....................... show/hide OpenGL modeling Maya menus
Shift + m ....................... show/hide OpenGL +  Outliner Maya menus

Maya viewport troubleshooting

This seems to be quite useful link from Autodesk Maya documentation to new Viewport 2.0 openGL renderer. If you are having problems with it, solution might be right here:
https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/maya/learn-explore/caas/CloudHelp/cloudhelp/2016/ENU/Maya/files/GUID-96B324B5-E9EF-4817-9CCD-1E324DB54FE3-htm.html

 

Maya.env tips

Since I had to fix something with my Maya.env file I thought it would be good to also share some example for Maya users who want to make their own Maya library in a specific place on disk or network.

Below is example of Maya.env file with custom path to MEL scripts, python scripts and plugins.
Note that plugins contain both path to python scripted plugins as well as C++ compiled plugins. Also plugins unlike scripts are stored under Maya version specific folder. Should be done for scripts too, but usually it`s not needed.

TIP: you can also use USER_SCRIPT_PATH in your Maya MEL script sourcing function. If you recursively source every subfolder from here, you have all MEL scripts available after Maya starts. This is done from a userSetup.mel which is special Maya file you can define. And as long as it is found in MAYA_SCRIPT_PATH it will be executed first after Maya starts.

TIP: By defining USER_SCRIPT_PATH you get this relative root folder and if you move your library to different place or computer, you just change this one and your library can be found by Maya again.

More about userSetup.mel here:
https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/maya/learn-explore/caas/CloudHelp/cloudhelp/2015/ENU/Maya/files/PC-Run-MEL-commands-whenever-Maya-starts-up-htm.html

Autodesk documentation about defining Maya.env variables:
https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/maya/learn-explore/caas/CloudHelp/cloudhelp/2016/ENU/Maya/files/GUID-DB30AAB7-4639-4C3B-A479-7F26D953E0F2-htm.html

Example Maya.env file content on Windows OS:

USER_SCRIPT_PATH = C:\Users\syntetik\Documents\maya_tools

MAYA_SCRIPT_PATH = %USER_SCRIPT_PATH%\mel\mystuff;%USER_SCRIPT_PATH%\mel\thirdparty;%USER_SCRIPT_PATH%\mel\startup
PYTHONPATH = %USER_SCRIPT_PATH%\python\
USER_PLUGIN_PATH = %USER_SCRIPT_PATH%\plugin\maya2016
MAYA_PLUG_IN_PATH = %USER_PLUGIN_PATH%\mystuff;%USER_PLUGIN_PATH%\my_scripted;%USER_PLUGIN_PATH%\thirdparty_scripted;%USER_PLUGIN_PATH%\thirdparty

Exploring Human Muscles Setup in Maya Course

Here is my latest course on rigging human using Autodesk Maya Muscles for Digital Tutors:

http://www.pluralsight.com/courses/exploring-human-muscles-setup-maya-2395

Over 6 hours detailed workflow, great as an introduction to anyone learning how to use muscles in rigging. Anatomy examples and custom Python tools included. Thanks to Pavel Hruboš who did test animations and Jan Jinda for providing werewolf model.

TurtleDefaultBakeLayer problem resolved

If you are using Maya 2014, 2015 or 2016 you might have seen this object in your scene TurtleDefaultBakeLayer, which you didn`t create. Maya was generating this automaticly since they acquired Turtle Renderer.
This was quite annoying. So now Autodesk has fixed this problem, if you download Maya 2016 Service Pack 5:
https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/maya/downloads/caas/downloads/content/maya-2016-service-pack-5.html?v=2016

Once you install SP5, Turtle plugin is not set to Loaded by default, unless you switch it to Autoload. This is how it should be.

If you cannot use Maya 2016 SP5, then you can use this python script for unlocking this node and deleting it:
import maya.cmds as mc
mc.lockNode('TurtleDefaultBakeLayer',l=0)
mc.delete('TurtleDefaultBakeLayer')

More about Turtle Renderer for Maya here:
https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/maya/getting-started/caas/CloudHelp/cloudhelp/ENU/123112/files/turtle-html.html

CGI Dreamworks Animation Studio Pipeline - YouTube

CGI Dreamworks Animation Studio Pipeline - YouTube:



'via Blog this'

Want to Own Coraline? Laika to Auction 250 Pieces From Its Films

Want to Own Coraline? Laika to Auction 250 Pieces From Its Films:



'via Blog this'

Point Constraint Offset Polarity

Really cool feature that can be sometimes handy - you can change amount of offset of the Maya Point Constraint. This was probably added in Maya 2011. The attribute is called Offset Polarity and is 1.0 by default. This basically multiplies the amount of offset from the target in local space. Nice in-built feature.
And unlike the Rest Position, doesn`t jump to the position, but make continous move to the target (or between targets).

Edits on referenced animation

Great feature recently added in Maya allowing edits on referenced animation curves.

Printing 3D toys at home

Looks like this is where future of toys could go to. Just download the design documents of toy, modify and print for your kids (in chosen colors etc.).
http://www.123dapp.com/tinkerplay

Dinosaurs by ILM

Nice behind the scenes about making dinosaurs by ILM for recent Jurassic World movie.