X3D

To change color of Ambient Occlusion, find mib_amb_occlusion1 node attached to the shader in Hypershade; then toggle through Output Mode presets.

www.gerhard-mantz.de

- Show manipulator tool (located on the left-hand side of your Maya window amongst Move, Scale, and Rotate tools) allows additional control of lights/cameras by adding a ‘manipulator’ so that you can control both where the light/camera is located as well as the location/direction it is looking at/pointing toward.

- Reflection/shadow/refraction controls are found in shader attributes, light attributes, and render settings. All three should be taken in to consideration. Note particularly Raytrace settings in your shader as well as under the Quality tab in your Render Settings, where you will also find your Sample levels for your render. Higher sample rate = smoother.

- Google is your friend.

Depth of Field

- Hierarchy, object, & component modes.

- Window menu to access Outliner. Select camera and change relationships between discreet objects.

- Camera’s attribute editor/channel box allows you to change focal length,  focus distance, focal length, and depth of field.

- Create Polygon Tool under Mesh menu. Click to “draw” silhouette and then press enter to close shape. Interactive Split tool under Edit Mesh menu to divide faces.

- Press y to return to last tool.

- Press x to snap to grid

Maya interface 3

- Object mode, component mode, & hierarchy mode shortcuts.

- To delete one side of a cube; make a cube, select component mode, select faces mode shortcut, select a face, and press delete. Alternatively, once in component mode, right-click over object and select faces mode.

- Adjust overscan under camera attribute editor if you can not see your entire film gate.

- Make note of shelves.

- Bookmark shortcut. Return to bookmarks under view menu in viewpoint.

- Render Settings to adjust image size, resolution, aspect ratio, render directories, which camera to render, file names, rendering algorithms, motion blur, render formats, etc.

Extruding and smoothing

- Select Polygons mode, then select Extrude shortcut or find under Edit Mesh menu. Extrusions can be manipulated by position, scale, rotate.

- Edges can also be extruded to “fill holes” over deleted sections/components/faces. To close “holes” or bridge gaps to create seamless forms/objects, select Merge under Edit Mesh.

- To smooth, select polygons mode, then select smoothing shortcut to multiply number of divisions, resulting in more organic forms.

- Items/functions/tools have option boxes, where properties/attributes/parameters can be edited/specified.

Lights

- Shortcuts for lights under Rendering shelf. Select a light, then select show manipulator shortcut/icon from tools on the left-hand side. Manipulator does not render and can be moved around and used to show where light is pointing to.

- Attribute editor of any given light controls its color, cone angle, shadow, shadow color, drop off, etc. Different lights have varying attributes.

- A camera’s attribute editor also allows you to change environment/background color.

Hypershade

- Hypershade is under Window menu, Rendering Editors sub-menu. This is where you can create/edit textures. A texture’s attribute editor allows you to change it’s color, brightness, transparency, etc. After making a texture, you can drag and drop it on top of objects to apply it, or you can select the object, and then right-click over the texture and select Assign material to selection.

Homework

More renderings, now using your own lighting.

Notes / even more Maya Interface

- Setting project directory; remember to do this before you begin complex projects.

- Smooth shading vs. wireframe.

- Smoothing increases divisions in polygonal geometry. More divisions produce the illusion of curvature.

- Object mode, component mode, & hierarchy mode shortcuts.

- To delete one side of a cube; make a cube, select component mode, select faces mode shortcut, select a face, and press delete. Alternatively, once in component mode, right-click over object and select faces mode.

- Adjust overscan under camera attribute editor if you can not see your entire film gate.

- Render Settings to adjust image size, resolution, aspect ratio, render directories, which camera to render, file names, rendering algorithms, motion blur, render formats, etc.

Paint Effects

- Paint Effects brushes will not work with mental ray rendering unless you convert them to polygons or nurbs under Modify>Convert>Paint Effects to Polygons or Paint Effects to Nurbs.

- Shadows may need to be switched on independently by switching on Raytrace Shadows in your Render Settings. Also, you may need to edit the stroke that controls the object(s) derived from Paint Effects. This can be found through the Outliner.

- To map jpeg around geometry, first make a shader in your Hypershade. Then, in its attributes, select the file icon next to the color attribute.

- Paint Effects have Flow Animation attributes. This recalls preset points in a growth animation.

- Final Gather in Render Settings>Indirect Lighting makes light bounce off of geometries so that they act as secondary light sources. This will also increase amount of ambient light and shadows.

- Shortcuts: 4 – wireframe, 5 – smoothshade, 6 – file texture, 7 – crude lighting

Mental Ray

- If your Mental Ray is not available under render presets, go to Plug-in Manager under Window menu and make sure mayatomr bundle is set to load properly. Then set rendering algorithm to Mental Ray under Render Settings.

http://www.experimental3d.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/Virtual-Installation_syllabus_Spring2012.pdf

http://www.experimental3d.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/IntoX3D_SPRING2012.pdf