Maya = Modeling?
Hey guys, this past Christmas my cousin picked me up a gnomon workshop dvd for character modeling. I'm super grateful and can't wait to start in on it in the next day or so. There is one problem though; The instructor on the dvd uses Maya. I use Max, but have seen this first hand: the amount of maya tutorials outnumber the Max tutorials in categories like Character modeling. Is there a specific reason for this? Is Max being phased out?
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3ds Max is the most used in game development (iirc) and Maya is generally the most used in the computer animation industry (or as the base for their own proprietary tools a la Pixar). It'll vary from company to company and some let their employees just use whatever is most comfortable. Once you learn one you can learn any, and all of them require equal amounts of artistic skill
Learn what you enjoy the most and you'll be fine. Most people here are using 3ds Max.
If you are just learning how to model, it will be very confusing how to apply Maya tools and interface to working in 3ds Max, but if you understand Max pretty well, you can apply most things from the tutorial. The work flow and available tools will be very similar between most 3d applications.
Stuff like the proxy crease tool, the way you can keep stuff on the grid for UDK, and the viewport rendering makes me think maya can be more efficient than max, but then it seemingly lacks in a few other areas, like uvs, but I have been using uv layout lately so thats less of a concern.
My experience with maya has been hard to get into, but now when I go back to max, I am missing more maya features then I am max in maya.
A negative point are the tools. In the older Versions the booleans are horrible and other tools are medicore. Sometimes its hard. But 2014, maybe, realtime Boolean intersection looks interesting.
I am supercomfortable with Maya, because it behaves almost like XSI and modeling is very fast. Whenever I watch a Max video I see people clicking on modifiers and browsing through menus, instead of modeling. I tried Max a few times and find it confusing when you come from any other application. I also use Mudbox, which has the same controls like Maya (or very similar ones), making it easy for me to pickup the pace. I used HeadusUV before, but find no reason to do so, because the unwrap tools in Maya work fine for me; I'm doing environments/hard surface though. Might be different with organic assets.
Maya has the advantage of its cheap(er) LT version, while Max is still hardly affordable and cluttered with plugins I won't need. I think if you start modeling with Max and are comfortable with it, it's probably best to stay with it, but due to the similarities between XSI and Maya, I found it very easy to get into the program and have become faster than I've ever been with XSI. Personally, I think it is the greatest and easiest (professional) 3D software around, apart from Modo.
There are lots of videos specific to the software you are using - even good, free ones. So I suggest just getting a character tutorial for the software you are using, in the future.
I just wish ad would give its UV tools some attention and modeling.
in the end just don't worry about the 3d package it is the skills that matter not the software.
yeah thats the real key, now the only mainstream package I haven't picked up is modo (if that is considered mainstream now I dunno) I am a personal advocate of cross learning software as it can give you a fundamentally deeper understanding of what you are doing and the mechanics in play.
like I went to zbrush first and I was kind of sucky at it, went to mudbox got better at sculpting, went back to zbrush and was better at Zbrush from the bits I picked up with mudbox, these fundamentals can be learned on anything really, its all the same in theory.
So true! Wish more people would adopt this attitude:)
When you look some Max tuts and use this workflow in maya you can become desperate.
everything that involves uv layout i would say Maya wins, a lot because of uvw being stuck as a modifier, It's like going to heaven switching over to the constant uv window of Maya, and yes i do use textools.
also many do say that 3dsmax has better uv unwrap tools, but even after many years I can't make 3dsmax be as predictable as Maya, In Maya I would be able to unwrap every piece of a mesh with unfold and knowing i would get a perfect result before pushing the button, with 3dsmax it still feels like a bit of a gamble.
Can't really say that much about animation, but some of the place I have worked for have been using Maya for animation even though the main software being used for 3D has been 3dsmax, so I guess that has to mean something.
be aware that I currently use 3dsmax as my main software for professional use at the moment, so I might have missed stuff from newer Maya versions or just forgot stuff I loved or hated about it.
If all things are equal then I stand by my "modeling is modeling" comment.
Maya 2014 and up with modeling toolkit really jumped a leap in modeling. It doesn't have anything ground breaking in there but the way you can utilize it in practice once you really learn all it's shift+crtl+left/middle/right click and assign some custom shortcuts, modeling workflow gets really really great! The best, in my opinion and i tried C4D, 3ds, and Modo.
It seems that Maya has nice future in modeling, when compared to previous versions.
That one guy on last Maya Expert Challenge said Maya now finally has it's own separate modeling team, before such team wasn't there! ...and that is way we see a lots of additions and improvements on modeling in Maya 2014.
It cool their approach to it and how he said they are working on resolving all the issues in existing tools and integrating NEX as much as possible before moving on, as he said: "new shiny things"!
Bottom line is...i'm looking forward to it that's for sure!
Out of the box modeling tools may be slightly better in Max, but when you are manipulating models with scripting , Max is revealed to be a kludgey mash up of legacy functionality. Maya is so much cleaner under the hood. Plus any significantly useful modeling tool can generally be found online as a mel script.
I once read a story about a japanese man that created a few 3d scenes vertex by vertex, basically just writing an obj from scratch. I can't find it though.
cube.obj
now thats a bitching cube, that took way to long to make.
@ahtiandr: Thanks for your input and insight! Learning anatomy is one of my highest priorities.
@passerby: That's a sexy cube.
I got a question for these guys who are working in the industry:
Can i use Maya, when a company uses max? ^^
I mean, i could model the whole Mesh in Maya and then Import it at the end via FBX to Max.
Where is the main problem? The Licence? Would it be possible to work on the Home Computer where Maya is licenced?
I really dont want to switch from maya to max because i want to get better in maya and this would be just like a new start in 3D Modeling...the only difference is that i know what faces, vertices and edges are
But where is the Edge Loop tool. The Merge Vertices Tool. The Collapse Tool. This different Shortcuts aso...aso...
Gazu
It's easier if everyone uses the same program. That way scripts and knowledge can be shared and sending people files is easy.
Some (rare) studios will allow the Leads to change the pipeline as needed. But most studios have invested time and money building a pipeline of tools for a particular set of software, and thus will be reluctant to change. Change still happens, just at a slower pace.
Even in strict pipelines, certain artists will still use specific software, e.g. Concept Artists using Sketchup for quick modeling.
Like mentioned above, best to learn multiple packages.
It's hard to make generalizations about what software is best at what, or the most popular, but we've made a stab at it here:
http://wiki.polycount.net/CategoryTools#Popularity
So, I think people should avoid getting too hung up on which package is the most popular and widely used in games. Unless anyone has a complete picture of the industry, it's hard to make such a sweeping statement.
Also, there are many factors, such as geographic location, education, user base and culture, to take into consideration.
I'd only echo what others have already said, in that be prepared to adapt and learn a new package if you have to. No doubt, there are probably some studios who do allow a more open choice of software that their artists can use, personally I rarely see this.
It has been a while since some real updates on making surfaces in Maya. It would so great if those are more reliable and robust. No need for "Alias" type of complexity, but I guess Maya wouldn't mind more love in that section.
I wonder what happened to T-splines that once was available as plugin in Maya and yet now when Autodesk acquired them it's only for Rhino! That would be so nice addition to Maya surface toolset.