Maya LT 2016

oglu

its looking interesting...
[ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_siu5R7wIbk[/ame]

[ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=itAb5rkbc_Y[/ame]

teaandcigarettes

New UI? Maybe I will finally be able to wrap my head around it Last time I tried to go use Maya LT for my home projects, I went back to Max pretty quickly.


Edit:

Hmm, looking at it closer it seems like it's just a reskin. Still, I really like the idea of an indie focused modelling/animation package and since we're not hearing anything about Max LT, I might give it another go. Although it's infuriating to switch apps as it wreaks havoc to my productivity and speed.

oglu

its the same UI just new colors and icons...

Fomori

I would like to know more about the enhanced "Mudbox" like sculpting tools. Autodesk should scrap Mudbox and integrate it into Maya :poly124:

For indie game studios that want an integrated modelling and animation package, Maya LT seems like a good deal.

However, if you're a freelancer that doesn't do animation, or a studio that's willing to split apps, then Modo (especially if picked up in the sale or Indie edition) seems a better deal???

*no mentions of Blender here...

pior

I would like to know more about the enhanced "Mudbox" like sculpting tools. Autodesk should scrap Mudbox and integrate it into Maya

While it would be awesome and would totally turn things around (since the biggest weakness of Mudbox lies in its inability to create and edit meshes from scratch), I honestly doubt that it would ever happen in a satisfactory shape or form, considering how unstable MayaLT can be. I doubt that the viewport would ever be able to support anything close to a regular sculpted model : Viewport 2.0 has been in progress for years and it's still not quite there. But then again I would be happy to be pleasantly surprised

Anthony

So, they added in spline IK support, which is all well and good, but still NO Python support, which pretty much rules out any UE4 user wanting to use the Animation Rigging Toolkit.

So for now, i'll stick with Modo

radiancef0rge

Does the ue4 python maya rigging toolset work in modo?

oglu

Fomori wrote: »

IAutodesk should scrap Mudbox and integrate it into Maya :poly124:

it is the mudbox core in maya... those are the mudbox sculpting brushes....

unit187

radiancef0rge wrote: »

Does the ue4 python maya rigging toolset work in modo?

of course not

MM

Fomori wrote: »

Autodesk should scrap Mudbox and integrate it into Maya :poly124:

JedTheKrampus

So you added the sculpting tools but not the mesh painting tools? Got to have something for the next release I guess

Fomori

Haha yes I am aware that would burn you Mudbox standalone users, hence the sticky out tongue.
But Mudbox development has been pretty slow (sorry derail).

radiancef0rge

unit187 wrote: »

of course not

i was just pointing out the irony of saying "using modo because no python for ue4 tools" when modo doesn't support it either

Boonta

still waiting on reference editor support. unless there is some other way to update/propagate rig updates in a animation pipeline in LT?

copy/paste animation to the new rig maybe?


i like how u can retopologize with a transparent shader now similar to topogun! and the uv tools look neat

modo indy still appears to offer a better toolset in comparison to LT on my brief dabbling? the renderer alone is pretty neat! wish LT would have some more rendering options.

rino

MM wrote: »

fucking hilarious

bounchfx

looks like a cool update, I will probably give LT another go as long as it's more stable. I thought 2015 was fine but it sure liked to crash on me while doing common tasks.

The sculpting looks cool, will have to see how much use it can actually be, how much it can handle in the viewport. I wish they would add projection painting since I'm a projection painting whore as far as texturing goes. Just make it like 3DCoat and then I'll be able to just stay within maya the whole time (even though I love 3d coat don't get me wrong)

still, improvements are good. they've already done more between LT 2015-2016 than photoshop has done for artists since CS2

wait what who said that

iadagraca

I just hope they improve their mirror modeling tools, the only real problem i have working in maya is symmetry.

exoddinary

iadagraca wrote: »

I just hope they improve their mirror modeling tools, the the only real problem i have working in maya is symmetry.

I dont have any symmetry problem so far working in Maya LT

JedTheKrampus

If you have symmetry problems you can just use the old instance mirror like you would in Modo

iadagraca

JedTheKrampus wrote: »

If you have symmetry problems you can just use the old instance mirror like you would in Modo

exoddinary wrote: »

I dont have any symmetry problem so far working in Maya LT

The problem with the instance mirror is that it seems to flip the normals of the model resulting in the mirrored side looking black and I have no idea how to fix that.

The problem with symmetry is that for some reason it would suddenly disable and be unable to re-enable.

JedTheKrampus

You could enable two-sided shading if your scene is light enough for your computer to be able to handle it.

iadagraca

JedTheKrampus wrote: »

You could enable two-sided shading if your scene is light enough for your computer to be able to handle it.

Actually I tried the instance duplicate again (been a few months) and it's not doing the black model thing any more.

But something is still missing from blender and other programs i've used

Saf

Excellent, almost everything you need.

DrunkShaman

subscription based?

Lt_Commander

Max LT

autodesk, pls. If I'm going to learn a second package due to costs, I'm just going to grit my teeth and go full Blender.

OBlastradiusO

Recently got into Maya 2015 and I must say their modeling and UVing is getting better than Max.

Fomori

Yeah Maya's modelling tools have come a long way.
I've recently been switching to Maya at home. With the Modelling Toolkit and a customised shelf it's feeling very similar to Max. Which is great.
Also retopologising in Maya is much better.

I'm missing my Relax and Push Modifiers though.

I know Maya has a relax option for the sculpting brush, but is there a way to relax a mesh uniformly? And anything similar to Push which expands polygons/verts/edges along their normals angle?

m4dcow

Fomori wrote: »

And anything similar to Push which expands polygons/verts/edges along their normals angle?

For vertices you can set the move axis to normal in the tool settings for the translate tool to move them along their normals.

Gheromo

Fomori there is similar function to push modifier. To do that you need to select an element of the mesh and Shift + RMB and at the bottom of the context menu you will see Transform component, you will see a transform gizmo appear. Also allows you to scale if you click on the cube in the middle of the gizmo which will activate scaling tools if needed.

As of modeling tools, i dont agree at all. They are cumbersome, original maya gizmo shortcuts conflict with ones from modeling toolkit etc, making it impossible for quick modeling as before.

Fomori

Thanks guys will have a look at that. Just need something similar to the Relax modifier now.

Gheromo wrote: »

original maya gizmo shortcuts conflict with ones from modeling toolkit etc, making it impossible for quick modeling as before.

As someone who never modelled without the Toolkit I guess this isn't an issue for me.

OBlastradiusO

Yeah the modeling toolkit does remind me of Max which is why I've gotten bit more used to Maya now. UVing in Maya is wayyy better than max's

antweiler

To relax a mesh uniforlmy, simply use the flood option of the sculpting tool. A modifyer with history would be cooler, though

JamesTKirk

Lt_Commander wrote: »

Max LT

I second that

Fomori

antweiler wrote: »

To relax a mesh uniforlmy, simply use the flood option of the sculpting tool. A modifyer with history would be cooler, though

Thanks!

Thomas P.

Personally I have been using Maya LT 2015 for a good while now and couldn't be happier. It is very stable on my end and really has pretty much all I could ask for. 2016 seems like an awesome update with very welcomed additions to UV tools. Sculpting was a bit unexpected but cool nevertheless. Now if they could add the "texturing" features from Mudbox as well that would be really sweet. I think Autodesk is doing a great job with Maya LT. They are clearly listening to users demands. I know that some are wanting Python etc, maybe sometime soon...

JedTheKrampus

It's pretty safe to assume that full Maya will generally have a superset of Maya LT's features.

Tzur_H

Fomori wrote: »

Yanything similar to Push which expands polygons/verts/edges along their normals angle?

I've got a hotkey with the MEL script

MoveNormalTool

which basically fires the move tool in normal mode, then you need to drag the N axis.

Fomori

Gheromo wrote: »

To do that you need to select an element of the mesh and Shift + RMB and at the bottom of the context menu you will see Transform component, you will see a transform gizmo appear.

Just tried this and it works perfectly. Thank you!

antweiler wrote: »

To relax a mesh uniforlmy, simply use the flood option of the sculpting tool. A modifyer with history would be cooler, though

Although this also works, it only seems on an object level. In Max you can apply the modifier to whatever sub object selection you have (this is awesome). That doesn't seem possible in Maya.

Sorry for derailing this thread into my help session :poly121:

Equanim

dustinbrown wrote: »

I'm assuming all of this stuff is going to be in regular/pro Maya as well, but they go out of their way to say "Maya LT" every time in the video.

Hard to tell. I'm using LT largely because its tool set started out as mirroring Maya full as well. Pretending the answer is no (though I have no idea), LT is still closer to anything resembling Maya full. They'd have to implement a LOT of UI revision to make it behave like completely different software.

I think they need to abandon the idea of "Maya Light", because it's dictating that their marketing strategy be "Sub-par to Maya, but enough to do the job." While every other alternative reads like a genuine effort to compete on part of the developers.

If they would just ditch the stupid cat and take notes from Unity's marketing. Then switch Mel for Python (because even Maya users don't use Mel), add plug-in support and then continue with their other updates, they could raise the price BACK up to $50/mo because the software would look like it was taking itself seriously. I just get the feeling that the devs are under strict instruction to make improvement B, but NOT A for fear of competing with Maya full.

GhosTDoG

MM wrote: »

:thumbup:


But it looks more like these useless "poly deformation brushes" 3ds Max already has with some core function tools of mudbox.

I don't believe that someone can be that stupid to put an entire sculpting application in a full 3d package (performance etc.)...but on the other hand - it's autodesk! !!

kanga

I dunno I reckon big apps like max and maya have loads of features you probably will never use. The vids look really good. A dedicated app like this seems like a pretty good idea, especially for new users. You should be able to concentrate on a targeted toolset making the whole thing highly efficient. Only thing I find weird is the poly cap for export which to me should be what the soft and hardware can handle and not what looks like a marketing ploy.

SonicBlue

Stripped down and lighter Maya is a good thing, but really, the 100.000 poly limit is constraining.

If you break down your model into <100K polies parts, and export them one by one, would Maya LT let it do it?

radiancef0rge

SonicBlue wrote: »

Stripped down and lighter Maya is a good thing, but really, the 100.000 poly limit is constraining.

If you break down your model into <100K polies parts, and export them one by one, would Maya LT let it do it?

yes

Equanim

SonicBlue wrote: »

Stripped down and lighter Maya is a good thing, but really, the 100.000 poly limit is constraining.

If you break down your model into <100K polies parts, and export them one by one, would Maya LT let it do it?

Yup, but if you're doing game art, what on earth are you exporting that's 200k tris? You can also use the "Export to Unreal" option with no poly limit. A lot of people feel they should just drop the limitation because there are so many workarounds.

SonicBlue

A car or an entire game level can easily exceed the limitations, someone could even use Maya to model and then export the result to be rendered in Blender, for example.

Also, if I don't want to bake my mesh inside Maya? There are many reasons you don't want to have those kind of limitations.

unit187

Exporting entire game level? Your programmer will kill you. Twice.

pior

Unit : from what I have experienced it is actually a rather common practice, for greyboxing but also for final levels with Maya/Max/Modo being used as a full-on level editor - complete with model instancing, metadata saved to and exported from the Maya scene, and so on.

An example from The Order :



Of course I am not saying that every game level can our should be made of one unique mesh. But the examples SonicBlue is giving perfectly illustrate why putting limitations because "sure enough, users won't need that" is a rather dangerous approach to software design. It basically throws arbitrary shackles on anything that the software makers didn't think of in advance, and that's very ironic since the most original uses of any software always come from the users, not from the software makers.

For instance, what if an indie studio wanted to create a game relying heavily on precise terrain simulation, but their base terrain model exceeds the export limit ? All of a sudden they become "not indie enough". Another example : I've used an earlier version of MayaLT in the past to test it out for Dota2 asset creation, and even for such a seemingly "low budget" task I bumped into the export limit back then.

These scenarios are near impossible to predict, meaning that no user survey will ever be able to cover them all ...

nervouschimp

There are no polygon limits when sending to UE4 and Unity, and then you can do whatever you want with that FBX file.

SonicBlue

pior wrote: »

Unit : from what I have experienced it is actually a rather common practice, for greyboxing but also for final levels with Maya/Max/Modo being used as a full-on level editor - complete with model instancing, metadata saved to and exported from the Maya scene, and so on.

An example from The Order :



Of course I am not saying that every game level can our should be made of one unique mesh. But the examples SonicBlue is giving perfectly illustrate why putting limitations because "sure enough, users won't need that" is a rather dangerous approach to software design. It basically throws arbitrary shackles on anything that the software makers didn't think of in advance, and that's very ironic since the most original uses of any software always come from the users, not from the software makers.

For instance, what if an indie studio wanted to create a game relying heavily on precise terrain simulation, but their base terrain model exceeds the export limit ? All of a sudden they become "not indie enough". Another example : I've used an earlier version of MayaLT in the past to test it out for Dota2 asset creation, and even for such a seemingly "low budget" task I bumped into the export limit back then.

These scenarios are near impossible to predict, meaning that no user survey will ever be able to cover them all ...

In fact I was thinking about a level a la Uncharted, or The Last of Us.

If your hardware can handle it, I don't see the problems of modeling an entire level in one file, as long as you keep the scene organized you won't find issues, I have to try what XSI can chew with its GigaCore though.

You can isolate a portion of your scene by using Layers, but also for example, in Cinema 4D, I can take an unpolished object, open a new file, paste it in, add details to the object alone and, while keeping the main project open in another window, paste it back when I'm done.

I find really annoying to work with chunks of a level at the time, and I'm not talking about sci-fi corridors, or modular objects, but anyway at some points, you have to evaluate your project as a whole.

There are also cinematics, even if you can't render them in Maya LT, this doesn't mean that you can't make them with it, you are paying to use the software, so why I can't use Maya LT for make what I can with it? Actually I'd prefer not to, but there are a lot of people who enjoys working with Maya but they don't have the money to buy a full license, so LT would be their only legal option. I know that if they remove this limitations, they'll create a competitor to full Maya.

Anyway, let's pretend that there are no ways to export over 100K polygon mesh, so that they'll keep the price low, and everyone is happy with the workarounds lol.

Rwolf

Hello XSI my old friend.

antweiler

I think with mayas GPU cache, one can handle huge amounts of static geometry in a scene with a powerful graphics card. I dont know, whether its in LT, or how it compares with XSIs GigaCore. But to be implemented as a good Level Editor it definately requires Python support.