[MAYA] VS [Blender3D]: merging animation layers tools comparison

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  Nixellion polycounter lvl 11

  Sep 16 2025

  Merge Layers tool in Maya has options, you can click on the option box next to it in the dropdown menu. By default, I believe, is has Smart Bake on and, surprise, it's not very smart. It kind of causes baking to not snap to frames. Like adaptive keyframe density based on what the animation is. So it can often cause tens of keyframes or more be bakes in between each frame.
  
  You can disable it and bake only on keyframes, which is usually much faster, and an animation like the above would also bake in a couple seconds.
  
  And for when you need to bake all animation to a single layer you can also use the Bake tool under Edit - Keys. 

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  evilmushroom polycounter lvl 10

  Sep 22 2025

  Nixellion said:

  Merge Layers tool in Maya has options, you can click on the option box next to it in the dropdown menu. By default, I believe, is has Smart Bake on and, surprise, it's not very smart. It kind of causes baking to not snap to frames. Like adaptive keyframe density based on what the animation is. So it can often cause tens of keyframes or more be bakes in between each frame.
  
  You can disable it and bake only on keyframes, which is usually much faster, and an animation like the above would also bake in a couple seconds.
  
  And for when you need to bake all animation to a single layer you can also use the Bake tool under Edit - Keys. 

  Thanks for the reply. Just to clarify, Smart Bake wasn’t enabled, so the slowdown isn’t from that. Blender does the same operation in 2 seconds, Maya takes 3 minutes (same rig same machine). That’s not about options that’s about architecture.
  and please take a second to think about your reply, imagine adding an option to your program that uses more resources to deliver worst results in longer time.

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