I don't have Maya loaded so bare with me. "When I hit the 3 key, it turns my polygons into sub division surfaces; right?" Absolutely not, its stay a polygon no matter what button you press [1], [2], [3] ... only "convert to" will convert polygon to subdivision or NURBS.
I'm learning Maya at the moment, so bear with me... When I hit the 3 key, it turns my polygons into sub division surfaces; right? The reason why I'm asking is, after I hit the 3 key, I went to modify and tried to convert the sub division surfaces to polygons, it said that it couldn't do that... Kind of confused here... And…
If you want to subdivide your model so it looks like when press 3 but with more actual polygons, with 3 "on" go to - convert - smoothmesh preview to polygons. You can edit the smoothmesh preview per object. Go to the shape node of the mesh, under Smooth Mesh, with 3 on, you can change the Preview Division Levels, default…