Exluna ( abandonware? ) I think I remember it werking on XP and getting good results/renders as well. Edit: I jes remembered. My avatar was Exluna rendered and I had a version of curves rendered as whiskers as well. I was really happy with how that turned out. ( I'll try to dig it up )
You can render curves in Maya. Use paint effects and Maya software render. A lot of features once you do it. When I get up in the morn, if you didn't find the solution on how to use Paint Effects and the curves I'll do a quick tut.
OK, got a decent start on it tonight, hopefully I will have something worth showing tomorrow. With any luck I can make this just as easy as Max's renderable splines.
Yeah the lack of this feature kills me in Maya. I used "renderable spline" all the time in Max, it's so handy. Maybe I'll try a quick and easy script this weekend, it shouldn't be too hard, and if I aim for the Max functionality then people should like it :)
I don't think it needs a script, I think you just need to set that Paint Effects menu item as a shelf or marking menu item somewhere handy so you don't have to keep switching to the Rendering menu every time you want to make a renderable curve. Once you've clicked that button, all the controls you need are easily…
Uhh, not hidden away. Heh, I've been using that function pretty much since Paint Effects was introduced uh, a long time ago. It was one of hte first things I looked into after Mental Ray became part of Maya. Never knew about renderable spline in Max though...Not much of a Max guy.
lol (by the way, this not an "aimed at you" lol. This is a aimed at prehistoric programs LAWLZ) You'll have to use good old extrude along path. There has been attempts at reproducing the 'renderable splines' functionality but none I saw working properly. I even had a Maya tech guy telling me upfront "HAHAHA YOU DON'T NEED…