Share your secret weapon...!

[Flo]

i like the drawSplit Tool..... you can also set it to mulit splice and get multiple evenly spaced cvs.

[Octagon]

Originally posted by Flo
i like the drawSplit Tool..... you can also set it to mulit splice and get multiple evenly spaced cvs.

hehe, cool thread. let's find out who knows the cooles tricks in maya! :buttrock:

i like using artisan with push/pull flood on geometry for easy bulge/shrink effects like push did in good ol' soft.

matthias

[ceql]

I love a healthy combo of MJPoly Tools, artisan, DrawSplit and lots of Lattice deformers for modeling :thumbsup:

[tropistic]

Originally posted by pearson
For me, it's Subdivide. I didn't know that you could use it to split edges...

Hmm...I can't seem to get it to work. Exactly how is this done, and - if it's just adding verts to the edges, what do you use it for?

And here's a little secret weapon for drawSplit fans: get the cly_drawSplitDrag script from highend. Adds an interactive slide (ala MJ Poly Tools) to the split.

Cool thread...

Jay

[ceql]

I love GI_Joe from pixho too, imho everyone should have it :)

[edit: well, in pre-Maya 4.5 days anyway ;)]

[colt]

Imho, Connect Poly Shape, even for Maya 4.5, is a must.

[rebo]

Xumi 2.0 and UV mapping a head in 2 seconds by smooth-flood->spherical map->blend shape.

[bentllama]

my fist to the monitor...

... i can't live without that technique. it always seems to break up the cloud of doom that makes things in maya go awry...

oh, and xdugef is very handy too...

[bigfatMELon]

Compound List Tools for variable size string matrices in MEL. StringTools to keep me away from REGEX. UltraPose for pose libraries and animation transfers. AppleScript for "telling" Maya to source and run a script from another application so I can debug it from an external editor without having to switch apps.

-jl

[Heber]

xdugef, i keep hearing this all the time? anyone care to elaborate? bentllama maybe? pls

[ceql]

xdugef?


...




hehe it's just something silly ;)
http://www.cgtalk.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=2170

[Peter Reynolds]

export obj to Wings 3D

import obj from Wings 3D

[bugo]

Rebo: do you know where can I find this Xumi 2.0? :beer:

[mark_wilkins]

Utility nodes in lieu of expressions.

-- Mark

[wrend]

http://www.maya-xtools.com/

for xumi. is good.

[Maya Ayanami]

I just recently found out how to do a diagnostic render for mental ray.

your renders look like you are looking through a thermal camera.
I also love the short cuts.
did you know that you can "rip off" the view panels from Maya and go full screen. it is in the panels menu(I think).:surprised

[pearson]

Flo - Now that I am working in quads more, I'm going to have to get drawsplit. Is it a d/l from A|W, or highend3d?

Octagon - That drove me crazy until someone showed me that trick! I kept thinking that scale had to work, but it doesn't.

Ceql - Haven't tried MJPT. Everyone seems to love them, so I guess I should d/l it.

Tropistic - Just grab the edges, go Edit Polygons > Subdivide. You can open the option box and set the minimum edge length (you may have to if you haven't ever used it...I seem to recall that the default won't work). Since I always work in tri's at work, I just triangulate after subdividing and then I can flip edges as needed. As I mentioned above, though, in my personal stuff I use quads and this way isn't very effective; I'm going to try drawsplit.

Rebo - This sounds very interesting...can you give a bit more info?

Bentllama - I heard it was your fist to the head of your cube-mate! Then you get him in trouble for 'sleeping' on the job!:thumbsup: And Xdugef isn't a tool, it's a way of life!!! Long live xdugef!!

bigfatMELon - What do you use MEL to do? I use it, but only to call maya functions in sequence (for example: scale -x, freeze trans, flip normals, set render opposite flags to false). I feel like I'm missing out on the power of MEL.

Great! Keep 'em coming!:thumbsup:

[bugo]

Im using:

- Kaydara programs for animation...
- poly plugins like the bonus game ones and the wedge faces!

dont remember anymore... :rolleyes:

pearson: what this Flo do? :shrug:

[Flo]

bugo > Flo is mostly doing modeling :)

pearson > get it directly from AW ..... man, it took them some weeks to recompile it for 4.5. that was a tough waiting time for me.
and also get the drag addon tropistic mentioned, though it has thsi little bug (like mjPoly) that you have to manually delete the polySplit node (or edgeLoop ..) node after deleting history.


Flo

[kfc]

it's recompiled for 4.5?
:)
hmmm.... i haven't find any place where i can download it yet. are u going to share this compiled drawsplit for 4.5 with us?

[stunndman]

Originally posted by kfc
it's recompiled for 4.5?
:)
hmmm.... i haven't find any place where i can download it yet. are u going to share this compiled drawsplit for 4.5 with us?

isn't that the draw split tool contained in the bonus game package from AW ? if you are refering to this tool then it's available on AW's support site

[Flo]

yep, its recompiled since end of december.
just grap it from the alias site.

Flo

[rebo]

o_O one more that ive just discovered.

ieForMaya (www.highend3d.com), lets you have a IE panel in maya so you can view PDFs tutorials and helpfiles with ease without alt tabing or clumsily flicking between apps.

Its Geeerrrraaat:bounce:

[Ckerr812]

Any script with the initials js in front of it...a freakin life saver :)

Oh..yes..and xdugef...but if it is the technique that I am thinking about...it's nothing new.....Nurbs modelers have been using that techniques sinse back in 95. ...:D

oh and one other thing I could never live without.....My secret weapon of all weapons.... :beer: ...mmmm

[sasquatch]

A couple of scripts I always use:

detachSeparate

Nuke history, Reattach skin (I think the script's called fixWeights). Lets you delete the history from a skinned mesh without losing the weighting info without messing about.

other than that, mostly just the regular stuff; the extrude tools, subdivide, Split poly.

[Octagon]

also useful very useful are Dirk Bialluchs

randomizeChannel
randomizePoints

scripts.
I esp. like randomizeChannel since its such a clever use of mayas nodes to accomplish something "new" (he uses a fractal shading node to randomize animation).

renderWindo
script is also really great. Help out a lot when you need to batch render out of the uior want to batch render regions (animated textures) etc.

btw, if anyone has some experience with particles. i'm having difficulties rendering my scenes in batch. some of them take like 5 minutes to pre-process before starting render (2.4gigaherz dual machine, 10k polys, about 5000 particles, all is cached, no raytracing, 1 light). withouth renderWindo i'd have a huge problem with my testrenders ...

matthias

[The Cross]

Difficult to say what my favourite tool in Maya is, The appication is so flexable...In terms of Modeling i'm more of a nurbs man, so i'd say a CV Curve tool with Cubic output. And the Ableness to biral and Loft is a part of that. Tessalation leveling in the attribute editor is commonly used in some areas, which has been known to make me happy.

Other than that, Hypershade is great too....It connects us to photoshop and the UV's of our surfaces.


Can't think of anything else i might abuse more than that although i dig the whole package.

[Zero_Gambit]

WHOA!!! sasquatch, ive been looking for those scripts for my whole entire life! could you please tell me where i can get them?

[BadMange]

Anyone here use the MOVE tool? I find it indispensible when modeling. :p

"But seriously folks," I'm just learning Maya and this thread is opening up a world of possibilities, as I was just thinking the other day how I keep discovering these tools in Maya. I can't wait to know Maya well enough to try the plug-ins from the A|W and Highend 3d sites.

Currently, I'm learning to use the Artisan sculpting tools by doing the Jack-In-The-Box tutorial from Learning Maya. I'm totally impressed with it, but it's pissing me off to no end at the same time. I like using it with my Wacom tablet... Happy Happy, Joy Joy!

-Bad Mange

[atzfratz]

Hey guys, i just wanted to throw in the paint selection tool, i started to love it when i was working on lots of cylindrical shapes for some catheter stuff. Its so cool to simply draw your selection onto the object, and by the way. The backface components are not selected and by the simple artisan hotkeys you can define the brush when it doesnt suit your wishes. maybe someone finds that usefull :)

[RichSuchy]

Wrap deformer/ negative Wrap deformer 2 for one blend shapes.

When I do blendshapes for cartoons, I need to build view dependent morph targets, biased for right side, and left side viewing. I discovered that if i use two wrap deformers on a symetrical model (one negative, one posative) I could get 2 blend shapes for the price of one and I wouldnt even have to bake it... The blend shapes blend nicely togather! which means you can hand one side off to the other as the character rotates... I've used this trick to derive left and right sides and repair models with screwed up point order as well.

If you want to test it for yoursel I suggest making a 3 spheres and one negative sphere (scaled at -1 on x) and then create a blend shape from one sphere to both a posative and negative sphere... then use those posative and negative spheres as a wrap deformer on the remaining sphere... then test the blend shapes and mix them ands see how nicely they blend.

[RichSuchy]

Originally posted by sasquatch
A couple of scripts I always use:

detachSeparate

Nuke history, Reattach skin (I think the script's called fixWeights). Lets you delete the history from a skinned mesh without losing the weighting info without messing about.

other than that, mostly just the regular stuff; the extrude tools, subdivide, Split poly.

wow, that would have saved me a lot of work... well practice is good for the craft eh?

is that included with maya, or a dawnload somewhere?

[Gremlin]

hmmm.... my secret weapon? well, I do know that nurbs surface fillets make ANYTHING look good :scream:

hehe, anywho... im just putting all this stuff into my own personal maya book, anyone want a copy? :D
Cheers,
:beer:

[Levitateme]

i have the bonus tools for 5. i had them for 4.5, but i could never get the draw split tool to work. can someone walk me through it, it says soemthing like select a edge and a neighboring face? i tried and could never get it to work. just a exp would be really apprecited. tahnks

some of my favorite scripts are.

xyz average.
loop split
delete edge.

[rock]

Like Levita, I have no clue how drawSplit works. I install it in bonusGames 5 but don't understand how or what it requires to draw or split.

As for my secret weapon, it's this forum. :thumbsup:

[koinu]

Okay someone please make a list and site that all these can be found at, I ran into some sites that came back wrong.. As for my fav. maya tool, it would have to be the exit button..... After long hours of staring at a model I find it a great tool. Split poly and connectPolyShape are probley my most used tools. Although there are the few hotkey tool that I have customized for better work flow.And for all those of you that are new to maya, try hiding all your unused windows and learn to use the hotbox. You'll be amazed at how much space you have to model/animate in... Well just words of my vice......MAYA... Love her, Hate her, Need her... damn nows she's callig me to play!!!!:surprised

[ceql]

ok, Here's the basic gist of drawsplit:
(5 sec tutorial :bounce: )

[Bri_Spencer]

Polyconnect Sub-d hands down. I'm surprised that no one listed it yet. It is just like CPS but uses Sub-d's instead of polys. The script is on highend-3d.:buttrock: :buttrock: :buttrock:

[Kinematics]

My favourite id guess wouldnt be that special and its not a tool but a great method. its simple to :)
First i get the basic shape outta nurbs then covert em to polys, then work out details then SUBD BABY! :)

So Nurbs-Polys-SubD. Thats a way of life
Special thanks to StevenStahlberg for introducing it too me.

[Bri_Spencer]

Kinematics- Hellz yeah, that is workflow that I use the other half of the time. Stahlberg is the man!!!!

[sasquatch]

Rich Suchy: the fixWeights script isn't posted up anywhere at the moment as far as I can tell; it's by a guy named Jan-Bart van Beek, but his site seems to have disappeared. If you want it PM me, and I'll mail it on to you.

*edit* there is an old version of the script on highend in mel scripts>animation. Whilst it doesn't work fully in 4.5 (haven't tried it in 5) ie: it won't generate the menu items, you can still call the mel script directly (source it in the script editor, type fixWeight -default in the command line). It seems to work fine.

detachSeparate is available on highend3d, in the mel scripts>polygons section.

[Mananetwork]

Project Curve on Surface :buttrock:

[Gremlin]

drawsplit looks sweet if your working with a reference....
just draw on the detail :scream:

[Levitateme]

thanks ceq, but i guess im thinking of a differnt tool, i used that long ago . thanks for the tut, ill find out what tool i was using and then reply back on here maybe someone can help me out with that tool once i find what it is.

[sinistar]

some really cools tools i've found recently is the select contiguous edges tool, grow shrink selection tool and convert selection to faces, verts,edges tools dunno how I lived without them before.

[Lyr]

make live :thumbsup:

[nemirc]

the automatic keyframe tool :rolleyes:
That's the one I can't live without :surprised

[ragecgi]

THough not really a secret, I LOVE watching the UV editor window AS I press the UVLayout command!

It's so fricken cool:)

..also, in case it hasn't been said before, the DannyUV tools melscripts ROCK!

[rock]

Ceql,

Thanks for the 5-sec tutorial of drawSplit. I could split when I draw before, I think, because on certain angle it doesn't seem to split.

But everything is cool now. Sometimes when it doesn't split, I just reverse the draw. That is, instead of splitting from top to bottom, I split bottom to top.

[chips__]

my new weapon of choice has to be mental rays dielectric shader in maya!!

[RichSuchy]

Originally posted by chips__
my new weapon of choice has to be mental rays dielectric shader in maya!!

whats that do?

[chips__]

Good question actually :D

it makes stuff like glass and fluids look absolutely gorgeous. And since i'm working on a commercial for carlsberg beer at the moment, i just love it :D Slow as hell though, but just beautiful!

[RichSuchy]

Originally posted by chips__
Good question actually :D

it makes stuff like glass and fluids look absolutely gorgeous. And since i'm working on a commercial for carlsberg beer at the moment, i just love it :D Slow as hell though, but just beautiful!

thanks for the tip. Ill check it out.

[chips__]

http://www.hartwig.dk/wip/bottle_.jpg

the first test i did with it. don't mind about the hands... long story :)

[RichSuchy]

Originally posted by chips__


the first test i did with it. don't mind about the hands... long story :)

I turned my monitor brightness up. I think I see what it does. thanks

[chips__]

i think it's some sort of fresnel thing :)

[Atwooki]

Nobody using 'clayDough' here???
Very handy 'magnet' tool for many types of smooth editing, especially in those 'post hires up ' situations....

from:

http://macvizion.com/Claydough/scripts/clay-dough_1.5.zip

or:

http://www.highend3d.com/maya/mel/?section=modeling#1097


and:

'Smooth UV' from CoyHot;
smoothes polysmoothed polys' UV's

from here:
http://www.coyhot.fr.st



Atwooki

[RichSuchy]

I've been doing it the hard way, trying to make latices work, or wrap deformers shapes, or just by hand... I'll have to take a look at that.

Originally posted by Atwooki
Nobody using 'clayDough' here???
Very handy 'magnet' tool for many types of smooth editing, especially in those 'post hires up ' situations....

from:

http://macvizion.com/Claydough/scripts/clay-dough_1.5.zip

or:

http://www.highend3d.com/maya/mel/?section=modeling#1097


and:

'Smooth UV' from CoyHot;
smoothes polysmoothed polys' UV's

from here:
http://www.coyhot.fr.st



Atwooki

[ktpr]

This is more of a secret weapon technique :) I found this out today while struggling with uv mapping.

Ktprs Pretty Quick UV mapping:

1. Select faces you want to uv map.

2. Auto map your faces with a plane setting somewhere between 4 and 12. 4 is good for simpler faces while 12 is good for more complex geometry variation.

3. Select the outer edges of the whole face selection. Store these edges as a selection set, which will be deselected later (qssManager from highend3d.com does this).

4. In the uv texture editor switch to edge mode. Region select all the edges of the auto mapped faces. Deselect the outer edges from the selection set you just made. Be sure to deselect any other outer edges from neighboring faces. Now you have all the internal edges that belong to your set of faces.

5. Preform Sew+Move. Volia!

remember you can use poly smooth with world or uniform values to clean up wiggles. World smoothing works wonders. You can also select bad faces, plane map them, scale them down, and sew+move edges of the bad faces to stick it back in place...

This is best applied on sub areas that have similar general geometry. Variation is fine but to much will throw the auto map off and you'll have to apply it to a smaller region.

Also look at the AutoMap tool that comes with the bonus game pack. It's interesting. uses up a lot of ram cause it writes to history, though.


hope this helps someone :)
cheers
ktpr

[Atwooki]

Hi ktpr
I've been using a similar technique in a somewhat more labored and long-winded way...
This looks like a very useful workflow, and I think has great scripting possibilities (at least for the main part!)
Thanks for the tip! :thumbsup:

To Rich:
Still working on my NURBS patch tut, man :wip: (see avatar).... hadn't forgotten; just work getting in the way! :annoyed:

Atwooki

[RichSuchy]

Originally posted by Atwooki
To Rich:
Still working on my NURBS patch tut, man :wip: (see avatar).... hadn't forgotten; just work getting in the way! :annoyed:

Cant wait to see it. Someone suggested to me setting up my patches without the extra end CV... then when I set up tangency as a final step I can worry about that... are you familiar with doing that?

oops thats another topic.

Atwooki

[stallion151]

not sure if many people know this but when working with NURBS you can keep the wireframe detail at max as well as the shaded
eg.

create a sphere and make it level one detail (1 key)
then go into your atttribute editor and go to NURBS Surface History and change the second one Crv Surface Display( i think) to 4 or how high you want and you have a much cleaner wireframe area.

[ktpr]

hey thanks Atwooki. I'm waiting for a nurbs patch tut too, btw. Subds are very nice but I think once you learn Nurbs it all doesn't matter... The lack of mapping options for subds has driven me insane.

btw for deselecting stuff it's a lot easier to do it in the texture editor, with ctrl region selection around offending edges.

Also the Bonus Game pack comes with "invertCompSelection.mel" which inverts the selected components. So if you convert the user's selection from faces to edges, get the inverse selection as the outer perimeter, you could automap and merge+sew those edges after deselecting the perimeter. I think I'll make a quick script sometime this week and post it here; unless someone beats me to it :).

cheers
ktpr

[Levitateme]

ktpr, so your selecting the edges on the outside of your uvs shell? like so the whole edge on the outside is selected? not really clear on what your doing. is it possible you could post a pic? of your end result

[loked]

I have really got to be honest about this one. My favourite tool by far has got to be "UNDO". :bounce:

What would any of us do without it ;)

Later:wavey:
loked

[Klark]

Originally posted by loked
I have really got to be honest about this one. My favourite tool by far has got to be "UNDO". :bounce:

What would any of us do without it ;)

Later:wavey:
loked

I believe HongKonger, (see his thread), is trying to come to terms with this invaluable tool.

My own secret weapon: When I first started learning Maya, it was with the help of Maya Fundamentals, (By Jim Lammers), it came with custom marking-menus. Now I can´t live without them.

[Bpanting]

My own secret weapon: When I first started learning Maya, it was with the help of Maya Fundamentals, (By Jim Lammers), it came with custom marking-menus. Now I can´t live without them.

What were the custom marking menus that you got with the book?

[loked]

Originally posted by Klark
I believe HongKonger, (see his thread), is trying to come to terms with this invaluable tool.


Now thats one funny thread and he's really serious about it too :argh: What's the world coming to????

Thanks for that Klark!!!

later:wavey:
loked

[ktpr]

Levitateme -

yeah I select basically the border edge. Here's a brief discription:

1. Select the faces you want to map. Try not to pick areas that branch out (arm and torso, etc).

2.
download qssManager. You can deselect and store quick select sets. At highend3d.com

- Store the face selection as a quick set for later selection.

- Convert your faces to edges. Using ctrl and the lasso tool deselect all the interior edges until only the border edges are there. Store this as a quick set too.

3. Select the faces in the quick select set. Auto map (use anyting from 4 to 12 planes).

4. Convert the selection to edges. Deselect the borderEdge set you made. Press Move+Sew.

cheers
ktpr

[pearson]

One thing that I never see anyone else do is turn off the Title Bar for Maya. Under Windows > Settings/Preferences > Preferences, in the section titled "Interface" (this is the default section, btw), uncheck "Show Title Bar In Main Window".

People ask me how I close or minimize Maya without the title bar, but it's simple. Mouse over the Widows Taskbar and click the Maya task item. This will minimize Maya if it is currently the window with focus. It will also maximize (restore) Maya if it is minimized. To close Maya, simply right click the Maya task item on the Taskbar and select "Close".

It may not seem like much screen is being wasted by the Title Bar, but when combined with the Menu Bar in both the Main Window and in each Panel (use the Hotbox people!), you will gain alot of screen space!

[edit] Here is a screengrab of my Maya environment:
http://www.geocities.com/pear_son001/screenSpace.txt

[Levitateme]

yah, for my marking menus i have a menu called UI, it does everything i want either turned on or off.

[Klark]

Originally posted by Kwyjibo
What were the custom marking menus that you got with the book?

Well basically I use all of the Hotkeys provided with the book, stuff like turning off/on menus and opening the Hypershade or Outliner. Lots of stuff like that, not complicated but smart and fast.

The custom marking-menus I mostly use are: nurbsCreation:nurbsEditing, polyCreation:polyEditing and curveCreation:curveEditing. Each of them contains numerous options when activated, all with optionBoxes too.

These are accessed(spelling?) by combinations of leftCtrl,Alt and leftMB. Since the Alt- and Z-key are so much in use anyway it´s pretty well laid out considering my leftHand is already there.

Then there are a couple of others but I don´t use them so much.

Here is a link to the book:

http://www.trinity3d.com/xcart/customer/product.php?productid=471&cat=6&page=1

[Bpanting]

Very cool, I will have to check it out. Thanks :thumbsup:

[yinako]

* Rotate UV by 45 degree angle tool, press 2 times for 90 degrees
* FlipUV horizontally and vertically.

These tools are must for game devs, its installed as buttons on UV editor from game bonus tools.

[Levitateme]

the uv editor, it sure has some great tools i think as well.

[Peter Reynolds]

Don't know it its been said, but for me obj import and export is essential.

Maya and Wings get along great.

[ktpr]

Atwooki, Levitateme and anyone else who is interested in quick subd uv mapping:

I scripted up the automapping and merging faces thing I wrote about the otherday. It's at highend3d.com, called

ktpr_subdAutoMap

You pick level 0 (or higher if you really want to) faces and it'll go up the heirarchy and plane/auto map those faces and then merge them. The automap option is a bit faster than planar mapping.

The script is based on Steven T. L. Roselle's bgAutomaticTrackMapWin which comes with the Bonus Game Pack (the autoMap function).

cheers
ktpr

[Levitateme]

ktpr, im going to download right now and try it out thanks. you know how to make a tweak function just like the one in wings? you should work on that next, there is a plug in for it, but its not for maya 5. just throwing that out there at ja. thanks again!

[Atwooki]

Hi ktpr

Tried loading your 'Automap' plugin; does'nt seem to want to load up tho'.....:shrug:

Any suggestions?

----> tried typing in: AutoMap(30); which generated errors....

Given your past excellence in the subD script 'n plugin field I'm sure that it's me at fault!


Atwooki

[ktpr]

heheh. My script is telepathic. :) It takes no input.

Open up the script in the script editor. Hit ctrl-a to select all the text. Drag it to the shelf. It's now a button you can press.

If you want to run from the console you can just type:

ktpr_subdAutoMap();

also I updated the script because while using I found a bug. I also noted some limitations. Re-download it if you don't have ver 1.1.

cheers
ktpr

[JeffYashiroCGT]

my secret weapon is

my pfx shelf and my dynamics shelf.

simple.

quiet

but deadly.

[Levitateme]

these arent secret weapons, but im sure that some new users to maya could find this helpful. a few things on here are just how i work that maybe people havent thought of trying. i wouldnt work like this unless it was really fast.

Tips: press W, E, R LMB to access the tools options
hold ALT+Shift Rotate camera, it will be a linear rotate.

i also use the component move tool alot, for my Q key i ahve a marking menu with alot of the selection type tools i use

Component move+paint select+Lasso+Sculpt polygon

thisis just me talking, but ever since i started using maya i always had a shelf with all my most used tools on it. my freind always said use marking menus there so much faster. well i always thought my shelf's were pleanty fast.

here is how i have mine set up, its all on the space bar, every tool i mainly use is on here. this is a PSD image originally, in N, W, E i have RMB also for things like Component/object mode, delete, i try to keep my hands on my mouse at all times. i can work so fast that alot of times im just in a zone, were i just work and dont think about were my tools are. its very fast.


http://home.bresnan.net/~planetofsound/WebHelp/MayaHotbox.gif

[Modulok]

Modify>transformation tools>proportional Modifycation tool...

She works wonders when you need to just tweak a dense mesh :)


That, and Non-linea deformers... :drool: They speed things up ooo so much.


-Modulok-

[the_zed_axis]

hey rebo can u be a lil more specific about ur uv mapping technique thanks in advance

[Atwooki]

Hey ktpr!

Forgot to thank you for your 'sudDAutoMap' script...
Works great :applause:

- the minor udate made a difference.

Cheers

Atwooki

[RichSuchy]

nodeLock (problem locked node);
delete (problem now unlocked node);

[rISO]

ok,
it's not a secret but IMHO the possibility to switch between poly, nurbs and SubD is f***ing cool :thumbsup: i use it often to solve some problems when i am lost doing a model because some kind of operations are easier with the right one :)

[FloydBishop]

It's not really a tool so much as a technique, but I use the += and -= in the curve editor to nudge groups of keys all the time.

It works great for things like joint chains on tail and such.

Set your keys, and then step from joint to joint, doing a +=# or -=# (where # is a number of frames) to offset the animation, making a really nice wave.

I also use "alt+>" and "alt+<" to step through animation quite a bit.

[Peter Reynolds]

I use a Griffin Technology Power Mate to scrub through the time line and jump from key to key among other things. Its also handy for zooming in photoshop, etc.

[Modulok]

I use a Griffin Technology Power Mate to scrub through the time line and jump from key to key among other things. Its also handy for zooming in photoshop, etc.

Now THAT looks kewl! Must have :drool:


...this is a great thread, keep em comming guys!

[Levitateme]

peter, what does that do exactly?

[Peter Reynolds]

It plugs in via USB, and you can set it up to perform all sorts of functions in whatever applications you like. Its PC and Mac friendly.

I hear its very handy with shake, and I'm sure it would be great for editing programs like Final Cut Pro or Avid Xpress DV. If I was an editor out in the field with a laptop, I think it would be my new best friend.

Its definitely not a MUST HAVE, but its still nice to use with maya. Particularly when I'm animating.

Check it out at:

www.griffintechnology.com (http://www.griffintechnology.com)

[Levitateme]

good lord 45 bucks...haha thats great. looks really cool. i would definatley get,but rarley animate.

[vg1]

personally, I love to use lattices as a main modeling tool. They sure come in handy when having to move multiple verts at once.

If anyone not sure on how to use a lattice as a modeling tool, just select your mesh, or select verts you want to work with, go to animate=>deform=>lattice and create lattice. You can up lattice sections thru input in channel box. Then select lattice points and start tweeking.

vic

[TheShaddix]

my favourite tool is smooth proxy when i model using polygons.
U cant use it with plain objects unless you combine your plain with a cube or a sphere, then it works. I dont consider it a secret weapon but maybe someone could find it useful. This thread is cool.

[Levitateme]

if anyone has played with wings 3d, they knwo about its great great tweak tool


if (`selectPref -q -clickDrag`)
selectPref -clickDrag false;
else
selectPref -clickDrag true;

i have that as part of one of my marking menus. it turns on or off the click drag its exactly like the tweak tool without the radius, i turn it on when i want to start really moving verts very handy. my friend is recompiling the TWEAK plugin that is suppose to be just like wings tweak with fall off and everything. so im just using this until he gets that done.

[rISO]

guys u wonder how useful are "Center Pivot" and "Freeze Transformations" Buttons :beer:

[Levitateme]

i have hotkey for center pivot. but i just go to the menu to freeze.

[jadamburke]

To elaborate on what floyd said, you can use any text field like a spreadsheet. += and a number will add that number to the current value, this works in the channel bar, attrib editor, graph editor etc and probably any text field for numbers in maya. you can also use other arithmetic symbols in place of the plus sign.

You can use text fields in the attribute editor like sliders by ctrl-middle clicking and dragging for .1 increment right clicking for 1.0 increment. Good for visually positioning selection handles.

you can type simple expressions right into text fields of the attribute editor by puting an equal sign at the beginning.

For animators, if you hold the k key down you can scrub your animation by simply moving your mouse left and right. It will also work in the graph editor and dope sheet.

[mental]

Originally posted by jadamburke
To elaborate on what floyd said, you can use any text field like a spreadsheet. += and a number will add that number to the current value, this works in the channel bar, attrib editor, graph editor etc and probably any text field for numbers in maya. you can also use other arithmetic symbols in place of the plus sign.hello adam, i'm having trouble getting this to work. i have a cube with a Y translation of 1. if i wanted to add 2 to that value i click on the TY text field in the channel box and press the '+=' with 2. the command has no effect and the value stays at one. :shrug:

[cgmonster]

You must type in channel box "+=2" end push enter-

wholaa

[MikeRhone]

Modify->Evaluate nodes->Ignore all just saved my life.

It allows you to disable all IK, Expressions, set driven keys etc so you can get back to the characters bind pose AFTER the rig is set up. ( I used to do it manually, but with over 200 nodes, expressions, constraints I would have died)


dagPose -reset -name bindPose1 (Where bindPose1 is the name of the current bindpose you are working with)

This allows you to reset the attributes/orientation on a joint after its bound and rigged.

Import/export skin wieght maps.

Ever have a modeler make changes after you've started rigging? Use import/export skin weight maps on any un-altered geometry and you'll be one happy TD.

Its amazing how much you can learn in one day when the thumbscrews are tightening hehe.

Next post: What to do when you need to do cloth but cant USE cloth. ;)

[Levitateme]

rhone dog. i have seen people use lattice deformes, and soft bodies. that always looked nice.

[SDIT]

so much to learn... thanx for keeping up with this guys
VERY VERY helpful!!!
:scream: :applause:

[SDIT]

ohhh btw levitateme... your tuts are great!

cheers

[ntmonkey]

My favorite tool as of late has been relax UVs in the Texture Editor Window. This is good for getting rid of overlapping UVs. What I do is get the UV borders the way I want them. Then Relax UVs (make sure to check pin border), and boom, UVs don't overlap anymore.

Lu

[Gremlin]

lol, that "powermate" looks awesome, but think of the posibilities with gaming...LOL, i'm so getting that baby, and I'm gonna configure it to zoom, or something... and I'll set it up next to my mouse! :surprised

[isome]

finalRig...wouldn't have the time to do anything else without it...

[Incrediblah]

Create > Polygon Primitives > Cube.

[dmcgrath]

________________This___________ (http://www.vislab.ucl.ac.uk/imgbr_lobes.html)

[pearson]

LOL, dmcgrath, that's the tool I use the least!

NTmonkey, I too, have been using relaxUVs to great effect. It doesn't handle cliffs too well though, tearing quite alot. Seems to be projected along the Y axis or something

[Flo]

don`t know if it was already mentioned , but the `shift + m` and `crtl + m` default hotkey gives you a littlemore screenspace.

Flo

[Peter Reynolds]

***

[Count_Zr0]

I make a custom hotKey for each of the things I'd like to toggle on and off really fast (i.e. - polys, nurbs, joints, cameras, x-ray, wireframe on shaded, etc.)

Just create a custom hotkey w/ this as the command:

"//by J.Parks - Count_Zr0@yahoo.com
if (`getPanel -to (eval("getPanel -withFocus"))`){
$currentPanel = `getPanel -withFocus`;
if (`modelEditor -q -polymeshes $currentPanel`){
modelEditor -edit -polymeshes 0 $currentPanel;
}
else {
modelEditor -edit -polymeshes 1 $currentPanel;
}
}"

Substitue -nurbsSurfaces, or -joints, or -cameras, or -xray, or -wos , etc. for -polymeshes in the above script for other hotkeys.

I use -xray toggle on and off about 10 baZillion times a day. Hope this speeds up your day a bit too.

Enjoy! - jason

[pearson]

I use this all the time. So much that I forgot about it, but I find it very useful when I want to line up uvs and want to turn off the wires so they don't obstruct my view. Also useful for checking edges for hard/softness.


if (`displayPref -q -wsa` == "full")
displayPref -wsa "none";
else displayPref -wsa "full";

[dmcgrath]

I don't know if anyone has mentioned this before but it really is nice to know.

That little white box at the top right area where you can type the name of an object in to quick select it. You can also use wildcards to get all objects of a certain name.

For example, if you have at least one ik handle in the scene. You can type in ikHandle1 to select it (if that is still the default name).

But if you have several and want them all, you could type in ikHandle* with the wildcard modifier and it will select all things named similarly.

Did that make sense?
:drool:

[MikeRhone]

Constrain>>Orient>>Options

Check Maintain Offset.

This allows you to constrain the orient of an object, without having the constrained object "pop" into place.

**New in Maya 5.0. VEY cool feature

[nottoshabi]

Originally posted by Rhonedog
Constrain>>Orient>>Options

Check Maintain Offset.

This allows you to constrain the orient of an object, without having the constrained object "pop" into place.

**New in Maya 5.0. VEY cool feature


Does that work for point to???

[Levitateme]

The new Tweak plugin for maya. that you can get off cgtalk.

http://www.cgtalk.com/showthread.php?threadid=47098&goto=newpost

that is the last page. but the tweak dont have all the featuers taht wings3d does for exp. but it works which is great.

[nottoshabi]

I got the bonus tools for 5. But I dont know what moust of them do or how they work. Does anyone know of a read me file or anything that describes what they are and how they work?

[Ocean Size]

Okay, this one is simple, but a lot of people seem to forget about it, I just love the Recent Commands menu under the Hotbox, I think it's pretty handy if you don't wanna switch menu sets or shelves constantly, I'm all about the least amount of mouse travelling possible, so this one helps to limit how often I have to drag my mouse ALL THE WAY up to the shelves tab or what have you.

:cool: :D

[Bob27]

I have the same question as above. Is there a guide or short tutorials for Maya 5 bonus tools ?
Also, I have downloaded from somewhere -I don't remember-
the ByronPolytools video but where can I get the script or
plugin, a hint please...
thanks

[Bpanting]

I have downloaded from somewhere -I don't remember-

They are not out yet. I think they just started Beta testing them and hopefuly they will be out soon..=

[Levitateme]

I am beta testin the byronpoly tools now, i think sebastian said in 1 month he is going to put them out. btw, the tools are amazing. just fyi.

[Bob27]

thanks Levi, let us know when they are out.
What about the any Bonus Tools 5 guide ? is there any?
many of the items neeed short helps to work with.

[john_homer]

I just midified an existing copy/paste script that copied skin weights from 1 vert/cv/whatever to another, so that it averages the weights...
I'm sorry, but I cant remember who wrote the original script ;(

I use this script to smooth out weights on a per vert basis... ie. you have 1 vert that is weighted badly, but the verts either side are correct... select the 2 (or more) correct verts, run the copy script... select the bad vert,,, run the paste script... it will average the "copied" weights and paste them onto the bad vert(s).

another example.
you have "solid" geo built into a garment. ie buttons.
so you weight the entire surface, so it deforms right.. and those pesky buttons are bending/deforming.... select all the verts that make 1 button, run the copy, run the paste. now they are all weighted the same (no bending) but should move with the rest of the surface ;)

if you are copying from 1 surface to another. they MUST be bound to the same joints. exactly

just drop them on a shelf or a hot key...
NOTE: these are 2 separate scripts..

// COPY WEIGHTS ON SELECTED COMPONENTS

float $weights[];
float $v2Weights[];
float $v2Weights[];
string $cmd;
string $vsel;
string $joints[];
float $tmpVal;
int $nJoints;
float $tmpArray0[];
float $tmpWeights;

string $expandedSel[0] = `ls -sl -flatten`; // gets the selected object components
// get the name of the skinCluster
string $history[] = `listHistory $expandedSel[0]`;
string $clusterNames[] = `ls -type skinCluster $history`;
string $skincl = $clusterNames[0];

int $nVerts = `size $expandedSel`;


for ($i=0; $i<$nVerts; $i++)
{
$cmd1 = "skinPercent -q -v "+$skincl+" "+$expandedSel[$i];
$weights = eval($cmd1);

$arrayCmd = ("$tmpArray" +$i + " = " + "`" + $cmd1 + "`;" );
eval $arrayCmd;
}

$nJoints = `size($tmpArray0)`;
$weights[0] = 0;

for ($i=0; $i<$nJoints; $i++)
{
for ($a=0; $a<$nVerts; $a++)
{
$tmpStr = (("$tmpArray" + $a) + "[" + $i + "]"); // ie. "$tmpArray0[0]"
string $tmpCmd = ("$tmpVal = " + $tmpStr);
eval $tmpCmd;
$tmpWeights += $tmpVal;
}
$weights[$i] = ($tmpWeights / $nVerts);
$tmpWeights = 0;

}

$cmd = "skinPercent -q -t "+$skincl+" "+$expandedSel[0];
$joints = eval($cmd);

global string $output="";
for ($n=0; $n < $nJoints; $n++) {

$output += ("-tv "+$joints[$n]+" "+$weights[$n]+" ");

}

// UPDATE COMPONENT EDITOR
compEdMenuCmd CEMIAutoUpdate componentEditorPanel1WindowComponEditor;
print $output;

//-----------------------------------------------------------------



// paste WEIGHTS ONTO SELECTED COMPONENTS

string $skincl = "tunic_skinCluster";
string $vsel;
string $sel[0] = `ls -sl`;
string $history[] = `listHistory $sel[0]`;
string $clusterNames[] = `ls -type skinCluster $history`;
string $skincl = $clusterNames[0];
global string $output;
string $expandedSel[0] = `filterExpand -ex 1 -sm 28 -sm 31 -sm 46 -sm 36 $sel`;

for ($vsel in $expandedSel) {


string $cmd = ("skinPercent "+$output+" "+$skincl+" "+$vsel);
eval ($cmd);

}
// UPDATE COMPONENT EDITOR
compEdMenuCmd CEMIAutoUpdate componentEditorPanel1WindowComponEditor;

[nottoshabi]

Ohhh Wow :eek:

Thanks John I will have to play with that one just I'm a little busy now but I will definetly play with that.


Thanks a million :bowdown: .....

[john_homer]

here is a simple one I use about a million times a day...

toggles xRay on/off for the current pannel (ie. the one the mouse is currently over)
you will get an error if the mouse is not over a pannel (of course :)

$p[0] = `getPanel -wf`;
modelEditor -e -xray (!`modelEditor -q -xray ($p[0])`) ($p[0]);

I map it to <alt X>
that way I can be panning around my model (with the alt key) and just tap X to toggle ON/OFF :)

[john_homer]

I also use a similar script to toggle isolate selected ON/OFF
(isloate selected rules)

string $cp = `getPanel -wf`;
enableIsolateSelect $cp (!`isolateSelect -q -state $cp`) ;



and to add an object .....

string $cp = `getPanel -wf`;
isolateSelect -addSelected $cp;



and to remove an object ....

string $cp = `getPanel -wf`;
isolateSelect -removeSelected $cp;

[pearson]

John, thank you!! How did I miss Isolate Selected all this time?! :surprised That is a very handy tool! Please tell me it was new in 4.0...otherwise...:blush:

[macaroniKazoo]

if anyone uses quick selection sets for their characters (real cool, and super fast way of selecting a bunch of objects) check out this script: zzSetMenu (http://www.highend3d.com/maya/mel/?section=animation#1289)

also, for those that do heaps of animation, if you ever need to copy animation to/from another character, this script is pretty useful too: zooXferAnim (http://www.highend3d.com/maya/mel/?section=animation#2527)

[john_homer]

Originally posted by pearson
John, thank you!! How did I miss Isolate Selected all this time?! :surprised That is a very handy tool! Please tell me it was new in 4.0...otherwise...:blush:

I think its been around for a while.... but then again so has maya 4 ;) hehe

here's another handy one for anyone working with polys (or anything)... the undo list can use up a ton of RAM on those little buggers... so if you know you are at a safe place to do so.. you can flush the undo cache with the command...
flushUndo

I've seen this little trick hand back hundreds of MB in seconds, after an hour or so of poly moddeling with unlimited undos...

.j

[macaroniKazoo]

I always set my undo queue to something like 250. Its still comfortably large enough to hold all undos I may need to do, but its not big enough to devour all my ram. I hate using flush undo because i know that as soon as i use it, I'm gonna want to undo back one too many times. ;) I've never worn out 200 undo levels though...

[paradisio]

Honestly I have none... I just spent 7 hours trying to position images for reference in the picture.... and there were only two...

And now I have all these freaking "folds" now that I have started modelling....

I'm gonna go... :cry:

[CoolDuck_HRO]

I can't live without the merge faces tool. A MEL script at highend3d, it's called Rage Merge Faces, great for correcting meshes.
http://www.highend3d.com/maya/mel/?group=melscripts&section=polygon&sort=

Also can't live with target weld. Also a MEL script. With target weld you get to pick one vertex and a second one to merge to. Very quick and handy.
http://www.users.on.net/neilandbron/

One more thing that's really handy. You get to toggle between subD and Poly like the TAB in Lightwave.
http://www.highend3d.com/maya/mel/?group=melscripts&section=polygon&sort=
(toggle subdivision surfaces v2.1)

[alesmav]

Ho!

2 tips...

Sometimes you have to dig for a node in the hypershade. If you see the node name in the channel box, simply copy/paste that name into the field entry (upper right part of your status line) and you have the node selected without digging

If you find the texture in your render too blurry (often happens with textures containing sharp lines like text) set the texture from default Quadratic to Mipmap)

ALES

[nanoma]

One of my favorite is the Polygon Sculpt Tools>Import Attribute Map. Instead of sculpting polygon directly in maya, paint any color or B/W image and use them to reshape the model accordingly. It can be used to create coarse folds on clothings, landscape, etc.

[john_homer]

here is a quickie I wrote in an add break last night for a workmate that was sick of maya's crappy proportional modification tool..

select some components and run it.
just makes a cluster and smooths it $i times ($i is a number derrived from the number of components selected)
so it fades off nicely to the edge of the selection

// script follows...


ConvertSelectionToVertices;
string $sel[] = `ls -sl -flatten`;
int $numSel = size($sel);
string $buffer[];

int $smoothNum = $numSel/2;
$numTok = `tokenize $sel[0] "." $buffer`;
string $objName = $buffer[0];
string $cC[] = `newCluster " -relative -envelope 1"`;
select -r $objName;
artSetToolAndSelectAttr( "artAttrCtx", ("cluster." + $cC[0] + ".weights"));
artAttrInitPaintableAttr;
artAttrPaintOperation artAttrCtx Smooth;
for ($i=1; $i<$smoothNum; $i++)
{
artAttrCtx -e -clear `currentCtx`;
}
select -r ($cC[0] + "Handle");
setToolTo $gMove;

[Pumuckle]

i looove the extrude polygons tool, it is priceless

[pearson]

I love extruding faces and edges too. here is a little script I have on a marking menu. It detects whether you have an edge or a face selected and calls the appropriate extrude function. If you don't have an edge or a face selected, it does nothing. This way I don't have to have two mm slots taken up by extrude! :)

v--------script below---------v

if ( size(`filterExpand -sm 34`) > 0 )
{
ExtrudeFace;
}
else if ( size(`filterExpand -sm 32`) > 0 )
{
ExtrudeEdge;
}

[Levitateme]

Pearson, i used that script for a while but its very buggy. it works like 60% of the time.

[pearson]

Really? I've never had a problem with the script. I actually wrote this one, using that previous post as reference.

I do, however, have trouble with the extrude function. About 10-20% of the time it won't let me switch to the regular move tool (it starts moving more than just the selected edges). I don't think that's related to the script though, because I had that problem even before I started using the script...:shrug:

I'm using 4.0.1, BTW

[Modulok]

Pearson - It works fine for me...I've been using it since that post way back in the day about using multiple actions for one hotkey. I'm using 4.5 and it works like a charm. *shrug*

I also modified it to work for split polygon, or loopsplit from MJ's Poly tools by altering the filter expand and corresponding commands....easy, but for us MEL cripples its the best we can do lol.


if ( size(`filterExpand -sm 12`) > 0 )
{
SplitPolygonTool;
};
if ( size(`filterExpand -sm 32`) > 0 )
{
loopSplit;
};


...what I would *like* is a context sensitive marking menu itself..and not just the commands within it. Perhaps a new thread on the matter ehh...

-Modulok-

[pearson]

Modulok, you are in luck! I have just such a thing. This will allow you to pop a different mm depending on what you have selected:


OK. Make the marking menus you want, say one for faces, one for edges, etc. For all of these menus, where it says "Use marking menu in:" leave it on "not set".

The trick is to make another MM and set it to work in the hotkey editor. Don't put any functions in it. Then, in the hotkey editor, underneath "user", there will be "userMarkingMenus". Edit the [yourmenuname]_press and delete the 3rd line, which should say: source "menu_[yourmenuname]";

This is where you put your check for what is selected:


code:--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
if ( size(`filterExpand -sm X`) > 0 )
source "menu_[facesmenuname]";

else if ( size(`filterExpand -sm Y`) > 0 )
source "menu_[edgesmenuname]";
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Here you can set a MM to display if you have nothing (or anything other than "X" or "Y") selected:

code:--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
else
source "menu_[defaultmenuname]";
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

or you could have it do nothing:

code:--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
else
deleteUI tempMM;
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Now just set [yourmenuname]_press to a hotkey, and let it hook up the release for you, and you're all set!

[Levitateme]

Pearson,i really liked your script. just some times this is what it would do.

I would select like a edge, then use the script from my marking menu and i have forgotten the error it woudl give me. but it would not extrude, so i had to use mayas edge extrude, its a great script dont get me wrong, but it just was buggy for me sometimes.

[Goon]

How can I override the default right-click menu? I really dont need those options and would like to make things more like wings. Can this be done?

[pearson]

Levitateme - I am not offended or anything, lol, but I don't think you were using the one that I wrote. All it does is call maya's default extrude edge command if you have an edge selected...:shrug:

Goon - I don't think this can be done. I talked with a maya demo artist about that about 2 years ago. She said she had tried to change it too but couldn't...I don't know how much she knew, though.

[pearson]

One thing to note about the context sensitive MMs I showed above:

Nothing will happen when you press the hotkey. You must press and hold the hotkey and then press the LMB in order to see the MM.

[MikeRhone]

Top secret trick:

If you right click on an .mb file in explorer, you can select "render" from the menu.

It fires up a batch render window without ever having to open Maya. (Using default render globals of course.)

--Mike R

[nottoshabi]

I just found this out last week. You know if you have to paint weights on a character, but you have to scroll throught that little window in the option box. Well you can right click on a joint and select it for painting. But it does not work for influence objects.


:wavey:

[Levitateme]

I dont know if sebastian has released them yet.

Byrons poly tools.
http://www.visualboo.com/~byronimo/mainpage.htm

[Byron]

This link may not work all the time:

Use this on instead :) (http://www.byronimo.de)

Regards
Sebastian

[Boolieman]

I found a tool that seems to work well for me and it is Mirror Skin Weights cuts down the painting time by a long shot and i have been able to make it work on multiple axes for weirs and alein creatures.

[pearson]

Originally posted by Byron
Also watch the latest Sneak Preview:



:eek: :bowdown: :thumbsup: :drool: I've been soooo frustrated that so many of maya's tools don't work as I would expect (ie: in a way that would be helpful and not cause me a whole bunch of time fixing what it messed up!). This is soooooo cool!!!

I have to ask: at one point you pick an edge and then, magically, all the edges parrallel to it, in the same edge loop, became selected. How did you do that?

[AniMo]

MJpolyTOools ~_~
and nurbs duplicate surface curve all the time (when im using nurbs :D)

hopefully soon byrons! but im asd about it dosent deal with uvs
cause as i ddecide to alter my finished textured modelle with lets say smart split it will blow my uv map :/

also strg + rightclick and convert selection to: ....
is realy kick ass workflow function :)
just my 2 cents ;)

[AniMo]

btw as someone mentioned the IEforMaya (internet explorer) is realy good idea
i tryed to load it via the plugin manager i get this error:
Error: No plug-ins loaded - "Das angegebene Modul

wurde nicht gefunden

which means in english the specified module wasnt found
any hint !?

[blendertrout]

Wow a great resource here. Thanks all!

[KidderD]

Yeah, I have BPT... and it's awesome!! Just had to say that, but I too am interested in a working IE viewport... can't get the plugin to load. I need it for references, I mean it would be handy, rather than creating planes for reference images that is, I don't need it. Sometimes I overemphasize.. At any rate does anyone know why I can't get the plugin to load?

[nottoshabi]

AniMo> that error means that the plugin is not for that version of Maya... I thinck there is a plugin for Maya that will do what you guys are looking for but that is only for Maya 4. Wich sucks:argh:

[KidderD]

Well, the one I downloaded from HE3d was supposed to be for 5.0., here's the link if anyone is interested

http://www.highend3d.com/files/dl.3d?group=mayaplugins&file_loc=IEForMaya-v5.0-.zip&file_id=2297

But, it doesn't load, I suppose it could be a 5.1 update thing.. but I think I read other people loading it just fine.

[Levitateme]

Here is a Isolate selection script my friend found i find this script to be one of my most precious tools. it also hides faces!
Sorry i cant give credit to this amazing script. i just truly dnot know who did it.


string $currPanel = `getPanel -withFocus`;
if ("" != $currPanel && ("modelPanel" == `getPanel -to $currPanel`))
{
int $isolate_onoff = `isolateSelect -q -state $currPanel`;
switch ($isolate_onoff)
{
case 0:
enableIsolateSelect $currPanel 1;
isolateSelect -state 1 $currPanel;
break;
case 1:
enableIsolateSelect $currPanel 0;
isolateSelect -state 0 $currPanel;
break;
default: break;
}
$isolate_onoff = `isolateSelect -q -state $currPanel`;
print("IsolateView: " + $isolate_onoff + "\n");
} else {
error "No modeling panel selected or invalid.";
}

[nottoshabi]

@ KidderD.. I down loaded the plugin my self and I got the same error. I run windows 2000, maybe that might have something to with it. Maybe???

[Jhonus]

God knows if someone has already posted this, I didnt have enough time to read through everything.

Just a couple of time saving shortcuts.

If you press and hold W, E or R and left click in the viewport you get a marking menu with the tool's settings at your fingertips. Super handy, use it every day. (edit: I see levitateme has already posted this)

Also if you Ctrl + RMB in the UV editor or in the viewport you get a marking menu with different selection conversions.

(Really handy in the UV editor with the select shell item being on the marking menu.)

[mixtus]

insert
my secret weapon is the INSERT key to move the pivot point of anything you have selected. I like to use it when working with groups cv's.

also the "g" hotkey to repeat the last thing you do.
"g" key and extrude faces - i love that.

+ and - key to change the sizes of your transform tools.


thanks you guys for some killer tips.

[pearson]

mixtus - Something I have begun to use a lot lately is "Create Cluster". If you ever wanted to snap a group of verts and keep their spacing from each other the same, this is the trick for you! Maya, by default, will snap all the verts on top of each other, but the cluster snaps the verts as a group.

With the verts selected, under the Animation tab, select Deform > Create Cluster. Now you can move the pivot of the cluster around and snap the cluster of verts to anything you like. To get rid of it, just select the object and delete history.

[mixtus]

i will have to start using clusters // i use deformers and lattices all the time from the animation menu. I haven't used clusters yet to model. thanks for the tip.

snapping is good.

[yinako]

someone wrote me a script for doing element selection in maya (3dsmax),
you would want this if you ending doing a lot of combin/seperate polygons.

http://www.noboundrees.com/yinako/mel/mhselectpolyshell.mel

BTW another script bin you may find usefull. http://www.noboundrees.com/yinako/mayamel.html

[JeePee]

The F key
i use it to center the camera's aming piont at the selected component/s

[shahrokh]

Hi,

My favorite is CPS polygon tools which you can get it fron www.highend.com.

GOOD LUCK TO ALL

[Modulok]

Polygons>smooth proxy ...the cool thing about it is the smoothed mesh has its own transform node, so you can translate, rotate and scale it, and still preserve the relationship to the proxy mesh.

I very often will scale it to -1 so that I have half of my model in a smoothed state, and the other half as the proxy mesh, it provides a nice workflow, and no clutter on the smoothed mesh. Drop a blinn shader on the smooth mesh to provide a specular highlight to trace curvature and its all good :thumbsup:


-Modulok-

[vizion]

my current fave tool in Maya is the MJpoly tools. It allows for the quickest edge splits and vertices connections.

[Octagon]

Originally posted by pearson
mixtus - Something I have begun to use a lot lately is "Create Cluster". If you ever wanted to snap a group of verts and keep their spacing from each other the same, this is the trick for you! Maya, by default, will snap all the verts on top of each other, but the cluster snaps the verts as a group.

With the verts selected, under the Animation tab, select Deform > Create Cluster. Now you can move the pivot of the cluster around and snap the cluster of verts to anything you like. To get rid of it, just select the object and delete history.

just as a follow up:

as of maya 5 (or 5.0.1) you can use "preserve component spacing" (settings in move options) to get the same effect without the need for a cluster.

matthias

[Copyright]

MJ poly tools is good ..... here is the link
http://www.maya3d.dk/:wavey:

[alexx]

Originally posted by Octagon
just as a follow up:

as of maya 5 (or 5.0.1) you can use "preserve component spacing" (settings in move options) to get the same effect without the need for a cluster.

matthias

just as a followup for the followup:
you can change this behaviour in the new default marking menu for the move options (rot and scale has some as well):
hold down the w key and left mouse button hold and there is the check box for preserving the spacing.

only fix up that function in maya would need, is that the pivot should be located on e.g. the last selected component

cheers

alexx

[recklessronin]

Both the Auto Key button and the Dope Sheet are tools of the devil. Especially the Dope Sheet.. but ESPECIALLY the Auto Key :scream:

I like the zoom marquee ( ctrl + alt + LMB drag )

[Modulok]

as of maya 5 (or 5.0.1) you can use "preserve component spacing" (settings in move options) to get the same effect without the need for a cluster.

I think this was actually implemented in version 4.5 :D

-Modulok-

[Mudvin]

i'm using Joss Scripts Pack from http://joss.starnet.ru
;)

[bjoern]

for me , there is nothing better the ByronsPolytools!!!

I hope Alias has sometimes such ideas

regards
bjoern

[PsychoSilence]

well, for modelling i mostly use CPS Toolbox and CPS Control...since i never got right resault with birail i model poly not nurbs... ;) :D

for texturing i´d never start without ATR, a fast interaction with photoshop...

and well...some lighting melsd are essentiell for me as well... 3point light mel / lightdome to fake GI / lightman to multiple-modify light settings...

[JasonOsipa]

Originally posted by Rhonedog
Modify->Evaluate nodes->Ignore all just saved my life.


Rhonedog, you just helped me take Squash/Stretch in 3D to a whole new level with this. Getting a solid bind pose -at will- out of a character whilst in the middle of an animated scene thats rigged to the tits was stopping me. Now; I ride.

Mwahahahaha.

(Jes. Intentionally cryptic.)

[MikeRhone]

I hope you decrypt it and show us the results soon... ;)

On a similar vein, you can also delete the bind pose. If you need to add influence objects or other such tools, the bind pose will limit you and give you errors. Just delete it and you will have no more trouble.

To get the model back into the bind pose position without the bindpose node:

-Do Modify->Evaluate nodes->Ignore all

-Right-click on the root joint >>Assume prefered angle

There is your bind position. :)

Im not sure if this is common knowledge, but it's another sliver of info for this sticky thread.

Mike R

[Modulok]

To get the model back into the bind pose position without the bindpose node:

-Do Modify->Evaluate nodes->Ignore all

-Right-click on the root joint >>Assume preferred angle

There is your bind position.

Just a technical note on this one:

This doesn't exactly take you to the bind pose, but rather to the last preferred angle that was set on any specific joints. By default this is the angle that the joints are in when you created the skeleton, so it may work in some cases.

However, if you have set a new preferred angle, for example: You have a leg, and there is no bend in the knee joint, you can rotate that knee joint in the direction you want the IK to solve, and do a Skeleton>Set preferred angle. Then that IK handle will always solve predictably in the correct direction without having to apply a slight rotation to the knee joint prior to creating the IK handle.

If you were to select your skeleton and do a Skeleton>assume preferred angle, you would not be returned to your "bind pose" but rather to the angles you set previously.

-Modulok-

[SpaXe]

Polygons: CPS

- It's really a good tool to build lots of things!!^^

NURBS: Sculpt Surface

- Also a great tool to create feels^^"

Subdiv: base....and polygon mode

^_^

[kemijo]

Using hypershade nodes or direct connections instead of expressions...if I see another single attr straight assign in an expression again, I might faint :especially when there's thousands of them shrug:

- Connect Poly Shape
- Move Component
- Move along U, V, or Normal
- MJ Poly tools
- select an edge, and polySelectConstraint -pp 4;
- MEL scripts and Particle Expressions
- MEL scripts that write expressions
- Clipping plane manipulator
- pointOnSurfaceInfo, distanceBetween, implicit shapes, any other node that can't be created with the GUI (as of Maya 4.5)
- Post Infinity -> Linear

[dom93hatch]

I would have to say Quick Select Sets. That saves me so much time in texturing because I keep forgetting to name my materials.

[AndersEgleus]

Don't know if this is an awkward way of doing things, but...

If I want full controll over the orientation of a joint, I do the following:

[list=1]
Use the Insert Joint tool to insert a new joint between the joint in question and its parent (or if the parent has several children, create a new joint from it then parent the joint I want to change orientation on to this new joint).
insert-move (move joint only, not its children) the new joint so that the triangle made up of the new joint, the joint I want to change and its child is coplanar with two of the axes I want on the new rotation.
Use Maya's Orient Joint.
Remove the newly created joint.
[/list=1]

I know there are several scripts for orienting joints out there, but they don't always work, and I have never had any problems with the above method.

[nottoshabi]

Anders Egleus > Your way of orienting joints its not bad but if you had to do that to a rig that had 420 jpints you will bether for a while.

I sugest getting Jasons S orient joint script. It does what you want a lot faster and easier. I use it all the time never had a problem with it.

[AndersEgleus]

Your absolutely right about the workflow disadvantage, nottoshabi.

I don't know if I'm doing it wrong, but I tried to use jsOrientJointUI on joints with driven keys and their orientation (all three axes) just got aligned with the world axis for some reason, same with dwRiggingTools. Don't know if it had anything to do with the driven keys, I suppose I should check it out and report the bug/limitation.

Also (maybe because of driven keys too, maybe not), I couldn't change the orientation using component selection.

Plus, with those scripts I can't align the axes exactly how I want them.

I'm thinking of writing a script with a bit more options than aligning the upaxis with a world axis using this technique, but I have to think about what I want in it first.

[ewerybody]

my secret weapon: I even created a hotkey for the hotkeyeditor!! :D

another thing I love: shift-mmb-move or -scale smart selects the direction i want to move or scale it.. don't have to grab the fkn gizmo anymore :] the only thing left: shift-rotate for that feature!

one more thing: grow selection is a delicious funktion! (I switched the < and > for that grow is more accessible) btw: Does anyone know why grow, shrink, select continios edges or selection boundary won't work anymore if you modeled some time!?!?! And when I restart maya, it works again at the same spot!

indispensable for smooth animations: Flat tangents! with some more tweaking goes without saying..


ok so far I must admid: didn't check out any plugins or scripts yet. :hmm: (exept from byrons bevel-thingy (but didn't work for my purposes)) But I'm going to do so after reading all your suggests ;]

[pearson]

Originally posted by ewerybody
btw: Does anyone know why grow, shrink, select continios edges or selection boundary won't work anymore if you modeled some time!?!?! And when I restart maya, it works again at the same spot!

Actually just closing the file and reopening it will fix this problem. Don't know what causes it, but it is annoying.

[pearson]

[hmm double post. sorry]

[acidream]

I know several people have mentioned it already, but Connect Poly Shape is really a time saver. It's user friedly and packed with features. If you haven't already, check it out.

[ewerybody]

Originally posted by pearson
Actually just closing the file and reopening it will fix this problem. Don't know what causes it, but it is annoying.

:cool: But feels quite great that I'm not the only on that experienced it! Thanks for the hint!! cheerz ::..

[fr3drik]

Since the hotkey CTRL+h is "hide selected", I changed CTRL+shift+h to "show selected". By default CTRL+shift+h is "show last hidden". Nasty.

Also I am, since just recently, dependant on the Auto UV plugin (http://www.coyhot.fr.st/) by François Grassard, which is actually not really "auto" but rather semi-auto ...but still a mighty fine tool. Saves me HOURS of unwrapping.

MJ Poly Tools (http://www.maya3d.dk/Scripts/MJPolyTools/) has three super great features: "Edge loop split", "select edge loop" and "select edge ring". Once you create an edge loop between two existing ones, you can choose to slide it to fit the way you want it. Great tool indeed.

Another superb feature of Maya is wrap deformers. If you work with subd, simply create a duplicate of your shapeHistPoly (poly cage) and make the duplicate a wrapper of the shapeHistPoly (which drives the subd). Apply blendshapes etc onto the wrapper and voila - you can hide the subd while animating the wrapper, then render the subd. This is a neat feature since subds tend to be sloowwwww when animating. And hey, now you can forget about those blindData nodes! Don't forget to hide that shapeHistPoly forever. You only work with the wrapper after creating it.

[AndreasMartin]

many things have been anounced and i think this one wasn't mentioned
APESplit CG Talk thread (http://www.cgtalk.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=94077&perpage=15&highlight=apesplit&pagenumber=1)

the script trys to achive continuity if u split a edge loop ring. very nice feature for doing continous surfaces with polys.

[yinako]

new tricks from yinako:
* polysplit without pressing enter, just press Q after your split (Yes now non of my modeling commends force me to use right side of the keyboard).

*Pm me if you want my custome right click menu for modeling(dagMenuProc) I do all my modeling with it, its context sensitive you'll never need any shelf/menus/hotbox

[Iotrez]

ewerybody - If contignous edges stops working try going to:

Edit polygons - selection - selection constraints and then click the "close and reset" button.

That seems to work.

Not sure if it works for shrink and grow.

[anthonymcgrath]

"graph materials on selected objects" button in the hypershade is a nice little button I use more often than I think.

also, making my own little swatches for my own misc shader library by renaming a little (for example) ***.iff to a ***.ma.swatch file so when I scout through my misc shader folder in the hypershade I get an instant visual thumbnail of the kind of thing that shader will do.

some others:

rndPoints is a great tool for adding micro- imperfections

rndChannel is fantastic for adding random secondary motion to any channel

zooReorderAttribs is great for re-ordering custom attributes

transferSelection - shift combination of selected verts/faces/edges to another model. Great for blendshapes.

[CoolDuck_HRO]

Selection Constraints...

Found in: Modeling menu set >> Edit polygons >> Selection >> Selection Constraints...

I didn't know this existed in Maya, but it is very handy to spot triangles, quads, Ngons, etc... of a polygon model.

(It works like the statistics panel in LW.)

[MikeRhone]

FrameCache Node

This technique will update a chosen objects animation via the timeline by referring to the past or the future of a second node.

Create one cube named "Boss"
Create one cube named "Child"

Set keys on Boss for the translationX.

In the script editor type: createNode frameCache. This creates a frameCache1 node

Open the connection Editor.

Connect Boss.translateX to frameCache1.Stream

In the command line type connectAttr -f frameCache1.past[4] Child.translateX; (Where 4 is the integer number of frames of follow through)

In your playback you will now see the child cube animate the exact same as the boss cube, but 4 frames later.

One limitation I have noticed to this is that you cannot manually move around the object in world space manually anymore once the connections are made, you will have to move and edit keys directly in the graph editor or dopesheet.

Special thanks to Jason S. for touching on that node on the fast animation rigs DVD. I asked this question in the forum here at cgTalk a long time ago and never got an answer other than the expressions method I've used thus far.

I hope someone else finds this as cool and as useful as I have!

Mike Rhone

-Just another TD

[pearson]

Sounds cool! From inside my little box I can't see what you'd use it for, though...can you give some examples?

I think it would be cool if the connection could be rubberbanded to create flocking...

[MikeRhone]

It would be useful for any times you wanted automated secondary animation. (Instead of copy and pasting curves.)

But hey, I thought it was neat!

m

[Gremlin]

and/or rigging a spider's walk cycle! ;)

[MikeRhone]

Damn server crash...

"Inherit Transform"

Turn off "inherit transform" on the geometry group of a rigged character. You can then parent it under the TOP node without fear of double transforms.

The child will 'act' as if it is parented to world space, while still remaining in the actual character heirarchy.

Cool eh?

Mike Rhone

[Atwooki]

Rhonedog:

That's a l'il gem!

Cheers for that one - great :)

Atwooki

[westiemad]

This is a wonderful thread, uv mapping tools, ways of hiding more of my menus and the way of constraining movement to an axis without me to constantly having to click the damn arrow first. I use 2 modeling tools, zztogglesubd is a toggle from poly geometry to subd, at level 0 (your verts are preserved), its quick and simple, and I use spinfaces, which is another lightwave tool for spinning 2 faces (topology etc).

AnDy

[ashwin_m]

I like most Sculpt poly and nurbs surface tool.

[bJekX]

Best tool EVER is -> UNDO :bowdown:

[pearson]

Originally posted by bJekX
Best tool EVER is -> UNDO :bowdown:

Tsk tsk! Someone hasn't been reading the thread! :P

(page 5, 6th post down (http://www.cgtalk.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=47020&perpage=15&pagenumber=5))

[ThomasMahler]

I love to use Attribute Collection by Roland Reyer - It's a nifty, little MEL Script that helps you generate a custom User Interface.

It actually has been built into the Maya 6.0 Bonus Pack - It's really great:

You select Attributes from the channelbox and you can put them in groups in the Attributes Collection Panel - there you can modify it, put min/max values in it, use sliders or just value fields and so on.

Every Rigger/Animator should at least try it - You'll get the hang of it pretty fast, I assure you! :)

[eric_bit]

i do think pologon is good tools for model

[trish4maya]

Utility nodes in lieu of expressions.

-- Markye i too like subdivide

[raaz]

Well the tools in Maya I used most of the time r extrude Poly tool, Cut Face tool, Paint Effects n Fluid Effects a lot.
I m using almost all these options in my final yr project of graduatiion as well.

[MikeRhone]

After replying to a thread in the Character setup forums, I realize that I haven't posted this little tip to anyone yet:

Simple expression for correct volume scaling in 3d space:

objectScaleX = 1 / objectScaleY;
objectScaleZ = 1 / objectScaleY;

(X and Z will squash/stretch driven by the Y scale. I recommend using nodes instead of an expression, but this is te easiest way to show it.)

Great for spine rigs, IK arms/legs, Cartoony heads.

[sporadic]

probably pretty good for modest amounts of squash and stretch, yup. If you want more accuracy in the volume changes, add a square root in there. That will make XYZ = X'Y'Z' (with the primes being the dimensions after the deformation). This will make the volume maintain itself more accurately (though with joint rotations and the like it'll never be perfect).

[Iconoklast]

for those who have asked about it in this thread, to edit the RMB menu, you need to edit the "dagMenuProc.mel" which is in your "maya6.0\scripts\others" folder.
Instead of overwriting the original however, move that script to your "my documents\maya6.0\scripts" directory.
I haven't got a script to show you, but if you search naughty nathan maya on google, you'll fine one that does what you're looking for..

[Soyseitan]

As posted in the Rendering forum, when experiencing crashes/fatal or out of memory errors while rendering complex scenes with Mental Ray .... you could also try to decrease your memory limit for the renderer to <70% of your total memory. I my case 550 Mb (of total 1 gig) solved all my crashproblems (so far.

[JasonOsipa]

probably pretty good for modest amounts of squash and stretch, yup. If you want more accuracy in the volume changes, add a square root in there. That will make XYZ = X'Y'Z' (with the primes being the dimensions after the deformation). This will make the volume maintain itself more accurately (though with joint rotations and the like it'll never be perfect).Accuracy is your enemy in scaling for squash and stretch (as defined by classical animation), in fact axis alignment timing-wise is really bad, too. You want to be in the ballpark, but not exact.

Trust me, I've been plugging on this one for coming on a year now... ACCURACY+SQUASH/STRETCH = BAD :)
INACCURACY+SQUASH/STRETCH = GOOD :)

NON-VISIBLE (or changin) AXIS OF SQ/ST+ROTATION = EVEN BETTER

So, for nice looking squashystretchysquooshy;
SLIGHT INACCURACY OF VOLUME (both timing from axis to axis *and* volume within that)+CHANGING/INVISIBLE AXIS OF SQ/STR (rotations within the deformation that break the visible axis) = BEST!

[sporadic]

Then my reasoning would be to put in secondary control of the squash to stretch. Any arbitrary amounts are going to cahuse problems like you mentioned. If you want off timing, you almost have to have two separate controls to keyframe separately, since choosing an arbitrary number of frames won't work for many cases, you'll need it adjustable.

And yeah, adding a changable axis of squash stretch would be cool too, but adds a lot of complexity for the animator, I'd think.

In any case, I'm not really an animator, and if an animator says that's the way he wants to work it, I have no problem putting those kind of controls in. It kind of depends on the style of the project as to how much of this stuff is really applicable.

[JasonOsipa]

...In any case, I'm not really an animator, and if an animator says that's the way he wants to work it, I have no problem putting those kind of controls in. It kind of depends on the style of the project as to how much of this stuff is really applicable...Yeah, style's a biggie. I'm referring most specifically to how, a volume scale looks pretty cartoony, sure, but if you *rotate* that baby even 0.5 degrees in any axis during that vscale, the computeriness is instantly visible even to an untrained eye. For some reason (and I cite no resources save trial and error) breaking the three axes ever so slightly buys you a few degrees more, and again, actually having a chain of sorts to CURVE that entire shape whilst being scaled buys you the whole farm. Here's a link to an interaction vid for my latest character; nothing outstanding, but I've actually gone to great lengths to allow for all the things I'm describing here, every squash/stretch style pull tries it's hardest to create arcs instead of straight deformations, and where the rigging fails that automatically, I've included the ability to tug/push at things to create arcs easily. Of particular concern to the scaing/squash/stretch thing: near the end of this there is some face interaction that has a 1-control setup to get squash/stretch/curve/misalignment as I've been yammering about.

Pardon the yammering, but I AM trying to share my secret weapons :)

http://www.jasonosipa.com/Squoosh/v02/movs/squooshTeraction.mov

[sporadic]

Thanks Jason. I love the Squooshy characters you've managed, and now I'm closer to understanding it. I think (and this is just theory from my limited experience and watching far too many cartoons) the problem is linearity. Unless you break up that linearity, people will notice.

Not sure I see how you get your curves to come out so well, but then, as you know from our discussions on the Creature TD forum, I can be pretty dense. :/

[MikeRhone]

2 more tricks to make you more Maya-guru ish:

#1:Not many people realize this, you can render a .ma or a .mb by just right clicking on it on the file. You dont need to have maya open or a cmd prompt open.


#2: You can start a batch render in Maya, then close Maya. The mayabatch.exe will keep running until the render is complete.

[anthonymcgrath]

I'm a fan of the non-linear character setup tools in maya. very very cool and allow you to quickly plot out traditional keyposes for a character and time the main motions against any audio before getting in there and sorting out the interpolation - great fun!

I also like setting up a quick mel button for draft finalGathering rendering with low aliasing, sampling and raytracing settings and a second button to switch to my higher res settings. I saved these settings off in a seperate shelf.

[Noodlz]

here is a quickie I wrote in an add break last night for a workmate that was sick of maya's crappy proportional modification tool..

select some components and run it.
just makes a cluster and smooths it $i times ($i is a number derrived from the number of components selected)
so it fades off nicely to the edge of the selection

// script follows...


ConvertSelectionToVertices;
string $sel[] = `ls -sl -flatten`;
int $numSel = size($sel);
string $buffer[];

int $smoothNum = $numSel/2;
$numTok = `tokenize $sel[0] "." $buffer`;
string $objName = $buffer[0];
string $cC[] = `newCluster " -relative -envelope 1"`;
select -r $objName;
artSetToolAndSelectAttr( "artAttrCtx", ("cluster." + $cC[0] + ".weights"));
artAttrInitPaintableAttr;
artAttrPaintOperation artAttrCtx Smooth;
for ($i=1; $i<$smoothNum; $i++)
{
artAttrCtx -e -clear `currentCtx`;
}
select -r ($cC[0] + "Handle");
setToolTo $gMove;
awesome script mate.. works very well!

[evanhorn]

One oft overlooked feature that's been with Maya since the beginning is the ability to export and import animation data as a separate file. This is useful for sharing curves among similar rigs or importing previously created anim curves into the current scene.
You'll have to go to the Plugin manager for this one, since it's off by default: check animImportExport.mll. Now to export anims, select a character's hierarchy and File>Export as Anim. To import, select hierarchy and File>Import. If the naming convention is the same, it will import fine. An alternative to Trax editing if nonlinear animating and character nodes just don't cut it for you.

[nottoshabi]

Erik VanHorn> Look for ZooXferAnim. Its made by MacaroniKazoo, its f$%^ing awsome. It completly blows Mayas animation transfer out of the water. This one actually works. And you can even transfer animation curves from one rig to another even if its not the same character.

MacaroniKazoo you RULE.. :beer:

[westiemad]

You can zoom the script editor input pane, put your cursor in it, then hold ctrl and scroll the mouse wheel (type something in the box);

AnDy

[yinako]

after seen how in modo you could easily move pivots around during modeing I decide to try it on maya. the way I put it was assgin a new hot key with the command:

ctxEditMode;
snapMode -point (!`snapMode -q -point`)

now assign the key with shift+` to both press and release. SO now all i have to do is hold shift+` to move my pivot during modeling and release when done, this will also snap to vertex, since when ever I move pivot during modelling it always follows a with vertex snap...:/ this saves me about 3 steps :/

[Iconoklast]

In maya 6.0 (could be for other versions aswell), if you hold down 'd' and 'v' at the same time, you'll achieve the same as your script.
Holding down 'd' enters pivot mode while using any of the translate/scale/rotate tool, and obviously 'v' enters point snap. Releasing both 'd' and 'v' will switch back to normal. Thought I'd point that out.

On another note of the 'd' toggle key, if you're creating a curve, and you decide you want to go back to another point without having to end the curve and switch to component mode, just hold down the 'd' key, pick the CV you want to move and then move it. Also applies to the create polygon tool.

Just thought I'd give a heads up on the 'd' key toggle. It's quite handy

[CONDE3D]

My secret weapon... "project curve on surface", "trim tool" and "Duplicate surface curves" are my favorites. I use them a lot and I love them!

[rollmops]

What was the name of script who rendered that picture?

Answer: fcheck -cv

Example in a command prompt, just type fcheck -cv then drag and drop your image.iff
press return and you'll get the answer like this:

C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32>fcheck -cv P:\BIG5\linetest\sea\sea_R.6339.iff

...

.TSIH 220 C:\Program Files\Alias\Maya6.0\bin\mayabatch.exe -render -n 0
-proj M:\BIG5 -s 6330.000 -e 6339.000 -b 1.000 -se 6330 -be 1 -pad 1 -im sea_R
-cam cam_R -x 720 -y 576 -rd P:\BIG5\linetest\sea M:\BIG5\scenes\rol\sc2_sea.mb

LIMITATIONS:
Works only with iff images rendered in batch or commandline and maya-software renderer.
:sad:

[AlexMateo]

good, i think need more hours to practice whith maya.

[Meko]

wow. great thread guys...

i didnt see it (i also did read every page) but no one seems to like Booleons?? i find them very usefull

[AndreasMartin]

no one seems to like Booleons?? i find them very usefullused booleans only when starting modelling but didn't found it very handy most time. you have to rework the intersection cut of the surfaces so I can do it by hand from the beginning

[ietra]

This is super simple, but I haven't seen it on here yet -- combining properties of the move tool with the snap hotkeys to line things up along a single axis.

Example: selecting CVs, verts or objects + clicking on the Y arrow of move tool to isolate movement in that axis + holding down V key and middle-mouse dragging to any CV/vert/object = line up selected objects along Y with that object.

Also use a lot with the X snap-to-grid hotkey when modeling half a character, to make sure that the center vertices are all lined up at 0 on the X axis...

(note -- move tool must be in World mode for the above to work)

And I love that holding down CTRL and clicking on one axis of a transformer will restrict movement to the other two axes... With the translate tool, it's great for freely moving something along horizontally in the perspective view... or with the scale tool, for a quick proportional squash/stretch while modeling... think it was new to Maya 5, I embraced it like a lost puppy when they put it in.

[Brodix]

Undo seems to be my fav :D

[Karlfucious]

If found that lofting into polys is really handy when trying to create characters and such.

[mimo8]

I just found this mel and it makes me sooo happy.
http://www.stannogen.org/Scripts/

it exports and reimports your skinweights of a softskinned mesh.
In the contrary to mayas standard skinweight import/export tool this one

a.) works, and
b.) works also when you modify the mesh, cause it is based on world coordinates.

this is sooo helpfull when you want to reedit your character, seperate or combine parts or even just use a character that is similar

top, top, top
thnk you anders egleus

[mimo8]

anotherone:

I ran into a problem with blendshapes, wich is when you throw away the object which serves as the blendshape, you are not able to delete the slider out of the blendshapes window. It allways takes the specific blendshape(mesh) to delete its slider ... nasty thing!!!

failure (http://www.cgtalk.com/member.php?userid=104436) saved the day and posted a little script that you can run to eliminate the unwanted blendis

first run that scrip as it is:

// draft version
global proc purgeBlendshape( string $bsnode ){
string $att[] = `listAttr -m -st "inputGeomTarget" ( $bsnode + ".inputTarget[ 0 ].inputTargetGroup" )`;
string $w[] = `listAttr -m ( $bsnode + ".w" )`;
int $i = 0;
string $a;
for( $a in $att ){
if( ! `connectionInfo -id ( $bsnode + "." + $a )` ){
string $target = substitute( ".inputTargetItem\\[6000\\].inputGeomTarget", $a, "" );
removeMultiInstance ( $bsnode + "." + $w[ $i ] );
removeMultiInstance ( $bsnode + "." + $target );
}
++ $i;
}
}


then type:
purgeBlendshape( "bodyBlend" );

body blend was the name of my blendshape node, for wich I wanted to delete some unneeded sliders, so replace this by the name of your blendshape node.


see the thread for more info (http://www.cgtalk.com/showthread.php?p=1738410&posted=1#post1738410)

thnx failure ... you are my mel-hero

[Omita]

http://johnhaller.com/jh/useful_stuff/disable_caps_lock/

While this isn't a Maya only trick I love it... it disables CapsLock on Windows so no more hitting it by mistake and then wondering why Maya isn't working right... much nicer then ripping off the key. What is also cool is that you can then Bind CapsLock like its a normal key! Which is very cool. I use it to toggle from Poly to Subd.

-Omita

[bjoern]

it can be easier, i just demounted my CapsLog :-)

[fr3drik]

Don't know if this has already been posted but I just found out about the blendTaper script when reading the "Stop staring!" book by Jason Osipa. It does some wonderful things for you when working with blendshapes.


Takes base and target blend shapes, and generates a third shape which is a tapering blend between the two.
Pick vertexes on one side of your shape and mirror/swap their translation to the other side (example: eye blink).


Download:
http://jasonosipa.com/SS_Downloads.htm

[JasonOsipa]

Don't know if this has already been posted but I just found out about the blendTaper script when reading the "Stop staring!" book by Jason Osipa. It does some wonderful things for you when working with blendshapes.



Takes base and target blend shapes, and generates a third shape which is a tapering blend between the two.
Pick vertexes on one side of your shape and mirror/swap their translation to the other side (example: eye blink).

Download:
http://jasonosipa.com/SS_Downloads.htm


Thanks for the plug! It's timely, too, I just released the latest version. It actually doesn't have point 2) quoted above any more, that'll be it's own unique tool surfacing shortly. Here's the new one:

joBlendTaper.mel (http://jasonosipa.com/Downloads/Mel/joBlendTaper.mel)

to run, type: "joBlendTaper"

It's the latest in a series of tools for working more efficiently/powerfully with blend shapes. This tool does what it's predecessor's did (blendTaper.v01-v04) but with some improvements.

This new version does things pretty dramatically differently, using "masks" instead of bounding boxes to do the tapering, giving you much more freedom in how you split shapes. There are also quite a few new features that allow you to work in a much more "macro" manner.

OH -and there's documentation built-in this time. http://jonhandhisdog.com/forum/html/emoticons/smile.gif

[Malapropos]

Little melscript i recently started using:

makebot

Been having to use larger than normal texture images lately, this one saved me.

Makebot comes with maya (not sure about <5.0).

Script is:

makebot -i "inputimage" -o "outputimage.bot"

eg: makebot -i "test.jpg" -o "test.bot"

What this does is makes a block organized texture. These are multi-res images that will change their resolution depending on distance from camera.

Things to note:
1)The .BOT cannot be edited after they're made. So if you need changes, do it to original source file.
2)The maximum source image size is 8000X8000 pixels.
3)I beieve there's a way to specify input/output directories, but havent played with it enough, so as is, input must be in s/sourceimages, and output goes to project root directory.
4)specify the extension of input and output files
5)very large source images can crash Maya, alot. Work around is convert to IFF first.

[vantage]

This is a little trick that i use to maximize my viewport. (go to windows>preference and setting>hotkey and set a hotkey for the HideUIelement and ShowUIelement. The HideUIelement command will hide all the shelf and tool bar in the window)

It could fully utilize your view expecially when doing modeling.:thumbsup:

[Firas]

hi all..

this is my version from blendtaper .. its speeding my blend modeling alot.

www.ztoon.com/3d/smartVtxII (http://www.ztoon.com/3d/smartVtxII)

giveit a try :)

[Bpanting]

This is a little trick that i use to maximize my viewport. (go to windows>preference and setting>hotkey and set a hotkey for the HideUIelement and ShowUIelement. The HideUIelement command will hide all the shelf and tool bar in the window)

If you are using Maya 6, now you can use ctrl and spacebar, and it will toggle between the two views.

[nottoshabi]

Ok I just remember one. :) This is one is called "ArtPaintAttrTool" I use it for selecting or deselecting mulpiple cv's, faces, or isoparms. I only do blendshapes since I'm a rigger. I have set as a hot key, I use it as a mixture between my blndshapes tools, its really great for selecting a check with out selecting the nose or the ear. I dont remem ber how I found out about it or were to find it. I just have the script for it.

artAttrToolScript 4

[eahartz]

Alright, a mighty thanks to all who posted. Very nice. Here are my marking menu scripts for patch modeling. Basically these keep your NURBS patches uniform and clean by performing the desired procedure, rebuilding, and deleting history.

First create a new Marking Menu.

Add the following to your MM as tools.

Insert Iso:

// ISO insert uniform

insertKnotPreset 1 1 1 1 0 0;

performRebuildSurfaceSet 1 1 0 0.01 0 0 3 3 1 0 0 0 2 1 0.05 0 0;

CenterPivot;

DeleteHistory;


Attach Surfaces:

// ATCH uniform

doAttachSurfaceArgList 2 { "1", "1", "1", "1", "0.5", "0", "0.1" };

performRebuildSurfaceSet 1 1 0 0.01 0 0 3 3 1 0 0 0 2 1 0.05 0 0;

CenterPivot;

DeleteHistory;


Detach Surfaces:

// DTCH uniform

performDetachPreset 1 1;

performRebuildSurfaceSet 1 1 0 0.01 0 0 3 3 1 0 0 0 2 1 0.05 0 0;

CenterPivot;

DeleteHistory;



Hope you enjoy. I map the MM to SPACE+LMB.

Eric Hartz --

eric.hartz.jtv@mindspring.com