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JA-forreal
05-07-2003, 01:23 AM
I really want to increase my character animation skills, and I want to do so with a 3d application that will alow me to explore all of the facets of 3d character animation. My main 3d tool has been Blender for some years. And now I want to practice animatimg with a software that is more mature in the animation area.

It has been said that Maya is that software. I downloaded
Maya Personal Learning Edition.

Any Maya users here who can tell me about the steps that it took getting into Maya after comming from an app like Lightwave or Blender in the animation area? Modeling, lighting and texturing have never been real a problem to me in any 3d app.

I am hoping that the Maya learnig curve was pretty quick for some of you experienced 3d artist moving from another app.

And no, I am not jumping the Blender ship, Blender is my favorite app. I've just heard so much good news about Maya in the character animation areas. And I want to get the best grasp on 3d character animation in the best possible 3d app for the job.

I'm ready to roll!
wgreenlee1
05-07-2003, 02:22 AM
Well I havent did anything with XSI yet but Maya seems to be the most capable app yet.....:thumbsup:

It is truly a animation package.
SheepFactory
05-07-2003, 02:25 AM
i would highly recommend the character rigging book from alias wavefront.
ntmonkey
05-07-2003, 02:34 AM
Hiya,

Maya user here. I think the main reason why Maya users go with Maya for character animation is because of the flexible MEL (Maya Embedded Language) that allows you to create your own tools for character animation. I'm not sure with other 3D apps, but I do like some of these features in Maya:

Graph Editor really rocks, oh how I love it so. I couldn't get use to animating with it at first, but its really powerful. And once you get the animation you want, only to adjust the timing. Grab the dope sheet and blam...timing is done.

There's a ton of control and flexibility you can have animating a character in maya. Everything from the Graph Editor to writing expressions to constrain certain movements makes character animation less of a tedious task and into a fun one.

I would definate recommend trying Maya's animation tools. They're definately designed with the artist in mind. Hopefully I'll be able to get my hands on other 3D apps and be able to make a sound assessment of animation tools.

Lu
JA-forreal
05-07-2003, 03:29 AM
flexible MEL (Maya Embedded Language) that allows you to create your own tools for character animation.

Thanks for your responses. I plan to take a 3d animation course and I know that some of the classes will require some knowledge of Maya. That water mark stuff has to be dealt with in a more discrete way. But I'll let that slip for now. So far Maya's ok. I'm messing arround with the tools and features for now before I start doing anything more serious. The Alias web site tutorials are a bit simple but effective. I know that I will need some deeper stuff, so that book sounds good.

The mel script system always caught my attention i will look forward to trying that out in my animations.

Well, off to new beginnings. And new disscussions.
JA-forreal
05-07-2003, 03:30 AM
wgreenlee1, how's XSi so far? Have you gotten the interface down and so forth?
wgreenlee1
05-07-2003, 04:02 AM
Originally posted by JA-forreal
wgreenlee1, how's XSi so far? Have you gotten the interface down and so forth?

No...I meant I had not tried XSI yet.....

Maybe next year....;)
JA-forreal
05-07-2003, 06:22 AM
XSI has also been on my mind too. But Maya seems to be more worthy of the two of learning for serious 3d character animation. But I could be wrong. I hope not. Any way, a pursuit of practical knowledge is never taken in vain.
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