<- Noob with Maya have a ?

[Doogie]

I C you turned up the hardware texture res, but it's still gunna be blurry becuse it's still a preview.

Maya has a special thing for Image Planes.

In your the orthographic view of your choice: View > Image Plane > Import Image

Instructions are in your Maya Docs under
How Do I? > Set up lights and cameras > Create an image plane

-Paul

[rob-beddall]

hey!!:wavey:
yep, i only found out about the image planes the other day.
they are so much better than making actual planes in the viewport( which, like an idiot, is what i was doing:wip: )
cheers!!:beer:

[Doogie]

Don't feel like an idiot. Coming from another package gives one an advantage, but keeps you from looking up "how it's done" because you are already used to your way.

I still use textured polys quite a bit for image planes too. They're a lot easier to move around and manipulate sometimes.

[LostSoul¹13]

thanks for the tip Doogie. Ill try this.

[FistsOfCurry]

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v177/kevino/marco.jpg

[LostSoul¹13]

sadly enogh no I'm not that good with the concept work and my art skill are low> she was desighned by my friend from school.

[zzzrByte]

I work a lot with image planes, and a great way to make your life easier is to create shelf buttons that will automate some common tasks for you. With just a little MEL you can create shelf buttons that will automatically manipulate your image planes.

Here's a short script I use to toggle my image planes on and off. It just checks the planes' alpha and if they are visible, it sets it to 0 and vice versa:

if (getAttr("frontImagePlane.alphaGain") == 0) {
setAttr "frontImagePlane.alphaGain" .5;
setAttr "sideImagePlane.alphaGain" .5;
setAttr "topImagePlane.alphaGain" .5;
}
else
{
setAttr "frontImagePlane.alphaGain" 0;
setAttr "sideImagePlane.alphaGain" 0;
setAttr "topImagePlane.alphaGain" 0;
}

Just swap frontImagePlane/sideImagePlane/topImagePlane with the name of your image planes node.

I also have shelf buttons that move the planes back and forth between being at the center, one over the other (like an X) and split apart.

P.S. - Actually I don't really know any MEL, but if you have any background in programming it is pretty self-explanatory and the help system is great.

[LostSoul¹13]

Thanks zzzByte I will try it. Were do i have to type all this stuff. Also i have a question call me stupid but whats a node?

[zzzrByte]

Here's how to create the shelf button.

http://www.jurassicpunk.com/zzz/shelfing.gif

Let me know if you're having problems with it.

As for nodes, the answer is: everything!
Alias|Wavefront defins Maya as "nodes with attributes that are connected"
Here's more from the Maya help system:

Nodes
Maya is built around nodes. An "object", such as a sphere, is built from several nodes: a creation node that records the options that created the sphere, a transform node that records how the object is moved, rotated, and scaled, and a shape node that stores the positions of the spheres control points.

Attributes
An attribute is a slot in a node that can hold a value or a connection to another node. Attributes control how a node works. For example, a transform node has attributes for the amount of rotation in X, Y, and Z. You can set attributes to control practically every aspect of your animation.


You can see the nodes by looking at the HyperGraph (Window -> Hypergraph)

You can work in Maya without knowing what nodes are, but when you do, it allows you to do some pretty advanced stuff. Don't worry about it too much... I rarely manually mess with nodes (except for when I'm doing texture work).

[LostSoul¹13]

ok ill do that TY man. So nodes ha interesting have to put it in my vocab. can u post the script that moves the image plane back and forth?

[zzzrByte]

Most of the video tutorials on Gnomon Online require a paid membership... But there are a couple of free ones in there. Like this one for example: Image Planes For Head Modeling (http://www.gnomononline.com/tutorial.php?category_id=2) it will tell you all you need to know, including a script on moving the planes.

The Gnomon DVDs (http://www.thegnomonworkshop.com/) are an excellent source to learn from... If you can afford them.
A free alternative are the video tutorials at Digital-Tutors (http://www.digital-tutors.com/digital_tutors/index.htm), and 3D Buzz (http://www.3dbuzz.com) (go to the downloads section and get the Maya VTMs)

[Waboflex]

Just thought I'd mention, in your original screengrabs we see you've got the hardware texturing set to highest - ironically this isn't the best quality setting. The Default quality setting should use the texture pretty much at full resolution, all the others are going to reduce the image if it's any bigger than 256x256.

I use textured poly planes all the time for reference plates, they just seem easier to work with in many cases. Personal preference really.

Wabo.

[zzzrByte]

So the "default" option for hardware texturing shows the texture at its original size...
I didn't know that. I thought it just used some default size that I can change in the preferences.

I learned something new.:thumbsup: Thanks

[LostSoul¹13]

ya but you need to have the same plane size as teh image and that would bee tooo big to work with. The view image plane worked perfectly and its much easier to set up that puting actuall image planes and mapping picture on them.
Thank again to everyone for help.

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