Maya's modeler

[Mikkel Jans]

Download the Connect Poly Shape Script or wait till Maya 4.5 comes out.

[ilasolomon]

it was about $6000,it has no SDS, no good renderer & they call it HIGHEND! ...poor MAX
may we call maya unlimited ULTRA-SUPER-OVER HIGHEST END!?
return your maya & buy little under-low-end buggy friend 3ds MAX!

[ZaonDude]

Actually, I just moved from 3dsmax to Maya, and although I'm finding myself resisting the difference in core architecture, I'm very impressed with Maya so far. The simple fact that it's node-based is incredibly helpful. Also, given that Maya is a sort of supreme source for nurbs modeling, I'm finding myself adopting nurbs quickly and a whole new manner of efficient modeling techniques.

I think Maya is indeed more advanced than 3ds max, but it will take me a while before I'm totally comfortable in it. I think max might still be faster (even discounting my great familiarity with max vs. maya newbiness), but I doubt I'll be going back to max.

[Mikkel Jans]

ila_solomon you don't know what you are talking about.
Max dosen't even have SubD. You have to learn the different between SubDivision and SubDivide.

[ilasolomon]

ok, teach me, if you mind
thanks :beer:
(but tell me something first, is the result different? or modeling
method is not the same?)
regards

[Mikkel Jans]

Modellen metode is the same but the Surface is different. The surface is just like a NURBS surface and can be renderet just like NURBS. SubDivision er mix between NURBS ans Poly.
SubDivide just dobbel the faces and make them smooth. It will allways be made out of triangles while SubDivisions Surfaces are 100% smooth.


You can't get SubDivision surfaces in Maya Complete but you can fake like Max do with the free script Connect Poly Shape or you can just wait till Maya 4.5 comes out it will support SubDivide in Complete. But SubDivision will allways be in Maya Unlimited.

[ilasolomon]

thank you... :)
is the rendering time differ? between SUBd & subD

[phyle]

What?!
I'm not much of a maya user, but mayas renderer works on polys doesnt it? Im pretty absolutely sure subd surfaces in maya are rendered as polys. In which case the programs are the same...

[Mikkel Jans]

Yes Mayas standard render convert the NURBS and SubD to Poly before rendering. But if you use Renderman or Entropy you can render true NURBS and SubD surfaces.

[phyle]

ahh, i see.
Yeh that is useful.
But im sure someone could program that into a the exporter from max?
No matter which program your in, the data of which you export a subd surface model is just polygon data?

[-wT-]

Well actually phyle, subdivision surfaces aren't like a polygons which you just edit in "subdivision mode" and there would always be a polygons below it, nope. It's just Maya's renderer which tesselates the surfaces at each render, so exporting subdiv's will always export subdivs, not polygons. Subdivision surfaces -> polygons will always be it's own operation.

[ZaonDude]

I have a question for those of you who follow SubDs a little more closely...

A lot of programs seem to claim SubD ability..

Here's a quote from discreet's feature list for 3dsmax: "Hierarchical Sub-division surfaces providing state of the art local subdivision, local smoothing, wavelet-based surface approximation, breakthrough refinement features, trimming, and a hierarchical approach that sets the bar for entertainment modeling and introduces an innovative approach to interactive geometry"

Here's a quote from Newtek's site on Lightwave: "LightWave 3D is a true, real-time subdivision surface modeler."

SoftImage XSI lists their SubD feature under 'curves' section, so I assume they can in fact offer true curve output.. But does MentalRay handle that since I don't see how XSI can be output to RenderMan? "Subdivision Surfaces provide for fast and interactive manipulation of complex characters, giving unmatched texture inheritance quality, and include new controls for displaying the limit surface while editing the points of the cage."

So, does that mean that using 3dsmax->MaxMan->RenderMan gives you true curve output? Same with Ligtwave->LightMan->RenderMan ??

Houdini didn't mention subDs... How many programs out there actually provide true subD output as a higher-order surface?

[ilasolomon]

yet i don't believe that there is a renderer that could shade surfaces without converting the
curved/formulated meshesh to polygons (faces). i need proof...is anybody here programer?

(since maya don't render real SubD, so what's difference between
SubD & sUBd ?! :) )

[ZaonDude]

Originally posted by ila_solomon
yet i don't believe that there is a renderer that could shade surfaces without converting the
curved/formulated meshesh to polygons (faces).

Once you try a RenderMan-compliant renderer, you'll know. They use 'micropolygons', but the manner in which they are employed allows for each pixel to be a micropolygon giving you perfect curve edges no matter how close the camera gets and at a speed that would put any other renderer to shame if it were to try for similar smoothness in the curve.

[Mikkel Jans]

I don't think that Maxs is real SubD.
SubD is not Polygons. It is it's own kind of surfaces so im not sure that you can export it to max. Or if you do so they will just be converted to Polygons.
SubDivision Surfaces is kontroled by a Polygon object. They are fater to work in. You have to SubDivide a Cube 3 times before it looks like a SubDivision Surface. But then it begins to lag and in dosen't lag with the Real SubDivision Surfaces. They are like NURBS surfaces made out of Curves.
There is no different when you render them out in Maya. But if you render in Entropy they will be 100% smooth. They won't be 100% smooth if i renderet SibDivide Surfaces in Entropy. They are just Triangles while Subdivisions are Curves. I have never tested it but m pretty sure that SubDivision renders faster then SubDivede. And also SubDivision is better to kontrol Displacement mapping because they are 100% smooth.

Here is a Screen shot of a SubDivide (On the right) and SubDivision (On the left).
http://www.maya3d.dk/temp/subd.jpg
With SubD you get a very smooth surface that is fast to work with. It is not 100% smooth in the Viewport but it is in the Render (If you use Entropy).
SubDivide just Divide all the faces 1 time and smooth them. If i Divide them 3 times is would look like a SubDivision in the Viewport but would be slow working with and it would never be 100% smooth in the rendering and im sure it will render slower.

[-wT-]

And to add to what Mikkel said, in addition on editing the subdivision surfaces in this "polygon proxy" mode (AKA the rough polycage of the subdivision surface (and smooth surface) of the Mikkel's picture), you can also go and control the surface itself, and small points in it. Abit like moving a single vertex after you would smooth out that rough polycage three times instead of using subdivision surfaces.
Sorry that my replies today have been abit messy, I seem to get these seasons of writing crappy english :scream:


Oh and to quote ila_solomon:
"yet i don't believe that there is a renderer that could shade surfaces without converting the
curved/formulated meshesh to polygons (faces). i need proof...is anybody here programer?"

I know Maya's own renderer doens't support "real" subdivision surface rendering, but subdiv's are really a mathematically driven surfaces, so it's not impossible to render them "like supposed to", a good example is these different renderman renderers mentioned here. I believe Entropy treats NURBS surfaces as a perfect surfaces too? As Maya's own renderer tesselates NURBS surfaces to polygons too, like it does on subdivision's, but I'm pretty sure NURBS Entropy renders completely mathematical and perfectly. Although I thought Entropy rendered Subdivisions "perfectly" too, and thought micropolygons were used only when calculating displacement maps? Well I could be wrong, but that's the image I've had about Entropy?

[ZaonDude]

Entropy does indeed act like PRMan in that SubDs and NURBS are rendered using micropolys and generate perfectly smooth edges at any resolution... assuming use of Maya or similar 3d app that outputs true curves.

[ilasolomon]

well, i'v just done a test with max & renderman
u r right, it did not matter how much i zoomed in to the corner
of the mesh, it still was curved!
only pixar guys can do such a thing!!! ;)

[ZaonDude]

Originally posted by ila_solomon
well, i'v just done a test with max & renderman

I assume that's a NURBS test output via Max->MaxMan->PRMan or just Max->Entropy?

But, Max's SubD's shouldn't do that, right? They should look polygonal.

[phyle]

I still think max should be able to output true subd surfaces.
I wouldnt be surprised if what ila said was true.
Ive never used any of these fancy renderers, but i think the process would be something like-
-You make a polygon mesh in your 3d ap
-you subdidvide it, and in your viewport you see a pretty smooth surface, put still polygons.
-then you export to renderman or whatever.
-But the data your program exports is a polygonial cage- telling renderman its a subd surface. Point 1 here, point 2 here etc...
-then renderman sees these polygons and knows to make it subd, and they come out smooth.

If renderman receives the data as some kind of curves(i dont see why it would), your exporter can create this data from the cage.

So i dont think its any biggy max rendering these true surfaces with renderman or whatever.

[ZaonDude]

Originally posted by phyle
So i dont think its any biggy max rendering these true surfaces with renderman or whatever.

It is for film resolutions or close zooms of any kind.

[kyphur]

From my understanding all renderers need to have the surface laid out as polygonal. I know that when I was programming shaders and .rib files for PRMan that they were being rendered as polygonal.

simple example:
_______________________________________________
WorldBegin
LightSource "distantlight" 1 "intensity" 1.5 "from" [0 0 1] "to" [0 0 0]

Surface "flame" "mid" 1 "cold" [0.5 0 0.8] "hot" [.78 .82 .05

Displacement "bumpy" "Km" 0.3 "freq" 2
Attribute "bound" "displacement" [0.05]
AttributeBegin
Scale 4 4 4
Polygon "P" [-0.5 -0.5 0 0.5 -0.5 0 0.5 0.5 0 -0.5 0.5 0]
"st" [0 0 1 0 1 1 0 1]
AttributeEnd
WorldEnd
_______________________________________________


And it should automatically convert ALL surfaces to polygonal no matter what they are. The modeling program converts the surfaces to polygonal based on the curve data of specific points for rendering. Whether it be NURB's, SubD or whatever, it just references the surface points. If it's straight polygonal then there's less surface points from point A to B. If you convert it to SubD then it places a bunch of reference points between A and B and adds those to the geometry and creates nice little lines for you to have to deal with when modeling.

Anyways, back to schoolwork.

Kyph

[ilasolomon]

ZaonDude:
simply i created a box, applied a MaxMan SubD modifier to it then
ouput to PRman via MaxMan.
no straight line was visible on the edges (extra zoom)
but still i think they are polys! :) mini poly or micropoly as you
mention it.

[Tudor]

If you see polygons or not all depends on how high the subdivision setting is set. Renderman can have some pretty high subdivision. For Geri's game or whatever the pixar short was called, they subdivided a polygons as soon as it became larger then .5 pixels.
Some programs can subdivide on poly level, some only on object level.

[ambient-whisper]

now if only all this "smoothness" made better models :hmm:
really. i would love for micropolys to become standard. because with micropoly displacements you could do some amazing things...

but as far as which is smoother...who cares. once you have a model at 10-20k and smooth it 1 or 2 times it will be smooth enough. depending on how large your render will be.
its soo bloody overrated its not funny.

[rebo]

as I understand it when rendering SDS with Rman compliant renderers the modeler (max/maya) etc exports a poly mesh and formats it within a subdiv tag. I dont think that the renderer receives any other data apart from polygonal mesh info.

The subdiv surface is just a derived surface in entropy/PRman etc.

The only specific subdiv attribute that would be set in a modeller when designing the object would be edge crease strength. Something that only PRman supports at the moment.

As to mayas true(?)- heirachical Sub div surfaces I am not sure how these are rendered in entropy/PRman.

At present my maya workflow is something like, rough out shape then use CPS script and switch between smoothed/unsmoothed approximate geomertry to work in details to the model. Once my approximate model is how I want it I then delete the smoothed model tag the base mesh as a subdiv surface in mayaman and render out in entropy.

The same workflow will work in max i believe.

As ambient-whisper says its far more important to understand how the algorithm that defines the derived surface works. I.e. understand how the topology of the base mesh defines the smoothed version. The control cage/ mesh surface can always be smoothed as many times is necessary depending on how much you are zooming in. Sure the subdiv Rman object makes it a moot point, but the quality of the control cage will always be more important than having to press 'smooth mesh' a few more times in the modeller of your choice.

[kyphur]

apparently no one read what I posted and just kept going...:p

kyph

[gaiXyn]

hi guys...I know this is a little off track...but I was just wondering if any of you knew when Maya 4.5 was going to be release?

Thanks.....

[dantea]

Originally posted by ZaonDude
Houdini didn't mention subDs... How many programs out there actually provide true subD output as a higher-order surface?[/b]

Houdini has a surface operator called the Subdivide SOP for doing catmull-clark subdivision. It also supports rendering as subD to prman (including crease weights). It also recently added subD output to its native renderer, Mantra 5 (http://www.sidefx.com/houdini/h5.pdf)

dante

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