Introduction to Maya - Modeling Fundamentals Vol 2
This course will look in the fundamentals of modeling in Maya with an emphasis on creating good topology. It's aimed at people that have some modeling experience in Maya but are having trouble with
complex objects.
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1
22-09-2015
, 08:50 PM
Registered User
Join Date: Aug 2015
Join Date: Aug 2015
Posts: 31
Smoothing
so, when modelling I understand to check your mesh by hitting '3', check supporting edges and add them where needed. But to keep the number of faces etc down I need to use as few as possible and still get the model. Forexample when creating a round object like an eyeball or a ring I shouldn't be using 30 divisions but 8, 8 will look good when the model is smoothed. I hope that makes sense.
So when we are modelling for ourselves, to add to a portfolio or to show....do we then add a couple smoothes so it looks really nice...and when showing the wireframes do we show them after the smooths. Or do we take a screenshot of the mesh after we hit '3'?
Apologies that Im not expressing this well, has always been confusing as to why people seem able to get some really nice smooth geo with so few faces and when I try its rough.
Also, do many people retopologize with tools like quad draw? Was billed and seems to be a quite effective solution for retopologizing organi subjects.
One last question, as I also love modelling architecture and props is there a plugin worth getting that enhances Maya for making these? Or do most people just use Max.
Ok all done, thanks in advance for any help.
Scott
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2
23-09-2015
, 10:16 PM
Super Moderator
Join Date: Dec 2006
Join Date: Dec 2006
Location: South FL
Posts: 3,522
You can smooth the objects if you want to, it's just that keeping them light makes editing less painful and it takes less resources from your machine. Every machine has it's breaking point where even manipulating the camera becomes a slideshow because there are sooo many polys. There are other options other than directly smoothing the model, like keeping the poly count low but have the software smooth it when rendering. David posted a video on it in the Free Fridays sub forum.
The smooth preview ('3' key) has options that allow you to increase the level of smoothing. Select the object, go to the shape tab in the attribute editor and under "smooth mesh" there is a "subdivision level" section with slider for adjusting the smoothing amount, the default is 2. Just be mindful because even smooth preview isn't free and can bog down interactivity if applied too liberally for your machine.
For showcasing wireframe shots, depends on how fancy you want to get. You can use hardware rendered shots (viewport 2.0 can produce some nice clean ones) or software rendered wireframes via Mental Ray's contour rendering or even manipulate Maya's toon outlines into presenting a wireframe. Either way, you're probably better off showing the "cage" or unsmoothed version instead of one that has been repeatedly smoothed to the point where the wireframe is so dense that the edge flow is lost in a blob.
After they've integrated the Nex plugins into Maya, there aren't any modeling plug ins I can think of.
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