Learning Maya- 2D to 3D

[Larry L.]

Hello!

Okay, I am now officially learning Maya (yes, you can teach an old dog new tricks).

Any specific suggestions you might have on resources on the internet or books where I can learn the program...especially, the graph editor?

Many Thanks...

Best,

[ender]

Well Larry our very own Patricia Beckmann has a Maya book coming out (which my work is in, woot!). Also in general for 3d one of my favorites is "Stop Staring" By Jason Osipa which teaches facial animation for 3D...

erm...

actually in terms of just learning the software, the Understanding Maya book (of which you can probably get a copy from Mark Thomasson in the Systems office at Montgomery Hall) is a pretty good beginning read.

Ender

[Dave]

http://www.thegnomonworkshop.com/videos/CHA_01.html

3DMax guy myself but I hear a lot of good things about these; and DVD should be a lot more fun to learn with then reading hundreds of pages of text and looking at graphs. This one seems to cover the basics of keyframing, setting timesliders and how to read f-curves.


cheers,
~D

[Poser]

Your learning 3d? Good for you, Larry. If everything goes good, I hope to be learning mya in the next few weeks. This is certainly the time to do it!

Cheers!

[ender]

Hopefully you'll be learning Maya for more then the next two weeks, Poser :) The learning curve is something like 2 years...

[joelpeet]

2 years:eek::eek::eek:

ouch!

Must admit it's harder to learn than Photoshop, Indesign, Xpress, Illustrator, and so on. But 2 years , glups! :p

[DreamFollower]

good for you, Larry...some sites I found useful. Not too much specifically on the graph editor out there.

http://www.maya3d.dk/links/tutorials/
http://www.angelfire.com/fl5/jcmiller/Acell.htm
http://www.highend3d.com/maya/tutorials/
http://www.3dcafe.com/asp/tutalias.asp
http://www.alias.com/eng/community/index.jhtml
http://www.worldofmaya.com/t_mayagui.html
http://www.3dtreat.com/pages/maya_notes/mainframeset_animation.htm
http://www.3dlinks.com/links.cfm?categoryid=13&subcategoryid=113

the graph editor panel
http://www.c3.hu/docs/maya/InstantMaya/InstantMaya/Anim3a.html
http://www.c3.hu/docs/maya/UserGuide/Anim/KeyAnimGraphEd.html
http://caad.arch.ethz.ch/info/maya/manual/UserGuide/Animation/
KeyframeMoPath/04_graph_editor.doc.html (you'll have to cut and paste this link!)
http://www.planetunreal.com/mentallic/Tutorial/Tute1Page1.html


In terms of using the graph editor, just play around with it. Build an object, animate it over some time and then just play. It's really the best way...have fun. If you have any specific questions, don't hesitate to email me.

[Larry L.]

Thanks Everyone...

Great stuff!

[Bob_D]

Hey Larry,

Welcome to the dark side!

cheers

Bob

[Harvey Human]

Start out with the tutorials that are packaged with Maya.
After those, you can either buy a character animation book or use online tutorials.