Surviving the first day in Maya 8.5
Contents
From Maya 7.01 to Maya 8.5
This page describes the main changes for students between Maya 7.01 and Maya 8.5.
Menu Changes
- The Modeling menu has been split into two menus: Polygons and Surfaces.
- Note that you'll find Edit Curves menu in the Surfaces menuset.
- Polygons are now referred to as Mesh. So Polygons and Edit Polygons are now Mesh and Edit mesh.
Polygon Menu Changes
| Menu | Maya 7.01 | Menu | Maya 8.5 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Polygons | Tool Options > Keep faces together | -> | Edit Mesh | Keep faces together |
| Edit Polygons | Extrude Face | -> | Edit Mesh | Extrude |
| Edit Polygons | Extrude Edge | -> | Edit Mesh | Extrude |
| Edit Polygons | Merge Vertices | -> | Edit Mesh | Merge |
| Edit Polygons | Normals > ... | -> | Normals | ... |
Create Polygon and NURBS primitives Changes
By default, Maya will create Polygon- and NURBS primitives in interactive mode. This allows you to determine the size and location interactively.
You can create a default sized primitive in the origin by a single click instead of dragging. You can also disable the interactive creation altogether: Create > Polygon Primitives / NURBS Primitives > Interactive Creation
Duplicate Changes
Duplicate has been split into Duplicate and Duplicate Special.
Duplicate, ctrl + d will always make one single duplicate in the same position.
Duplicate Special, ctrl + shift + d will make one or more duplicates using the settings in the option box. Allowing transforms, instances, etc.
Duplicate with Transform, shift + d hasn't changed.
You'll find both in the edit menu.
Absolute and Relative transform input
The input field for absolute and relative transform has been split into three fields for X, Y and Z value. The default is now Absolute Transform instead of Select by name. You can use [TAB] to switch to the next field while entering values.
Mental Ray Changes
The TOI-pedia tutorials on Mental Ray will be updated for Maya 8.5 very soon. Those are due beginning of september 2007.
You'll find the button to create a dome for Image Based Lighting under the section Environment in the Mental Ray tab of the Rendersettings. It has been complemented with a button to create a Physical Sky and Sunlight.
The Final Gather settings have changed. Final Gather Rays is now called Accuracy. The settings for min/max radius have been replaced by Point Density and Point Interpolation. It's recommended to use these setting, but you can still find the old radius control under Final Gather Settings, Use Radius Quality Control.
It's no longer needed to modify your materials (shaders) when using Global Illumination. The photon shaders is now by default part of the normal Maya shaders, such as Lambert, Blinn, Phong, etc.
Exporting curves to AutoCAD
Unfortunately, Autodesk decided to drop the dwgTranslator plugin without replacing it with something of their own. So it's impossible to export curves directly to DWG using Maya 8.5 (We logged a case with Autodesk for this issue, but we don't expect a quick fix).
Solution:
- Select the curves you want to export. File > Export selection and export as Maya Ascii (.ma).
- Start Maya 7.01 (with the dwgTranslator plugin installed)
- Open de Maya Ascii file using Wordpad.
- Change the line that starts with requires from requires maya "8.5"; to requires maya "7.0";
- If there is a line that starts with requires "Mayatomr", delete the entire line
- Save the file and close Wordpad
- File > Open or Import and open the modfied .ma file
- Now you're ready to export them to .dwg.
