Create animations, environments, motion graphics, characters and more. Useful for making games, movies, graphic designs and virtual reality applications.
Autodesk Maya is a powerful application developed to help professionals create unique and complex 3D modeling and animations by using innovative tools and effects. Either you're designing aliens, war scenes, or mesmerizing landscapes, you'll find all the tools you need in Autodesk Maya.
Its installation process is easy to complete but it does last several minutes. Once it's done, you are welcomed by a modern UI, with a black background theme, along with numerous buttons and toolbars. For novice users, the interface may seem overcrowded and will require a deep learning curve. This is why the program includes manuals and tutorials.
The amount of embedded features is huge and only some of them will be mentioned. Autodesk Maya can be used to create vector graphics and photo-realistic images. Individuals can use Arnold RenderView to visualize scene changes in real time, including lighting, camera, and materials. Also, you'll find a powerful color management tool that has an efficient library capable of executing fast and consistent Boolean operations on polygon geometry. Furthermore, it has extensive 3D modeling options, provides support for OpenSubdiv, and can sculpt and shape models more artistically and intuitively.
All in all, Autodesk Maya is a comprehensive program that embeds multiple tools for creating 3D animations and environments. However, its price is quite expensive, and it requires serious CAD knowledge in order to use its features. Also, its organic modeling is not good enough and can be quite difficult to use.
v2020.0 [Mar 31, 2020]
- Rokoko + Maya. We've partnered with Rokoko to bring you an industry-leading motion capture library right inside of Maya. With the Rokoko plug-in, you can simply drag and drop mocap assets into your scenes from the comfort of your own home, without the need for a multi-million dollar studio or equipment setup. For the first time, you can leverage assets built for big productions like Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Doctor Strange, Assassin's Creed, and Horizon Zero Dawn in your own projects, for just $3-$6 a piece.
- Bifrost Extension for Maya 2.0.5.0. Maya 2020.1 includes Bifrost Extension for Maya version 2.0.5.0. Some of the highlights since Bifrost 2.0.3.0 (released with Maya 2020) include:
- Faster compilation, giving better graph interactivity.
- Faster aero simulations, and other aero improvements.
- Improvements to vary_source_property, constrain_mpm, and other nodes.
- Better graph readability and zooming.
- High resolution textures now supported for 3D Paint. When painting on a 3D object, you can now save textures at a size of up to 16k.Textures larger than 4096 x 4096 may yield slower performance. See Paint on a 3d object for more information.
- Time Slider Bookmark Improvements. Based on your feedback, tooltips have been added to options in the Time Slider Manager and several new functionalities have been added to the Time Slider Bookmarks.
- Interactive Move and Scale. You can now Ctrl + drag a bookmark to move it left and right on the Time Slider. To scale a bookmark, Ctrl + drag the left or right edge of the bookmark. Both these interactions respect the Current time indicator Snap to whole frames preference in the Time Slider preferences, so you can turn this option off if you want to scale and move bookmarks at decimal values.
- Step through bookmarks. There are now two new commands to step bookmarks forward and backward, so you can set the current time to the start of the next or previous bookmark. To step through your bookmarks, press ' (apostrophe) to move the selection forward and ; (semicolon) to step backward.
- Bookmark Manager. Now, bookmarks are displayed according to their position in the time sequence, as opposed to by when they were created, allowing for a more intuitive approach to working with the Bookmark Manager.
- Obtain the latest Substance plug-in. The Substance plug-in enables you to create and edit shading networks with substance textures in Maya.
Review 2D and 3D designs without using the application they were created in
Create a floor plan for your home and start adding walls and textures
