Reading and video tutorials assignment first two weeks
SPRING 2009 - previous semester

FALL 2009 students
This page has information and links to great Maya web resources
3DBuzz, Swinburne and Michael O'Rourke free tutorials - both video and text

  1. Read through the following 14 page long Introduction to Maya book excerpt from Wiley publishers. Use it to answer the following 10 homework questions. You can ignore the portions of the PDF document that the questions do not mention and focus on getting familiar with the terms and concepts that the questions focus on.

    2. VIP: These Homework questions are due and will be collected on Wednesday, January 21st.

  2. Watch the following five video tutorials from the Swinburne Multimedia Design Tutorials. You will probably enjoy the Aussie accent of Steven Murdoch, the instructor on most of the videos! Note: If you wish to see a list of all the Maya tutorials, click here.

    1. Tutorial: What is 3D space? X Y Z and R G B Time of tutorial: 01:35 (1 minute 35 seconds)
    2. Tutorial: What makes up a 3D object in Maya graphics? Time: 02:55 (2 minutes 55 seconds)
    3. Tutorial: The Move Tool in Maya. Upside down M is a W. Time: 01:54 (1 minute 54 seconds)
    4. Tutorial: The Maya Rotate Tool. Think rotatE with an uppEr case E. Time: 01:42
    5. Tutorial: The Scale Tool, also known as the Resize tool. Time: 01:13

  3. Michael O'Rourke tutorial on the Maya Interface. What are the FIVE main modules that Maya is divided up into? What are the shortcuts to get to these 5 modules? Note: These are often called the 5 menu sets. The first icon on the Status Line allows you to select which MENU SET or MODULE you wish to use. A P S D R or show me your APS as in apps or applications DR as in Doctor is how I remembered them when I was starting out in Maya. APS DR.
    4. The free tutorial is accessed with user id mayatuts and password morourke
                                           --------              --------
Username:  mayatuts
Password:  morourke
    The Michael O'Rourke Maya3D Tutorials web site provides about 150 to 200 tutorials. These tutorials are most useful to read and do AFTER you have the Maya software and can sit down and follow the tutorial steps and experiment with the software. The categories are as follows: 
     Modeling
 Motion Dynamics                  Again,the username is     mayatuts
 Animation
 Character Animation                      with password     morourke
 Rendering

  4. The Maya video tutorials at 3D Buzz by Jason Buzby and Zach Parish are wonderful. The site is www.3dbuzz.com and the URLs to get to the free sample videos are:

    1. http://www.3dbuzz.com/training/view/mastering-maya-introduction/introduction
      ... 26 free videos ...

    2. http://www.3dbuzz.com/training/view/mastering-maya-the-talented-ball/the-talented-ball.
      ... 61 free videos ... 
      Please watch the following five free video tutorials and take some notes 
  if possible:
    
  Intro to Maya Fundamentals        07:24
  What is Maya?                     05:19
  2D vs. 3D                         09:56
  Viewports                         09:37
  Overview of the Talented Ball     06:13