Maya 1 – 3D Modeling and Animation

Maya 1: This is the class that taught me pretty quickly what I *didn't* want to do with my life. It was all about creating characters and animating them. I already knew that creating characters was a weakness of mine, but I discovered something in the class that would quite possibly change my life. Rigging!

In a process called rigging, the virtual marionette is given various controllers and handles for controlling movement (Wikipedia).

This is what my niche would be. 3D rigging – a perfect blend of art and logic for someone like me (half programmer, half artist).

Frankly, I'm quite embarrassed about the work I generated for this class, but I'll try to get some videos uploaded once I get back home.

Introduction to Computer Graphics for Animation

It wasn't until Spring of 2007 that I decided to change my computer science major, drop everything and move to San Francisco to attend the Academy of Art University's School of Animation and Visual Effects.

My first 3D class was called Introduction to Computer Graphics for Animation. Honestly, I think the class was a bit too basic for where I was coming from, but it was good to get a solid foundation. We had to make this 3D character out of primitive shapes (e.g. cylinders, spheres, cubes, etc.). I chose to make a dog:

From Jedi's 3D Art

Granted, I cheated a little bit by tweaking some of the primitive shapes like making the ears floppy, curving the tail and pinching his tummy, but I wasn't marked down for any of that. In fact, I got an A+!

This was all done using Maya. I used a fur effect for the grass. Yeah, I know there's much better ways to do grass, but this is a really basic class people! I was really happy with the results. The sky was created using a dome. That's why you see the grass curving like it's on a hill. It was a total happy accident! I also made the dog run, but I'll have to publish that video later because I don't have it on me.