Digital Animation Bible: Creating Professional Animation with 3ds Max, Lightwave, and Maya [Paperback]

George Avgerakis (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 2, 2003 | ISBN-10: 0071414940 | ISBN-13: 978-0071414944 | Edition: 1

This title deals with: how to choose and use the right software for your animation needs - covers industry leaders Lightwave, Maya, and Flash; how to create and execute intricate storyboards; character rendering; and lighting in 3-D animation.

Editorial Reviews

From the Inside Flap

JOIN THE RANKS OF CREATIVE, HIGHLY PAID DIGITAL ANIMATORS!

MASTER DIGITAL ANIMATION -- USING THE THREE HOTTEST PROGRAMS
Essential to today's commercials, feature films, games corporate presentations, and education digital animation is the hottest career prospect in the media creation business. In this new arena, creativity is king, not the size of your studio.

In the Digital Animation Bible, Videography and Digital Cinema magazine Contributing Editor George Avgerakis, a professional digital animator and videographer, gives you everything you need to get started, showing how any determined and creative reader can master this exciting new field by learning the fundamentals -- and getting comfortable with any of the three leading software packages that form the common language of contemporary digital animation.

STEP BY STEP: HOW TO SET UP AND OPERATE YOUR OWN DIGITAL ANIMATION STUDIO

Digital Animation Bible:

* Helps you get your fist professional experience as an intern

* Provides essential information on choosing and using the right software, with dozens of hands-on examples

* Shows you how to put together a killer show reel

* Guides you into your first paying job, from interview to paycheck

* Shows you how to take a client from a need to a complete storyboard

* Helps you originate, define, and render unforgettable characters

* Facilitates your skill in lighting 3-D animations

* Prepares you for your new life as a professional digital animator or studio owner!

Everything you need is in this book, including a CD that allows access to FREE learning versions of 3ds max, Lightwave, Maya and other useful animation software!

From the Back Cover

JOIN THE RANKS OF CREATIVE, HIGHLY PAID DIGITAL ANIMATORS!

MASTER DIGITAL ANIMATION -- USING THE THREE HOTTEST PROGRAMS
Essential to today's commercials, feature films, games corporate presentations, and education digital animation is the hottest career prospect in the media creation business. In this new arena, creativity is king, not the size of your studio.

In the Digital Animation Bible, Videography and Digital Cinema magazine Contributing Editor George Avgerakis, a professional digital animator and videographer, gives you everything you need to get started, showing how any determined and creative reader can master this exciting new field by learning the fundamentals -- and getting comfortable with any of the three leading software packages that form the common language of contemporary digital animation.

STEP BY STEP: HOW TO SET UP AND OPERATE YOUR OWN DIGITAL ANIMATION STUDIO

Digital Animation Bible:
* Helps you get your fist professional experience as an intern
* Provides essential information on choosing and using the right software, with dozens of hands-on examples
* Shows you how to put together a killer show reel
* Guides you into your first paying job, from interview to paycheck
* Shows you how to take a client from a need to a complete storyboard
* Helps you originate, define, and render unforgettable characters
* Facilitates your skill in lighting 3-D animations
* Prepares you for your new life as a professional digital animator or studio owner!

Everything you need is in this book, including a CD that allows access to FREE learning versions of 3ds max, Lightwave, Maya and other useful animation software!

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 330 pages
• Publisher: McGraw-Hill/TAB Electronics; 1 edition (October 2, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0071414940
• ISBN-13: 978-0071414944
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.4 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 2.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,588,356 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A better title would have been-, July 27, 2004

By 

Bob from the Midwest (The Middle of No Where) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Digital Animation Bible: Creating Professional Animation with 3ds Max, Lightwave, and Maya (Paperback)

'How to set up and run a video production studio' -- the main problem with this book is it cover so much it only gives the briefest coverage of anything. He covers subjects as basic as surge protectors and laptop computers, printers, scanners.
While digital animation proper is reduced to a couple of chapters. Lets take storyboards for instance - four scribbled panels on half a page - a couple of meaningless 'flow charts' and that is all. The animation samples are from the tutorial that comes with max and reproduced in B/W.
If you want an overview I suppose this will be a good choice, but if you want to learn 3D CG, find another book

10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars why this book is the one..., January 12, 2004

By 

Graham Proctor (London, UK.) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Digital Animation Bible: Creating Professional Animation with 3ds Max, Lightwave, and Maya (Paperback)

I bought the 'Digital Animation Bible' in December 2003 and I've been reading and re-reading it ever since. I can honestly say that it is about the most useful book of its kind that I've ever come across. My background is in graphics and digital audio and I would describe my general knowledge of computing as strong...but you don't need that much computer experience to get major benefits from reading this.

The book offers comprehensive overviews of the three leading animation programs (3ds Max, Lightwave and Maya) and also gives extensive coverage to general information about virtually every aspect of the field. If you're starting out with either no knowledge or just a general grasp, you should finish up with a very clear idea of what's going on and how you could get in on the action.

Normally, I get bored with shelf-busters because they often don't tell you much you don't already know - or if they do, they take relatively straight forward ideas and pedal them out over so many pages that you either loose the thread, or fall asleep before you arrive at the meat of the issue.

George Avgeraki's book is different. He's got a real knack for condensing key ideas into just a few pages or paragraphs in such a way as to make it possible for you to 'get it' with comparative ease. He also has a positive and enthusiastic 'can do' writing style that makes it easy to absorb what he's pitching you.

There is a great intro to splines, an extremely revealing description of the use by professionals of 3rd party compositing programs for rendering, and lots excellent insights on how people actually approach their work on a day to day basis.

The chapter on 'objects and surfaces' is particularly worth visiting - even if you think that you already have the basic idea.

One of the unique things about this manual that sets it apart from the competition is that George Avgerakis has peppered it with lots of valuable little nuggets from his business experience in the field. He's done this in a way that's funny and entertaining - it never gets in the way of the the reason why you're reading the book - but it's illuminating, whether your coming to this field as freelancer or as potential (or actual) employee. If you want some insight into what your client or employer is looking for from you in the computer animation game then you can get that perspective courtesy of Mr Avgerakis.

So, in summary, a great book and well worth your reading time.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Practically USELESS!, December 2, 2005

By 

C. Morris "Merlin" (Charlottesville, Virginia United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Digital Animation Bible: Creating Professional Animation with 3ds Max, Lightwave, and Maya (Paperback)

Read the review by "Bob - The guy from nowhere". It's the most accurate description of this book.

Don't waste your time or money on this one. It does not do a good job of covering any of the primary points it claims to present. Granted, it would take several books to cover each topic, but even as a general overview it's really not that useful. Digital Animation Bible? I don't think so!

At the beginning of the book, the author writes "I didn't want to open [this book] with a lot of boring stuff about how this book was organized or what you could expect to get out of it." There is a good reason for that. You will be asking yourself the same question by the end of the book.