Customer Reviews

Learning Autodesk Maya 2008, (Official Autodesk Training Guide, includes DVD): The Modeling & Animation Handbook

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Official Autodesk Training Guides are a superb investment and this book in particular, is terrific. If you have an intermediate-level of knowledge about Maya, you will find this book moves at a fairly quick pace. Also, if you have a good working knowledge of the Maya interface and its tools, but lack the discipline of a solid production workflow then book will enhance your skills and round out your education.

I am a beginner with only peripheral knowledge of the Maya interface but because the book is so well written I have been able to keep pace and have learned more in the last few weeks than I have gained in the hundreds of hours of parroting the video tutorials available online.

I've spent a small fortune in the last few months buying Maya video tutorials from a couple of different online sources and for the most part, they provide you with all the steps necessary to create the models you see in the videos and expose you to many aspects of the software, but what these videos don't do is explain the "why", which is necessary if you are to grow and take your creativity to the next level.

In all fairness to the authors of these videos, they are working with self-imposed limitations and the knowledge to be gleaned from the videos is only as good as the individual who wrote the lesson guide. Therefore, I decided before I get too far along in my Maya learning experience, I needed a good working knowledge of the fundamentals and who better to provide that than the "official" experts.

Breakout the videos if you want to build a good looking Mitsubishi car in twenty-hours time but buy this book if you plan to "design" the next Mitsubishi car. Therein lies the difference between their videos and this Autodesk series of books; not only do these books explain the "why", they provide the discipline necessary for a dependable production workflow, which is critical if you intend to work in this field.

By the time you finish this book you will know the key concepts and workflows of Maya. You will know the tools and their application. You will learn modeling and animation and understand how they relate to each other in a production pipeline.

This is a really cool learning guide. It is geared a little more towards people who have a basic understanding of the Maya universe. If you have never used maya at all, it may be a little confusing. I suggest playing with the interface and going through the "Getting Started" lessons included with the Maya software before getting into this book.. The dvd contains support files for the lessons in the book. It would have been nice if it had some video reference. The pictures in the book aren't the best guides, so unless you understand the text, you may find yourself using more creative freedom to complete the models than actual tutoring. Still, it is a great reference and gives you all you need to create some complete models to practice building and animating. Hope this helps.

it is a great reference book!! I'm a student at animation major.. this is helping me all the time.. Also you can use this book for learning the software by yourself.. it is explaning and then give you assignments so you can understand the lesson well..

good luck!!

I'm pretty sure it's not for beginners... this is not "Maya for Dummies" haha... but if you are familiar with the Maya interface already then this is the book for you. It's starts right off into modeling your character and is quite thorough. There are some minor details left out, but as I said, if you are familiar with Maya in a basic sense you can get through it.

I got it in a timely fashion and the book was in good condition. It was very helpful.

The major flaw to this book is the manner in which it "teaches" you concepts. Instead of describing the general, overall steps - Learning Autodesk Maya gives you step-by-step instructions to create their model images yourself. This leads very little room for learning variations and other tools that are helpful in the modeling and animating process. I would recommend this book be used only as a supplementary material and not as a main text if you are learning to use Maya.

Do not try to use this text with newer (or older) versions of Maya. Maya changes every year- not just in appearance, but also in functionality.

Its a great price for the book that has alot of good info in it and had no problems with on time delivery and showed up in great condition.

Si te interesa la creacion de personajes completos y hasta animarlos este es tu libro... esta en ingles!

This is one of the best book I have , that show you how to use Maya from the beginning

This is the ideal guide for those who want to perfectionate his or her modelling skills. Extremelly usefull step by step tutorials. Highly recommened. Another score for Autodesk!