Customer Reviews

Maya 4 Fundamentals (Fundamentals (New Riders))

5 star:		(33)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I purchased the first three books published for Maya 4 (this one, "Maya" by Danny Riddell/Andrew S. Britt, and "Exploring Maya 4: 30 Studies in 3D" by Maximilian Schoenherr), and this one is definately the most useful, especially if you're a newbie or intermediate. Just the acompanying CD alone is worth the money! (It comes with video tutorials not unlike the popular Gnomon series that visually demonstrates the main points of the book, helpful info for Max users trying to migrate over to Maya, and includes an improved and extremely useful hotkey/marking menu system that I'm permanently going to use.) In 2 days I consider myself much more profficient than I was, and the Maya workflow seems to make more sense now. Cheers to Jim Lammers and Lee Gooding for writting a superior manual on this complicated program!

Summary: Experienced users may end up skipping some of the chapters, but you're bound to learn something. Newer users will get a lot out of it (including confidence in your skills and professional working habits). If you get only one Maya book, make it this one.

Having bought this book a while ago, I have mixed feelings about it. I think overall I would say that this book is best focused to the Maya (and perhaps 3d) beginner. If you're transitioning from another 3d app and already have 3d experience, this book might frustrate you somewhat from the simplistic exercises. If thats you, then skip this book. If you're getting into 3d for the first time, and Maya is the app you got, then this book might be a good place to begin.

Things I liked in this book:

1. The beginning chapters discuss and implement custom marking menus which can be very handy. This was a cool item for sure.
2. Overall, the book covers basic functionality of Maya that IMHO does a better job than the tutorials that shipped with Maya (Instant Maya). And it tries to implement the concepts in applicable (albeit very simplistic) scenes.
3. The video tutorial (chapter overviews) on the CD are excellent, and you could almost go through the book just watching the videos. Very helpful in making sure you don't get confused in a step.
4. having accompanying files on the CD was nice.

Ok, things that I didn't like:

1. The exercises in the book are basically targeted to the beginner. the modeling exercises never cover anything intermediate to advanced. Since I already have 3d experience in other apps, I didn't find this very useful and left me frustrated cause it answered none of my questions.
2. The chapters covering texturing IMO were again way to basic. It had a couple of good tips for procedurals applied to a House project, but it just didn't go very far.. Mapping methods were the most basic, and shader structures in hypershade were very simple. basically everything you saw in the shipped Maya tutorials was here. Don't expect a thorough explanation of shading networks here...
3. The book frequently has you start off from a file on the CD. This really frustrated me, since you're not taking your own work literally from start to finish. Ok, well you can if you dig in somewhat and merge some file elements together. But like when they cover animating the twisting of the house, you have to start from a house file that already has deformers applied to it. Why doesn't the author just take you through it?? argh.. so I found that a bit annoying albeit its not a big deal.
4. The part I looked forward to the most was incomplete, the creature creation project. it only covers the basics of modeling the head. They went step by step with so much else in the book, I was a bit disappointed that they didn't follow that though for the whole character. An attempt to continue the tutorial was online on the CD (in HTML form), but it was simplified and made pretty big leaps between steps. So it assumes you learned alot doing the basic head... hmm from newbie to expert I guess
5. Character rigging was completely omitted. This was definitely unfortunate so even if you had finished the creature, you wouldn't be doing much with it. Also, UV unwrapping was ommitted so texturing a complex object like the creature was left out. again unfortunate.

Well I can see many people were pleased with the book, so its up to you how to take this review. Overall, I'd say its an ok book, I got some useful tips out of it. But if I had it to do all over again, I'd probably go with Mastering Maya 3, it seems alot more in depth. If you're a newbie, this book will get your feet wet. If you're intermediate, hmmm you might get frustrated... I'd say simply go to forums like highend3d.com or cgtalk.com and you'll get the equivelent info for free. If you're an expert looking for a new twist on things... well ok this is definitely not for you. This book is literally living up to its subtitle. ** FUNDAMENTALS **

As an instructor in the Media Arts and Animation field, it is one of the hardest things assigning text in a classroom that you feel will serve as an excellent resource to your students new to 3D. Not only does this text allow for an easy understanding of the interface, it also supplies you with movies so that you may follow along with the tutorials. I have yet to find any book on the market so complete and thorough. For many students, especially those new to Maya and 3D, this book and its accompanying CD are a true gift in the classroom. This book is a real supplement to any instructional material and demonstrations offered in any beginning level 3D course. It is straightforward with concepts and offers a real down to earth understanding of Maya and its amazing tools. I also believe that those interested in 3D, but not interested in attending a college or classroom environment, will be able to work through this text and completely hone their skills using Maya. Great work guys!

Maya 4 Fundamentals is an excellent resource for those wanting a hands-on introduction to Alias|Wavefront's high-end graphics software package. The book takes you through the basics of their modeling, materials, lighting and animation tools by presenting an overview and guiding you through a project whereby those tools are put to use. As an adjunct to the text a CD is provided which includes not only the individual project files but movies of actual on-screen demonstrations of the book's lessons so that you may follow the author's examples while concurrently running Maya. This is a fine book for those wanting to learn Maya's basics. References are provided for those wishing to explore more about the tremendous capabilities of this software. Readers with previous 3D graphics experience will find it easy to follow along; Lightwave and Max users will find useful appendices listing the specific similarities in the various aspects of the applications. For the novice Maya can certainly seem overwhelming in its scope - especially when confronting all the reference manuals for the first time. This book is a great starting point. Readers with previous Maya experience can certainly use this as a resource as well as a refresher course.

This book is by far one of the best instructional guides to a 3d application that I have found as a novice 3d animator. The explanations are to the point and aren't jumbled with a bunch of tech garble that only experts can understand. The book defines basic concepts that I've been trying to grasp for some time. The cd package that comes with is complete and includes real-time tutorials that hammer out any details that the text doesn't complete. The best beginner book I've found yet.

Since 1994 I have been reading computer-based books, and this is the first time I have written a review. Maya 4 Fundamentals is the best-organized book for beginners I have ever had the pleasure to read. On their CD they have a follow along video clip of each project in the book! How easier can it get!!?? So if you want to learn Maya, but have never used 3d animation before... This is your book.... 5 STARS!

This is truly the best Maya book for beginners to advanced Maya users. The AVIs put this book far above the other Maya books.
You can watch video clips of the authors doing the tutorials right on your computer. And, you can toggle between the Maya interface and tutorial to work along with the author.
Authors, EXCELLENT job! Keep up the good work.

The Authors do a terrific job in introducing a newcomer to the world of computer graphics and especially 3D application. It doesn't give you instructions without explaining why. The reader will come away with some solid understanding of the world of 3D. This book takes the mystery out of many terms that took me a while to understand.
This book is not wordy, very well structured and easy to read. It includes movie files of step-by-step instructions that also give you visual guidance.
This book is not only for beginners. As a Maya user I found good information that sped up my workflow. The authors also explain a way to use subdivision modeling in Maya Complete. A feature that is only available in Maya Unlimited.
3D artists working with 3D Studio Max and Lightwave will also appreciate this book. At the end is a section that compares Maya with these two 3D applications.

CG and 3D artists who have have had some experience with 3d modelling will fare the best with this title, however, the accompanying CD narrated by Lammers is visually helpful for the beginner, as well. Simple tutorials and practical methods will get you using Maya in about two weeks. The learning curve for Maya is well above the average 3D program, but with persistence this book allows the reader to interpret the daunting user-interface for Maya. Aptly named, "Fundamentals" this book is also an excellent reference for moderate users who are not using all of the available tools in Maya. I will look forward to another installment by Lammers and Gooding that tackles more advanced tutotials and methods.

Although all of us have practical experience dealing with the 3-D world around us, translating that experience into creating professional-looking scenes or animations is a potentially daunting task. Maya is a powerful 3-D modeling, animation and rendering program that has been used to produce numerous display ads, television commercials and full-length movies such as Harry Potter and Toy Story. Until recently, Maya's price and complexity have kept it out of the hands of the prosumer computer video/graphic audience and those simply wishing to learn the art of 3-D graphics. Both of these issues have been addressed this year. Alias|Wavefront lowered the price of Maya Complete by [Thousands of dollars] this February and offered a free, fully functional Personal Learning Edition of the program and New Riders Publishing has released Maya 4 Fundamental by Jim Lammers and Lee Gooding.

Maya 4 Fundamentals is perhaps the "Gold Standard" of computer training material. It utilizes the educational philosophy of "tell them what you are going to tell them, tell them, and then tell them what you have told them." While this is a simple principle, it can be difficult to implement. Lammers and Gooding have succeeded beyond my expectations. Utilizing a framework of didactic material and tutorials reinforced by outstanding chapter-by-chapter videos and sample scenes on an accompanying CD, they have made the process of learning sophisticated 3-D graphics fun. By the end of chapter 4, the reader has created an impressive animation that anyone (who has just read four chapters of a 3-D textbook) would be proud to show their friends, family, a potential employer or a client. The subsequent chapters delve deeper into the complete modeling, animation and rendering process presented and integrated so successfully in chapter 4. The authors of Maya 4 Fundamentals even offer quick-start instructions for those familiar with other popular 3-D programs.

The introduction states that the book is intended for beginners and intermediate users but stress that experienced Maya users will also profit. I believe it exceeds its intent. I highly recommend Maya 4 Fundamentals and, knowing what I know now, would have paid a premium to obtain a copy.

Disclaimer: I do not know the authors or publishers and have no relationship with Maya 4's developers.