Digital Effects Animation Using Maya (Graphics Series) (Paperback)

~ Kian Bee Ng (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Digital Effects Animation Using Maya takes an interesting approach to animation effects by categorizing them in terms of elements in nature: fire, water, air, and earth. It also employs a fifth element, dynamics, which governs the movement of the first four. Using these elements as a paradigm, the book offers eight tutorials that demonstrate ways of building scenes with fire, explosions, flowing water, splashing water, terrain, and grass.

The instructions in the tutorials are all specific to Alias|Wavefront's Maya animation system, but many of the principles discussed can be applied to other software packages. Fire burns the same, water flows the same, dust and dynamics behave similarly from application to application.

One of the most important chapters is "Generating Terrain, Grass, and Plug-ins." While it's important to know how to use the supplied effects and particle systems in Maya, it is 10 times more important to be able to write your own plug-ins (a.k.a. "shaders") for creating a specific or custom effect. This chapter describes how to write your own shader. (A programming environment is required.) The example in the book shows how to build a terrain generator and then use the "fur" shader to add grass.

Unfortunately, the book's title considerably overshoots its content. It would be more accurate to title this book Digital Nature Effects or Using Natural Systems in Maya. The term "digital effects" is far too broad to be defined by the five elements of nature.

In the scant few years since Alias|Wavefront released Maya, it has become known as a next-generation 3D animation tool for environments, particle systems, and effects. It is from this perspective that Digital Effects Using Maya is written, a handy volume of tutorials and tips for this high-end software for beginning to intermediate users. --Mike Caputo

Product Description

Due to the technical nature and mathematical complexities involved in creating realistic effects, digital effects have traditionally been in the hands of high powered computers and progammers. With the continued evolution of powerful graphics software, however, non programmers and designers can create exciting commercial quality digital effects. This book provides insights into both the technical and aesthetic challenges of creating awesome digital effects. By using example animations and breaking down the various steps involved in their creation, the author provides the problem solving skills and techniques needed to create your own stunning effects. There are a variety of software programs available for digital animation creation and readers can apply the skills they learn here to most of these programs. The example program used throughout the book, however, will be Maya. Maya is one of the most complete, production ready programs available, and its open architecture allows artists and programmers to add functions easily.

Key Features: -Covers both the technical and aesthetic issues from problem solving to generating believable animations -Uses example animations to investigate the techniques employed to create them -Detailed cover of Maya -CD includes tutorials, images, movies, and scripts. It runs on PC/Mac/Unix

Brief Table of Contents: The Basics; Understanding the Fundamentals; Basic Elements of Effects Animation; The Four Elements: Fire, Air, Water, and Earth; Dynamic Simulation; Lighting and Effects; Rendering Issues; Tips and Tricks.

Product Details

• Paperback: 550 pages
• Publisher: Delmar Thomson Learning; SGI/NT CD-Rom edition (September 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1886801371
• ISBN-13: 978-1886801370
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.5 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (22 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,798,623 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

36 of 38 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A serious review, December 9, 1999

By	Serious Reviewer (Toronto) - See all my reviews

I've read almost every graphics books (3D and games). So, let me give my analysis of this book.

My opinion is this book is a very GOOD book. I've seen other books that give all kind of false advertising - duplicate half of the manuals, copy articles from all over the places etc. (You will be surprise how many of these are lying around) Those deserve a one star rating. But this book is one of a kind that serve as a good reference for Maya. It doesnt take the manual and repeat them here, which is what I love about.

But, I believe because this is the first book on Maya, many people would probably rush to buy it without reading from the author that it is not a beginner book but one specifically written for effects wannabe. That probably explain why some of the readers are pulling out their hair while doing the tutorials. The other reason I believe is likely due to the printing errors. But hack, programs have bugs, system has flaws. There are more books that have more errors than this one! Besides, those errors are really minor.

So, my recommendation is very simple:

a. If you're first time Maya user, buy the learning maya book from alias wavefront. This one is not for you.

b. If you're experience user, but know nothing more than those from the manuals, buy this book. It has some really good theory and practice of effects.

c. If you like books that tell you and explain very thing step by step, this one is not for you.

d. If you dont mind people throwing the codes and answers to you and expect you to think, this is the book you should get.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Stay Away From This One !, October 1, 1999

By A Customer

This book is one of the biggest publishing jokes I ever seen. It is full of unattractive and boring tutorials. It comes with inadequate CD, and to top it all, it has plethora of MEL and expression errors rendering it pretty much useless. As many of you, I was exited to get my hands on the first book on Maya. The publisher description presented the book really well, and I bought the book right when it came out. I must congratulate to who ever wrote the synopsis, because I would love to have them when I have a bridge, or a lump of coal to sell. I expected a professional book, written for a professional. Instead I was immediately disappointed, and shocked with the mediocrity of the tutorial movies. Anyone, who is artistically inclined, would probably be put off by them. I decided, therefore, to look at this book from a technical point of view, since it clearly was not aesthetically pleasing. I jumped right into the tutorials, which very quickly became boring and somewhat hard to follow. The author seems to have a lot of digital effects knowledge, but he just can not present it well. The book is full of unnecessary screen shots, "tasks" and "note" sections, formatted with huge margins, and large font, ballooning it to over 500 pages. All this in apparent effort to make it more attractive for the reader, and make him/her feel like she is really getting something by buying it. In the end, however, there is a lot of publishing fuss and tricks we could expect from a high school paper, and not a lot of substance. This little substance, would still be useful for a reader, if the tutorials were not plagued with simple errors in MEL and expression scripts. It is incredibly frustrating to spend a lot of time figuring out why things are not working the way they should. This frustration doesn't even compare to how you feel when you discover that it was not your fault, but a simple typo, or mistake made by the author. Unfortunately, you will feel like that a lot reading this book. You will not only have to double check for your own mistakes when you type in the scripts, but also check if the author didn't leave any. Yes, I wrote "type in the scripts," because the CD does not include any of them. This might be fine with small, one or two line scripts, but I thought the reason for a CD in the back of the book, was just for such occasions. I also expected the CD to have scenes for each tutorial, shaders used, and other resources that could actually be useful. Instead we get few sample movies, sketches, plugin or two, and the always favorite, free models. Bottom-line - stay away from this book. It makes me mad that we have to pay ___ and get little in return. This book was obviously rushed through production, because of its many mistakes, half thought out tutorials, and week CD content.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Effects and advance Maya book, November 22, 1999

By	Serious Reviewer (Toronto) - See all my reviews

This book is more suitable for intermediate and (maybe) advance user. For beginner, I suggest that you stick with the manuals. Only buy this book if you are already experience in Maya. I agree with the comment that the editor and proof-readers of the book did not do a good job. So, you will expect to see mistakes here and there. But you should get the latest updates from the book's website. If you're experience, you will be able to spot the mistakes and carry on with the tutorials. But if you're beginner, I wish you good luck! For effects wannabe, this book does present a good overall idea of what to expect and how to use Maya to work out those effects. Pretty decent!