Chapter 6: Rendering

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Maya 8 at a Glance

• Chapter 6 Rendering

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Cameras

• There are three types of cameras

Standard Camera
Camera and Aim
Camera, Aim, and Up
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Clipping Planes

• Define the distances over which the camera will
  work
• Maya renders objects in the space between the
  near and far clipping planes of the camera

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Depth of Field

• Simulates how a real-world camera focuses
• Helps guide the viewers eye to important parts in
  the scene
• F-stop is the primary parameter used to determine
  the depth of field

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Motion Blur

• Simulates the film speed of exposure time of real
  cameras
• Enable blur by using the Shutter Speed in the
  Attribute Editor and the Motion Blur attributes
  in the Render Settings window
• 2D motion blur is a post-render process
• 3D motion blur affects geometry moving through
  the scene

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Render Settings

• Much of the rendering process is controlled in
  the Render Settings window
• Control common render settings in the Common tab
• Control specific software, hardware, mental ray,
  and vector render attributes in the second tab

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Render View

• The Render View window is where Maya shows you
  what it has rendered
• Rendering regions is a great way to speed up the
  time it takes to do test renders
• IPR uses render regions to interactively change
  basic settings in your scene

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Maya Software Renderer

• Default renderer
• Good general purpose renderer
• Anti-aliasing removes jagged edges from rendered
  objects
• Raytracing allows Maya to create highly realistic
  reflections, refractions, and shadows

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mental ray Renderer

• More robust than Mayas software renderer for
  realism
• Global Illumination allows mental ray to simulate
  the way light bounces off diffuse surfaces
• Photon intensity and number of photons
  drastically change the quality of GI

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mental ray Renderer

• Final Gathering is used as a finishing tool
• Final Gathering can smoothes and interpolates the
  light created by photons
• Caustics simulate the way light refracts through
  a complex surface or reflects off of it

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Maya Vector Renderer

• Uses mathematic formulae to represent color and
  shape in a rendered image
• Useful for web-based projects
• Can export to Flash .swf format

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Toon Shading

• Simulates hand-drawn, cartoony shading
• Various fill styles and outline options
• Modifiers can adjust specific regions in the
  scene

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