Many animators and designers would like to supplement their Maya learning with a less-technical, more helpful book. This self-study manual is both a general guide for understanding 3-D computer graphics and a specific guide for learning the fundamentals of Maya: workspace, modeling, animation, shading, lighting, and rendering.

Understanding 3-D Animation Using Maya covers these fundamentals in each chapter so that readers gain increasingly detailed knowledge. After an initial 'concepts' section launches each chapter, hands-on tutorials are provided, as well as a chapter project that progressively adds newly learned material and culminates in the final animated short. This is the first book on Maya that teaches the subject using a sensible, proven methodology for both novices and intermediate users.

Topics and features:

- Proven method that emphasizes preliminaries to every chapter

- Integrates the "why" concepts of 3-D simultaneously with the "how-to" techniques

- Skills reinforced with tutorials and chapter projects

- Real-world experience distilled into helpful hints and step-by-step guides for common tasks