Thanks for your input folks

[ignacio-1]

Well, I've gathered enough information here to realize that:
A) Maya sucks
Maya documentation sucks even more.

I've come to realize that Maya is optimize for factory work and not for single users. Maya documentation, both from Alias and third-party sources, is hideously erroneous, confusing, and absolutely annoying.

I've had it with this app, and it just went in the trash. I'd like to thank everyone who responded here for helping me realize the problem was not entirely mine. I want an 3D app I can enjoy working with, and Maya definitely isn't it.

I'm sure there are some of you here who feel quite at home with this app, and all I can say is enjoy yourselves. As for me, I'm looking at Blender or 3D Max, and right now it's looking like Blender.

Good luck to you all.

[joojaa]

Its interesting how something becomes pure [censored] if you dont understand anything.

Well my experiences are the opposite. Maya is absolutely fabulous for small teams, but its scalable to the extreme. But that said it took me 1 year of headbanging before i startted to appriciate maya (and i did have experience in 3d for about 5 years before that, maya kindoff brought me to the next levell and then beyond it).

Maya manuals are ok, nearly the best 3d manuals ive ever seen, altough i must say thet the v5 manuals were better organized than the v6 ones. But that said a manual is atechnical reference more than a teach me to do things resource, so dont expect manuals to be tutorials. (i dear you to wriete a tutorial on how to use a hammer, and list all that it can do!)

Maya isnt for everyone tough since maya isnt a easy tool, and is not intended to be one of thos things you can jump into in 10 minutes. Maya takes a HUGE time effort to get into. However that effort pays off in ways that max does not. Se most apps can do 85% of the stuff easily, and are hideously hard the last 15% of the way. Maya is heavy a bit heavy to use the 85% but maya also takes you the 15%.

Maya is desogned for thkose that understand what they are doing. And that isnt something you learn in a year or so!

My personal oppinion is that MAX is pure [censored] that should be avoided at all cost. Se max confuses the hell out of its operators, by hiding fundamental facts from the user... And deluding you into thinking you can do thing sytou cant, wich is very dangerous. Not to mention tha fact that switching form max to ANYTHING else is painfull to say the last.

Happy blending, hope you get to what you aspire to. But sadly most people dont have the right stuff to do so, even idf they deram of such things.

[jtk77]

Blenders cool. Have fun man. I'm not sure why you've gathered Maya sucks from this forum, most of the questions asked here are pretty advanced and would be either just as complicated or impossible in other apps out of the box.

[chaoticgood]

If you think you will learn this program in a few months, ignacio, you're not being realistic with yourself. I have just started as well, but I know that I'm not going to be able to design a character in 2-months, let alone a year.

I would recommend the book Maya 6 Foundation. I have been working with it and it has helped me understand some of the core functions.

ChaoticGood

[ignacio-1]

If you think you will learn this program in a few months, ignacio, you're not being realistic with yourself. <<

I have no such delusions. However, working with faulty documentation is hardly inspiring. That's at the core of much of my frustrations with this program. Maya forums haven't been too helpful either. See below.

I would recommend the book Maya 6 Foundation.<<

I've been told this is a rehash of Maya 5 Foundation, which was the last book I was working with. Notice my post here in MAYA NEW USER titled "Learning Maya 5 Foundation Tut Problem". I posted that almost ten days ago. How many replies do you see to it? I've had similar luck on other Maya forums. Great help, eh?

Putting books and forums aside, every app has it's ways and you either take to them or you don't. I simply HATE Maya's interface. I HATE the hotbox, I HATE the two-handed navigation, I hate everything about getting around in Maya. I've been working with this pogram since last winter, took a course at SVA in NYC, and read various books on it (see "Is Maya just a MAJOR CHORE?!" in this area as well), and eventually I realized that I really can't stand working in Maya.

While Maya is capable of doing some impressive stuff (which is what drew me to it in the first place), if the shoe doesn't fit, it's not going to be comfortable, now is it?

I hope you do well with Maya, and that you can make the best of it. For me, so far I've been quite happy with Blender, and getting replies to my queries in less than half an hour at the Blender forum is a shock to say the least, but also a refreshing and comforting feeling. I'm barrelling through with Blender, and I'm very glad I made the decision to go with it.

Good luck to you all.

[gmask]

For me, so far I've been quite happy with Blender, and getting replies to my queries in less than half an hour at the Blender forum is a shock to say the least, but also a refreshing and comforting feeling. I'm barrelling through with Blender, and I'm very glad I made the decision to go with it.

It's usually the case that once you have gotten familair with a particular program learning new ones is frustrating.

The main problem with Blender though is that there is no job market based on it like there is for Maya or Max or even Lightwave.

Perhaps the problem with learning Maya is that there are so many peopel asking to same new user questiosn that the regulars don't answer anymore.. whereas the small number of users of Blender are eager to increase their number and are perhaps more enthusiastic about answering those same new user questions.

At any rate it's not a popularity contest and to each his own.

[joojaa]

Havent seen any flaws in Maya docs yet, cant say much about books because athors are fallablable, and i dont need books, jsut give me the docs to everything and in time i can dissasemble it rebuild it or perhaps even recreate it.

No one method can teach everyone.

I mean the wrong book for the worng person will spell disaster (yes it feels flawed, even tough it isnt). I know i had to learn this the hard way around in university, i had to ditch everything i was taught in a uni course just because the approach the lecturer had chosen did not work for me at all. In the end the entire course was about one PHRASE of text that was put much better in a book that wasnt part of the course, wich solved me the course (in fact once i noticed this phrase everything clicked and i now probably know more on the subject than the lecturer did then)

Its a why didnt you say so thing, huh? the answeer offcourse is I did.

Anyway, having a bit of patience will make the shoe fit. I know it did to me. Se maya is this kindoff intagiable elastomer, that will formfit itself to any surface shape given time for it to warm up and loosen, and then harden again

Anyway, if you dont mekae the effort now to learn something outside of your beloved rralm you never will.

And as s side note for some reason MAX users initialy hate maya over everything, as switching over is so damn hard, some contradictory logic i cant put my finger on. Anyway now when im into maya i se Max as hugely flawed in design. Maya logic inst apparent bacause maya is designed to tackle problems most beginning users dont even realize exsit.

But im not saying you shouldnt go to use blender if you feel comfortable doing so do. Just make you sure you know the real facts why you do so. Ive seen a lot of users using something just because they didnt have time or patience to think what woud realy fit them better...

[failure]

Now, why would somebody want to post that ammount of maya-hate content on maya forum?

[joojaa]

To demonstrate... i wont say what.

[chaoticgood]

I stated the wrong book, Ignacio - I meant to say the Maya 6 Handbook. You can see it at -

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detai...ks&n=507846

This book helped me learn a great deal and grasp alot I was having trouble with. Also, as Joojaa stated, the help documents with Maya ARE really good if you follow them in order (working on them now.)

Good luck.

ChaoticGood

[jtk77]

yea, well about the interface. I love mayas and hate everyone elses haha, so to each his own.