Modelling

One of my interests of late (actually since Toy Story came out...) is computer animation. I started getting into it myself in high school when a friend of mine introduced me to anim8or, a free 3D modelling and animation program. I don't really have anything stellar to show for that time period, although I did model a lot of people, places and things (mostly things), because I never really got the hang of the animation part of it. Partly I think that was a failing on the software side of things, but let's not play the blame game. Then I stumbled across something called Maya (actually another friend introduced it to me I think), which, if you know anything about the video game, movie, and/or visual effects industry, is a leading player in the aforementioned industries (well, it's still a leader even if you don't know anything about aforementioned aforementioned industries). They've got (or used to have... #$%^&^&%^&% don't get me started) a personal learning edition which allows you to do basically everything with the software except end up with a usable product (commercial usage restrictions). That was really cool, and it's an incredibly deep and complex program. I fiddled around with it for a couple years and then stopped using it because I didn't really have a structured learning resource and I didn't think it would lead anywhere much.

But...! Now it's back!

Yay, Maya! I got a training book for my birthday, and I recently downloaded a 30 day trial version of Maya Unlimited (look it up, super cool) which let's me actually render usable images and animations. Thus, I have been starting the long process of trying to get a handle on this behemoth of a software package, and I'm hoping to share the mostly embarrassing and hopefully somewhat inspiring and satisfying results of this momentous journey (layer on the cheese please) with my faithful readers... you!

Ok, now you may have an inkling (a baby writing liquid) of an idea of what this blog will be about, so I'll leave it there, notably without any screenshots or renders yet (give me time).

Until the next time that I write in this text box and hit post, or until you scroll up or down because you've jumped on the bandwagon late, you behind-the-times you...

Stuart