Somehow, even after two full degrees in 3D using almost exclusively Maya, I’ve never even heard about nodes until this video! Much appreciated, you guys are legends!
Hearing this concept is so helpful. I always avoided learning Maya because after learning 3DS Max I thought it was crazy that there was nothing like the modifier stack. While it isn't as intuitive to me as the modifier stack, it is good to know that there is something somewhat similar.
Bro, at first I though only Houdini was node-based and Maya layer based. Later when I discovered node editor in Maya! I knew that Maya was also node-based. Which is really awesome. By the way, your introduction to Maya course is the best Maya course I have ever seen. Highly highly recommend to everyone who wants to learn maya the right way. This is really the best way to learn maya. Henning is really one of the best instructor
node editor is extremely helpful for debugging, like when you are playing with nCloth and the geo keeps outputting two cloth, cloth1 and cloth2. check the node editor and you will see the nClothShape node has two outputCloth nodes.
Remember when Soft Image was the best node based software, and then Auto desk bought them out? Then autodesk gutted the software and put those features in Maya, but some of the workflow is still glitchy and not the same.
As an old boy in maya, in ancient days when Maya was not a part of Autodesk and Alias Wavefront was rasing the child it was node based! (I'm using maya since it's fifth version). I thinks You've not used hypergraph or connection editor, before node editor borned. If I want to tell you more about Maya's node based nature hypershade has it's old lifesyle with some changes that makes it easier to work with. I highly recommend you find an old version of Maya and have some fun with it! (those days that pressing 3 did not perform smooth mesh preview for you. I think you should use Windoes XP or 98 (x86) for that purpose)
Hey you guys ever thought about doing some sort of podcast or placing you audio heavy discussions/interviews on platforms where one can download and listen to on the fly?
Really helpful! Being intermediate in skill, I feel that there is more functionality in the node system that I'm unaware of, would love to see a higher-level video on this!
I’ve been playing with maya the last three days, just watching UA-cam videos and following along. This video explains a lot and makes the processes in maya make a lot more sense. AmazIng video.
I did not know this ! This actually makes me want to dive into maya again! Although it seems a bit messy compared to Houdini ! But it is definitely useful, if you wanna do some light procedural modelling and don't wanna jump out of Maya, into houdini, export it from houdini and in to Maya agiain ! Wish Blender had the option to do node based modelling aswell..Thanks guys, love your vids !
you all prolly dont give a damn but does any of you know of a way to get back into an instagram account?? I somehow lost the account password. I would appreciate any assistance you can offer me
@Cayson Christopher thanks so much for your reply. I got to the site thru google and im waiting for the hacking stuff atm. Takes a while so I will reply here later with my results.
If you're interested node base workflow I highly recommend SideFx Houdini which I've switched from Maya for it's almighty dynamics workfolw. frankly for animation and rendering still Maya rocks the production. as you're a modeler for sure Zbrush is the that Zeus!
Dear friends you did a great job with tutorials. Is it possible to do a tutorial from start to finish for Iclone? I mean to build a cloth (specialy long dress) into marvelous designer and then go to maya and maybe zbrush or any other 3d program and then to iclone character creator and finaly insert the character and the cloth into iclone with full physical behavior. I'm asking to much but believe me that many people will love it. Thanking in advance.
A nice video on the explanation of nodes in Maya, thank you. As a 20+ year user, I always wished Maya to have a workable graphic node-based interface similar to Houdini, in order to access its MEL scripting capabilities. It's probably never going to happen under Autodesk ownership though... the raw power is there, but there isn't much access to it by the majority of users who do not code. Keep up the nice work!
i dunno.. maya always felt like a failure when it comes to nodes.. i'm used to just delete history every few steps... I could disable history altogether but that disables the ability to → make a primitive → press t to get its parameters
The hypershade is exactly the same as the node editor! The difference is that it only displays nodes that are tagged as shading nodes (materials, textures, lights, etc) and hides everything else.
@@AfterBasicsYT It sounds like you are looking for a tutorial on rendering in Arnold. Have you checked out Arvid Schneider? ua-cam.com/channels/1KDwEVBlxr4ew7xqLOhu9g.html
how exactly are the transform node and the shape node connected though? i know they're parented in the outliner, but i wonder why the aren't connected somehow in the node editor...
Maya doesn't represent a parenting relationship as a node connection. If you select a node and do input/output connections in the graph editor, you won't see the parents or children, since they're not connected. Maya treats the relationship between a shape node and a transform node in a slightly special way, in that they show up in the graph editor together.
The Hypergraph Hierarchy is a good way to see these relationships. In this editor you can switch between Hierarchy and Connections clicking a button, I think this should be implemented in the regular node editor and get rid of redundancies but that's how it is for now. Probably Bifrost will unify a big chunk of Maya in the future.
Henning has the best course so far if you're a beginner or if you are planning to learn Maya in general. I can tell because I've learned maya with it. It's from the flippednormals courses catalogue but it's Henning who is teaching in it.
Maya has worked this way for 20 years! The main place you see this stuff talked about is when following rigging tutorials, since understanding Maya's node system is essential for rigging. But it is surprising it's not talked about very often since you often end up interacting with it even as a modeler. (Select a geo node and hit the "down" key. What is selected?)
You should have expanded one of the nodes and explained different data types / input output value types etc. People watching this who were oblivious before will see it as magic (Just connect the one dot).
Maya node architecture is a hot mess when you compare it to how elegant houdini's node based system is. Hope that changes with bifrost and one maybe one day maya core will be based on bifrost?
@@theblah12 That is true for almost all DCC's (except Houdini). Look at Maxon, they are spending 5 years for their "Core rewrite" of C4d and its not even half done.
I agree that Maya core will likely be replaced by Bifrost in the medium to long run, and the current node system will be mostly left for things like shading networks. I think SideFX has Autodesk pissing their pants lol
@@theblah12 I don't think Maya's core is incomprehensible, at least no more so than Blender or any other huge CG application. However I do think Maya's core is very brittle because of the API promises they make to studios and plugin developers. Anything Autodesk alters has to get the OK from huge multimillion dollar clients building software on top of Maya who don't want anything to break. This means the developers are swimming through bureaucratic molasses.
Am I the only one who didn't really understand why the nodes are important 😅? Like, OK, it's exist, but for my level I see no practical useful power in that (maybe except that example with dragging files). For example, bcoz of nodes, you have an access to history. But who cares, when it just brokes a model if you'd try to change some values of "bottom" node? And a question about "magic cleaning" of unused nodes from Hypershade. Isn't it easier to go to File-Optimize scene size? It doesn't clean those nodes for you without you even need to think they exist? 😅
The most important use of the nodes is in building rigs. If you're not a rigger they may seem like unnecessary complexity, but the node system is what allows Maya to be the premiere rigging and animation platform. It also gives you a basic modifier stack and some level of proceduralism, so it's not useless for modeling either.
The main reason Maya's nodes are important is that they serve as the basis of its rigging and animation system. Animation has always been the premiere feature of Maya so they added a bit of complexity for the sake of that. However even for a modeler the nodes aren't useless. You can treat them like a modifier stack and make tweaks to your geometry and deformers later if you don't delete history.
magni319 I use them everyday, the fact that you don't know how to use something doesn't make it useless, it just makes you ignorant, something you can solve by learning instead of ranting.
Maya has 5 "node editor": Hypergraph Hierarchy, Hypergraph Connections, Hypershade, Node Editor, Bifrost Graph. None of them is completed! there are design flaws, annoying glitches, and gaps.
Maya has always been node-based, it's just that they've deemphasized it over the years probably in an attempt to make the software more accessible. Questionable whether that has actually helped or just made things even worse.
Somehow, even after two full degrees in 3D using almost exclusively Maya, I’ve never even heard about nodes until this video! Much appreciated, you guys are legends!
That's fascinating, what degrees are these? I guess there's such a wide variety of things to learn :)
Hearing this concept is so helpful. I always avoided learning Maya because after learning 3DS Max I thought it was crazy that there was nothing like the modifier stack. While it isn't as intuitive to me as the modifier stack, it is good to know that there is something somewhat similar.
Nothing's better than modifier stack
Bro, at first I though only Houdini was node-based and Maya layer based. Later when I discovered node editor in Maya! I knew that Maya was also node-based. Which is really awesome. By the way, your introduction to Maya course is the best Maya course I have ever seen. Highly highly recommend to everyone who wants to learn maya the right way. This is really the best way to learn maya. Henning is really one of the best instructor
who put this bot here ?
@@morphtek What?
Jk
Maya is node based. What a joke. Houdini is node based. Maya is just a 3dsMax on steroids
this was seriously helpful... i can't believe i've never come across this information before!
Went to college for game art for 3 years and never knew of this, crazy that this was never explained to me. Thank you!
node editor is extremely helpful for debugging, like when you are playing with nCloth and the geo keeps outputting two cloth, cloth1 and cloth2. check the node editor and you will see the nClothShape node has two outputCloth nodes.
Guys, you've just solved my main problem with Maya. Really. Thank you so much!
Remember when Soft Image was the best node based software, and then Auto desk bought them out? Then autodesk gutted the software and put those features in Maya, but some of the workflow is still glitchy and not the same.
As an old boy in maya, in ancient days when Maya was not a part of Autodesk and Alias Wavefront was rasing the child it was node based! (I'm using maya since it's fifth version). I thinks You've not used hypergraph or connection editor, before node editor borned. If I want to tell you more about Maya's node based nature hypershade has it's old lifesyle with some changes that makes it easier to work with. I highly recommend you find an old version of Maya and have some fun with it! (those days that pressing 3 did not perform smooth mesh preview for you. I think you should use Windoes XP or 98 (x86) for that purpose)
I heard so much good about Soft Image but I suppose it would not be so wise to learn it / use it at this point. - 3 years max / 2 years maya user
@@carlososa5155 before ad bought it just to get it off the market, xsi was in a league of it's own. It was Houdini for artists instead of TD's.
That’s helpful for tomorrows exam ;D
simple clean but straight to the point
Thanks
Hey you guys ever thought about doing some sort of podcast or placing you audio heavy discussions/interviews on platforms where one can download and listen to on the fly?
NICE! I did not know about delete unused nodes! my standard goto was just optimize scene but this is a cool bit of targeted control. thanks!
Thats how we used to do it too - both work great!
Really helpful! Being intermediate in skill, I feel that there is more functionality in the node system that I'm unaware of, would love to see a higher-level video on this!
I’ve been playing with maya the last three days, just watching UA-cam videos and following along. This video explains a lot and makes the processes in maya make a lot more sense. AmazIng video.
Lovin' this kind of technical explanation of things. Never knew majority of this. Thanks!
Happy to hear it!
I did not know this ! This actually makes me want to dive into maya again! Although it seems a bit messy compared to Houdini ! But it is definitely useful, if you wanna do some light procedural modelling and don't wanna jump out of Maya, into houdini, export it from houdini and in to Maya agiain ! Wish Blender had the option to do node based modelling aswell..Thanks guys, love your vids !
11:25 still don't know why the hell "Delete unused nodes" is not available in the regular node editor or even the outliner 🤷♂️
5:45 "This is not practical. This is not user-friendly." That's exactly what the node tree ends up looking like trying to model in Houdini. 😂
you all prolly dont give a damn but does any of you know of a way to get back into an instagram account??
I somehow lost the account password. I would appreciate any assistance you can offer me
@Hugo Ryland Instablaster ;)
@Cayson Christopher thanks so much for your reply. I got to the site thru google and im waiting for the hacking stuff atm.
Takes a while so I will reply here later with my results.
@Cayson Christopher It did the trick and I now got access to my account again. Im so happy!
Thank you so much you saved my ass !
@Hugo Ryland happy to help :)
If you're interested node base workflow I highly recommend SideFx Houdini which I've switched from Maya for it's almighty dynamics workfolw. frankly for animation and rendering still Maya rocks the production. as you're a modeler for sure Zbrush is the that Zeus!
This is super helpful, thank you!
can you guys do houdini tutorials?????????
You guys should do a podcast :)
This could be more used if it wasn't so messy. 3:20 The Polybevel node feeds the pCubeShape1 at the same time that it's feed by it.
I didn't even know what being node based meant...... Learning a lot :I
Please make a maya advance environment modeling course
Dear friends you did a great job with tutorials. Is it possible to do a tutorial from start to finish for Iclone? I mean to build a cloth (specialy long dress) into marvelous designer and then go to maya and maybe zbrush or any other 3d program and then to iclone character creator and finaly insert the character and the cloth into iclone with full physical behavior. I'm asking to much but believe me that many people will love it. Thanking in advance.
this was really good!
Thank you! Really useful information!
Glad it was helpful!
EXCELLENT!!!! Always wanted to know!!!!!
Great! Thanks for watching.
@11:40, could all this extra nodes have a negative effect in Maya's Profiler, when recording?
please make a video on hypershade bin
A nice video on the explanation of nodes in Maya, thank you. As a 20+ year user, I always wished Maya to have a workable graphic node-based interface similar to Houdini, in order to access its MEL scripting capabilities. It's probably never going to happen under Autodesk ownership though... the raw power is there, but there isn't much access to it by the majority of users who do not code. Keep up the nice work!
Don't suppose you are going to do a similar video once blenders "everything nodes" are more developed. Or maybe go with a compare and contrast?
i dunno.. maya always felt like a failure when it comes to nodes.. i'm used to just delete history every few steps... I could disable history altogether but that disables the ability to → make a primitive → press t to get its parameters
Can you do for unreal nodes pls? :) super helpful btw thanks for video:)
Can you explain the hydershade fully? Ofcourse explain in multiple video... I want to know about things are not commanly used as beginner...
The hypershade is exactly the same as the node editor! The difference is that it only displays nodes that are tagged as shading nodes (materials, textures, lights, etc) and hides everything else.
@@AerysBat i need to know about nodes in arnold-utilities-shader section in hypershade
@@AfterBasicsYT It sounds like you are looking for a tutorial on rendering in Arnold. Have you checked out Arvid Schneider? ua-cam.com/channels/1KDwEVBlxr4ew7xqLOhu9g.html
After Basics why don't you read Arnold's user guide? It's very well explained and it has tutorials also.
I was always wondering why after a while Maya is getting so slow. Damn I wish i knew about deeding unused nodes. Thanks a lot.
This understanding will help so much with optimising scenes! :D
@@FlippedNormals Another thing that's useful to do is to turn off history, for example I do this when using quad draw
how exactly are the transform node and the shape node connected though? i know they're parented in the outliner, but i wonder why the aren't connected somehow in the node editor...
Maya doesn't represent a parenting relationship as a node connection. If you select a node and do input/output connections in the graph editor, you won't see the parents or children, since they're not connected. Maya treats the relationship between a shape node and a transform node in a slightly special way, in that they show up in the graph editor together.
The Hypergraph Hierarchy is a good way to see these relationships. In this editor you can switch between Hierarchy and Connections clicking a button, I think this should be implemented in the regular node editor and get rid of redundancies but that's how it is for now.
Probably Bifrost will unify a big chunk of Maya in the future.
BASED!
Maya is based
Muito bom!
Exactly
Do you guys have any courses for mays
Henning has the best course so far if you're a beginner or if you are planning to learn Maya in general. I can tell because I've learned maya with it. It's from the flippednormals courses catalogue but it's Henning who is teaching in it.
@@MRJACG1990 can you give me the link of the course I have been trying maya for like 2 years but I want to be a professional 3d artist
I highly recomend FlipNormals Introduction into Maya - Where you ill be making spartan helmet. Its really good.
We have full 12 hour Introduction to Maya! :)
flippednormals.com/downloads/introduction-to-maya/
Thanks a lot - Really appreciate it
Maya is incredible thank you
Sooo when did maya become a Houdini Lite?
Seems like it's slowly transitioning there
is this a houdini comercial ?
nuke
Minecraft
Houdini sells itself.
@@theblah12 well anyone in their right mind after seing this video will want to go houdini
cool! but do this node thing really considered in professional work?
Moddelers and animators don't often have to think about it.
Riggers live in the node editor and outliner
just like SORCAR in blender (node based procedural modeling) but I think that's far more intuitive than this
Are nodes in Maya new? How come Maya never mentions or advertises this feature? :-o
Maya has worked this way for 20 years! The main place you see this stuff talked about is when following rigging tutorials, since understanding Maya's node system is essential for rigging. But it is surprising it's not talked about very often since you often end up interacting with it even as a modeler. (Select a geo node and hit the "down" key. What is selected?)
This is the first Maya user guide tells, at least back in the day, not sure how it is now.
Oh I made a mistake! I just need to find a needle in a haystack, is something I could actually say in this situation😅.
You should have expanded one of the nodes and explained different data types / input output value types etc.
People watching this who were oblivious before will see it as magic (Just connect the one dot).
nobody except technical artists/riggers know about this
Nodes: they're great when you know how to use them, a nightmare if you don't!
as in every software feature ever? or any tools for that matter? "Hammers: they're great when you know how to use them, a nightmare if you don't!"
@@Stevexupen true
Hwyo
Maya node architecture is a hot mess when you compare it to how elegant houdini's node based system is. Hope that changes with bifrost and one maybe one day maya core will be based on bifrost?
@@theblah12 That is true for almost all DCC's (except Houdini). Look at Maxon, they are spending 5 years for their "Core rewrite" of C4d and its not even half done.
I agree that Maya core will likely be replaced by Bifrost in the medium to long run, and the current node system will be mostly left for things like shading networks. I think SideFX has Autodesk pissing their pants lol
@@theblah12 I don't think Maya's core is incomprehensible, at least no more so than Blender or any other huge CG application. However I do think Maya's core is very brittle because of the API promises they make to studios and plugin developers. Anything Autodesk alters has to get the OK from huge multimillion dollar clients building software on top of Maya who don't want anything to break. This means the developers are swimming through bureaucratic molasses.
Am I the only one who didn't really understand why the nodes are important 😅?
Like, OK, it's exist, but for my level I see no practical useful power in that (maybe except that example with dragging files). For example, bcoz of nodes, you have an access to history. But who cares, when it just brokes a model if you'd try to change some values of "bottom" node?
And a question about "magic cleaning" of unused nodes from Hypershade. Isn't it easier to go to File-Optimize scene size? It doesn't clean those nodes for you without you even need to think they exist? 😅
The most important use of the nodes is in building rigs. If you're not a rigger they may seem like unnecessary complexity, but the node system is what allows Maya to be the premiere rigging and animation platform. It also gives you a basic modifier stack and some level of proceduralism, so it's not useless for modeling either.
After a year in Blender, I don't think Ill ever move to Maya (price also being a factor), looks way to complicated.
Blender has nodes too now! Animation nodes and also Geometry nodes coming in 2.9.2!
This is why Maya is so powerful
Step 1: turn off construction history
Step 2: work without any possible glitches and hiccups.
That's a pretty good tip when doing general modeling when you know you wont need it
@@FlippedNormals Yeah, that was pretty bold statement of mine, but you guys get the point of it.
feels like maya needs automatic garbage collection
So Maya has nodes, but they're completely useless. Correction: the useful thing about them is I can delete them...
The main reason Maya's nodes are important is that they serve as the basis of its rigging and animation system. Animation has always been the premiere feature of Maya so they added a bit of complexity for the sake of that. However even for a modeler the nodes aren't useless. You can treat them like a modifier stack and make tweaks to your geometry and deformers later if you don't delete history.
magni319 I use them everyday, the fact that you don't know how to use something doesn't make it useless, it just makes you ignorant, something you can solve by learning instead of ranting.
@@leecaste wasn't THIS VIDEO supposed to tell me why they're important? Well that's all it told me - how to delete them.
1337
Every time I hear 'Blender' and 'Maya' in the same sentence is in favour of Blender. Maya better step its game up.
FIRST
Maya has 5 "node editor": Hypergraph Hierarchy, Hypergraph Connections, Hypershade, Node Editor, Bifrost Graph.
None of them is completed! there are design flaws, annoying glitches, and gaps.
but maya nodes are really pretentious they were just an after thought when houdini started to get attention
Maya has always been node-based, it's just that they've deemphasized it over the years probably in an attempt to make the software more accessible. Questionable whether that has actually helped or just made things even worse.
Gfx Grafix WTF?!
Really? Nobody understands this about maya? REALLY?