Software
SHAPE UP Has the creative community been listened to for the latest release of Autodesk’s powerhouse modelling software?
Price £234 per month/£1,872 per year Company Autodesk Web www.autodesk.co.uk
Autodesk has released Maya 2020, the latest update on its 3D modelling, animation, visual effects and 3D rendering software. We put the program through its paces to see if the new features justify the high asking price.
Maya is over 22 years old, and there was a time when you needed a Silicon Graphics machine to run it. Such hardware was expensive enough, but when coupled with the price of a Maya licence it meant you had to spend a small fortune to be creative in 3D. While the software is now more affordable and runs on standard computing hardware, there’s an argument that it’s still too pricey, especially when compared to other 3D programs such as the free Blender and Cinema 4D (from £662/year).
Since its early days, Autodesk has released updates annually. These usually saw new tools and features being added to Maya’s arsenal. Such features were welcome additions, but were often aimed more at higher-end animation and simulation work.
The past few years has seen a shift in the direction Autodesk has taken with the updates to Maya. They’re now more focused on improving existing systems and implementing features that have been voted on by the artistic community. Taking this approach has transformed Maya into a much-improved application.
COMMUNITY FEEDBACK
With Maya 2020, Autodesk continues this trend of listening to its users to implement much-needed features. The company has also enlisted Blue Sky Studios – home to films such as Ice Age, Rio and the recent Spies in Disguise – to help refine the animation tools, which has also seen a huge upgrade in this release.
Maya now boasts over 60 new animation features, with the biggest being improvements to the animation cache playback. Originally introduced in 2019, cache playback enabled animators to view their work in real time with little or no need for constant Playblasts (a low-resolution version of the animation). This was the idea anyway, but it came with limitations. The first was a lack of dynamics support, so it couldn’t be used alongside these systems. Image planes still relied on legacy systems, so they were slow and hogged memory, and it wasn’t as efficient when used with dense geometry.
These issues have all been addressed and make for a smoother experience. Dynamics support is included, using a new layered evaluation system. nparticles, ncloth and nbodies are now supported, with nhair, Bifrost FX and muscle systems coming later.
MAYA, MEET ARNOLD
Speaking of the GPU, another big update this year from Autodesk is Arnold 6 with full GPU rendering support, based on the NVIDIA Optix ray-tracing engine. Arnold 6 is included in Maya 2020, which will streamline your rendering workflow. With the right hardware there’s no longer the need to render to see model and shader updates because they’re visible in the viewport in almost real time, although note that there’s the option to render on both the GPU and CPU.
On the modelling side of things, Maya now includes Remesh and
Retopology functions. These tools will enable clean, quad-based topology, but they have their limitations. As good as the resulting models are, there are no options to dictate edge flow, so for game art, for example, a lot of clean-up will still be required.
Autodesk is taking full advantage of the GPU because it’s being used on many other tools to help speed up workflow. The Proximity Wrap tool, which is new to Maya, is an advanced version of the Wrap tool. It uses the GPU to help calculate how the influenced geometry manipulates the surface model, making for smoother interactions. Facial rigs and custom muscle systems in particular will benefit from this.
While on the subject of rigging, the introduction of matrix-driven workflows is an exciting development. These are a series of nodes and attributes that make rigs cleaner and less cluttered. With the offsetparentmatrix attribute, constraints could be used less and less, meaning the art of rigging is more streamlined. Unfortunately, the new rigging tools aren’t backwards compatible, so bear this in mind if you creating work for clients who are still using Maya 2017 and 2018.
There’s much to be excited about with the new features in this latest version, along with the general modelling and speed improvements. All in all, Maya 2020 is an essential upgrade if you’re an animation studio that can afford the high subscription costs. With all the new updates, it could save you a lot of time when working on your projects.
Autodesk is taking full advantage of the GPU because it’s being used on many other tools to help speed up workflow