If you want to be taken seriously as a 3D artist you’ll need to approach your workflow professionally. This means being super organised when managing your assets and in this month’s free tutorial we are going to show you how this is done.
Free Tutorial: Mastering Dynamics in Maya
If you’re an aspiring VFX artist, knowing Maya inside out is an absolute must. On our VFX course, I make sure that every student has a good understanding of Dynamics and linking objects kinematically which are an integral part of the VFX pipeline. Not knowing these just isn’t an option. They form part of a basic skillset which post houses will expect you to know. That’s why, this month, I’ve created a tutorial which will give you two new skills you can add to your showreel. Being able to use Dynamics fluently will demonstrate to potential employers that you understand the key techniques in VFX and are ready to take your first steps in the industry. So what are you waiting for? Log on to our eLearning platform and add these skills to your existing toolset.
January Free Tutorial: How to Animate a Bird Flap (Part 2)
For those of you who logged into my November Free Tutorial entitled Animate a Bird and Make it Fly, you'll remember that I promised to deliver a second part to it. This tutorial uses a pre-created rig, which you can buy here and explores the mechanics of bird locomotion. It costs just $5 and trust me, it’s worth it. If you'd like a re-cap of what was in part 1, you can find all the details here.
December's Free Tutorial: Mastering Maya's Transfer Maps
I created this month’s free tutorial with one thing in mind: How can I help improve artists’ workflow’s? This tutorial explores Maya’s ‘Transfer maps’ tool and is designed to do just that. I’ve made sure that we cover this tool in great detail, providing valuable insight into how it works, and how you can avoid common problems. It’s a very practical, hands-on demonstration of the ‘Transfer maps’ tool and with it, you will learn how to bake a diffuse texture from multiple pieces of geometry to one individual model.
November Free Tutorial: Animate a Bird & Make it Fly (Part 1)
When I created this tutorial, my number one objective was to ensure that whoever was learning could really use what they create and incorporate it into something that they might already be working on. That’s why this animation tutorial is so substantial and has been separated into two parts! This month, we will use a pre-created rig, which you can buy here and use to explore the mechanics of bird locomation. It costs just $5 and trust me, it’s worth it.
Free Tutorial: Generating Faster Renders Using Command Shells
In this month's free tutorial, I have a real treat for you - something which I know many VFX artist wish they could do. It all stems from my experience working in the industry where I have so often witnessed artists resorting automatically to using Maya's Render Tool when they could actually be so much more efficient if they knew some of the alternatives available to them.
Autodesk Incremental Suite Webinar Recording Now Available
On September 7th, 2011 we held a webinar for Autodesk’s 2012 version of the Entertainment Creative Suites. As ever, registrations for this Autodesk webinar were plentiful, and we're delighted so many of you were able to join us on the day.
Free Tutorial: Paint Effects in Maya
If you want to create a seamless finish for your CG scenes, this is the video tutorial for you. This month, I've created a tutorial that explores how paint effects can be used to embed models into backplate environments simply and easily.
What's in this Tutorial?
First off, we'll take a look at paint effects and will explain how you can paint onto geometry. In order to do this, you’ll need to understand the importance of an object's UV which we will discuss as well. You'll then learn how to access a host of preset paint effect brushes that you can find in Maya.
Free Maya Tutorial - Creating Realistic Materials
If you want to replicate the complexity of real world objects, you need to create materials that mimic them and this month's free tutorial will show you exactly how to do that. A car body is made up of lots of materials or layers, like metal and paint. If you want to create a rusty car you'll need more materials to create the common signs of deterioration. Many Maya users will be familiar with the 'layered shader' and 'layered texture' nodes. This tutorial asks what happens if you are using the MIA material and rendering in Mental Ray.
Would You Pay For Your Own Training to Get Ahead?
Would you pay for your own training to get ahead of the competition and secure a better job? Well that’s one of the hot topics in our new Creative Futures Report which launches today.
Free Tutorial - Demolish a Brick Wall With nCloth In Maya
If you're reading this blog, then chances are you're like most of us here at Escape Studios and love blowing things up and putting them back together again. So this month's free tutorial should be right up your street because we're going to teach you how to demolish a brick wall using nCloth.
Free Tutorial: Effects in V-Ray for Max
For those of you who want to learn V-Ray for Max, you’re in for a real treat this month. We’ve released a tutorial from our new V-Ray course which will be launched over the coming weeks. The tutorial has been taken directly from one of the major case studies within the course and this video is designed to demonstrates the power of V-Ray.
New Free Maya Tutorial: Gimbal and Rotation Order
This month, I am tackling some pretty technical issues that affect CG artists on a daily basis. I am going to walk you though the often over-looked issue of Gimbal, using a whole bunch of examples to explain what it is, what causes it and the issues it can have over our animations.
Free Tutorial: Volume Caustics for the Maya Expert
This month’s free tutorial is aimed at the experienced Maya user. It has been designed by Mark Spevick, our VFX tutor, to help you master some of the advanced tools which can sometimes be complex and take a while to get to grips with.
Free Tutorial Learn to control occlusion
This months free tutorial has been specifically created by our tutors to help you learn to control occlusion. It's not taken from any of our online courses so it truly is a unique tutorial. You'll start off by looking in depth at the mib_amb_occlusion texture node and how careful use of 2 attributes will ensure that you obtain the perfect ambient occlusion pass.
Free Tutorials - Animation & ZBrush
You can really impress future employers by taking advantage of our two expert tutorials this month. Taken from our Character Animation Foundation and ZBrush for 3D Artist courses, they are designed to give you pro-skills in very specialised areas.
New Year's Resolution
It's that time of year when everybody makes a multitude of New Year's resolutions. I am of the opinion that they are not worth doing unless you are going to stick to them. Having said that, we have actually decided to start the year with a resolution. It’s a fairly simple one: we are resolute in our wish to give you more of the free tutorials that you want. There you are, I told you it would be an easy one.
TWO Free Tutorials: Car Lighting and MIA Material X Passes
Lighting and Shading are an integral part of the VFX pipeline and if you want to take your skills to a professional level these tutorials are the best place to start learning. What’s great about these tutorials is that they tackle pretty complicated subjects head-on and they are practical so, although you’ll understand the theory, you’ll also learn how to practically apply this knowledge. The best part is that these tutorials will sit in our resource centre permanently, so you can access them whenever you want and learn whenever it suits you.
Camera Tracking and Nuke Tutorials
There's nothing better than gaining extra skills - especially when you can do it for free. This month's free tutorials have been taken from our Camera Tracking and Nuke courses and are great for boosting your skills if you're looking to become professional. The great thing is, they're just 10 minutes long so you can easily work through them in your lunch hour, but like last month's six free Maya Tutorials they're staying in our e-learning platform permanently so you can refer to them whenever you want.
October Free Tutorials
I find it really annoying when I find freebies that are ‘for a limited time only’, and it’s something we’ve been guilty of with our free tutorials. We’ve had some great feedback about them, and with that in mind we've decided to revamp the way our freebies work.
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