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In the Rendering menu set, select Texturing 3D Paint Tool.You can paint textures with the 3D Paint Tool using two types of brushes: Artisan brushes and Paint Effects brushes. You can paint renderable attributes such as color, bump, transparency, and specular color on polygons, NURBS, or subdivision surfaces. You can also paint on file textures created outside the 3D Paint Tool.Artisan brushes use grayscale images to define the brush profile (or shape). You can select from 40 predefined brush shapes, or you can create your own shapes using any image format supported by Maya. You can paint, erase and clone textures using Artisan brushes.
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When you paint on a model, you actually paint on a file texture that has been assigned to the model. You can assign a file texture in Hypershade, or you can create and assign it from the 3D Paint Tool.When you select the 3D Paint Tool, Maya checks to see if there are any file textures already assigned to the selected surfaces for the current attribute (such as color or bump maps). If any of the surfaces do not have file textures assigned, Maya prompts you to assign textures to them.
Maya creates the textures, assigns them to the surfaces, names the new textures based on the current scene, shape and attribute names, and places them in a subdirectory of the current project’s 3dPaintTextures directory.If there are existing file textures, Maya checks to see if their names match the current shape, scene and attribute names. If they do not, Maya copies the textures to the correct names. This prevents you from overwriting existing file textures, and makes it easier for the tool to keep track of the textures.When you Assign Textures you can save the file in any of the following formats:(Windows and Linux) Maya IFF (the default) Autodesk PIX, EPS, GIF, JPEG, RLA, SGI, SoftImage, Targa, and Tiff.(Mac OS X) Maya IFF (the default), Windows Bitmap, JPEG, MacPaint, Photoshop, PNG, QuickDraw, QuickTime Image, Targa, SGI, and Tiff.Important Notes:.
Displaying other surfaces significantly slows down painting. Display only the surface you are painting using Isolate Select or by hiding the other surfaces. On textures larger than 512 (which have to be scaled down to appear in the hardware render), sometimes darker pixels appear where there are seams in the UV mesh. These do not show in the software render. Changing shader assignment while in 3D Paint Tool will cause inconsistent display. Exit the 3D Paint Tool before reassigning shaders to the selected surface. Switching UV sets while in the 3D Paint tool gives unexpected results.
Exit the tool before switching UV sets. When using the 3D Paint Tool in High Quality Rendering display mode, the display is not updated until the end of the stroke.
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This is necessary to maintain interactive painting performance.
Posted by on October 17, 2010 There are two important things to remember when preparing a 3D Print.1. The model must be ‘watertight.’ This means that the object to be printed must be a solid surface with a thickness, and it cannot have any holes in it. If you were to fill it with water, none would leak out.2.
All surface Normals must be facing the same direction.The Z Corp 3D Printers recognize Stereolithography (.stl) files. Maya does not export.stl files so we will use either Rhino or 3DS Max.
I will explain how to use both.Step 1: Export.obj from MayaBy default Maya does not load the OBJ exporter. To do this go to Windows – Settings/Preferences – Plug-in Manager.In the plug-in Manager scroll down to OBJExport and check the box that says ‘Loaded.’ Check Auto-Load to have the OBJ Exporter Loaded every time you open Maya.Note: Do not check auto-load for all the plug-ins at random. This causes problems for Maya. Only load the Plug-Ins you know you are going to use.Once you have loaded the OBJ Exporter then click ‘Refresh’ and then ‘Close.’Now select the object you want to export. Go to File – Export Selection and open the dialog box.In the dialog box select file type and scroll down to ‘OBJexport.’ The default settings are fine.
Click Export Selection and save your file.Printing from RHINO:Open Rhino. First type ‘Options’ into the Command Line. Hit enter.In the options dialog navigate to Rhino Options – Appearance – Advanced Settings – ShadedOpen the pulldown menu next to Backface Settings, select ‘Single Color for All Backfaces.’Then Select a Bright color other than Yellow (Yellow is Rhino’s selection color – this can cause confusion) and Click ‘OK.’ I like to use green.Changing Backfaces to green will make all ‘Inverted Normals’ appear green, so you know something is wrong. All normal faces will be the correct object color.An object with an inverted normal will now look like this:To fix this first explode the object (type ‘explode’ into the command line) or ungroup (type ‘ungroup’ ) until you are able to select individual faces. Select the inverted face and type ‘flip’ into the command line. The face is no longer green.Select all faces in the object. Type ‘join’ into the command line.
You now have a single object with all the normals facing the correct direction.Now on to the 3D Print.Type ‘Import’ into the dialog box. Navigate to your OBJ file and select open.Zoom Selected to Center your model into the Viewports. ‘Z’ enter, ‘S’ enterNote: If your model looks like it did in Maya (doesn’t look like this) skip ahead to scaling the object.If your model appears slightly different from the model in Maya, as mine does above, select your model and type in Explode.WHOA!! Everything is green!! But, now the model looks like it did in Maya.The fact that everything is green is good.
This means all our faces are facing the same direction, but they are facing the wrong direction.To fix this Select the entire object and type ‘flip.’ as shown above.Select the entire object again and type ‘join,’ again as shown above.Your model should now look as it did in Maya. Orbit around make sure there are no other Normal issues. In this case we are good to go!Scaling the Object for Printing.If you are printing to a specific scale you must first take your object by the appropriate scale factor. 1/96 for 1/8″=1′-0″, or 1/48 for 1/4″=1′-0″ for example.Since we are dealing with an abstract object we do not need a precise scale. We do need to scale the object to a size appropriate for the 3D printer.The Printer Bed is 8″.10″.10″Create a Box with these dimensions.Now scale down your model (type ‘scale’ into the Command Line) until it fits inside the box.Great! We have solved our Normal issues and scaled the object to the print size we want.Only one more step. We have to make sure the object is water tight.For this we will use the ‘OffsetMesh’ command.Delete the box, we don’t need it anymore.
Select your model and type ‘offsetMesh’ into the Command Line.Now In order to be structurally sound a 3D print needs to be at least 1/8″ thick. Since our model from Maya already has thickness however, so in this case we only need to add a nominal thickness to make sure all the surface intersections are closed.First, make sure the offset is in the right direction. Our goal is to add thickness, after all. If the new mesh (White) is inside the object click ‘Flip/All’ to make the offset go outward.Check the box ‘Delete Input Mesh’ use a thickness of.02 and select ‘OK.’ Make sure the offset did not create any Normals.
Ours did not.We are now ready to export to Z Print.Select your model, type ‘export’ into the Command Line.Select Stereolithography (.stl) as your file type. Name your file and save it. We are now ready to open the file in ZPrint.Printing from 3DS MAX:Open 3DS MaxAs with Rhino I will again first explain how to solve Normal Issues. Max is prepared to show flipped Normals without any extra set up by us. Thank you 3DS Max!Objects without inverted Normals show as the object color.
Inverted Normals appear black, instead of object color.To fix this open the Modify panel, select edit ‘polygon.’ ‘Polygon’ is 3DS Max’s word for ‘FACE’. Now select the inverted (black) polygon. Then on the Modify Panel click ‘Flip.’Now, onto our Model. Click on the Max Logo – Import – ImportSelect the OBJ file we exported from Maya.
Click ‘OK.’The default settings are fine. Make sure your geometry is selected and click ‘Import.’Whoa!!
All of our geometry is black!(Note: If your model shows up with the object color, and not black with a colored wireframe, skip ahead to scaling the object.)As in the Rhino example all of our Normals are inverted. Open the Modify Panel, as above. Select ‘Polygon’ Select the entire model. Click ‘Flip.’Deselect your model and it will appear with all the faces as the object color.Scaling the Model for Printing.Again we will scale our geometry to fit with a 8″x10″x10″ box, the size of the printer bed.First a note about scale factors in Max. You cannot simply type in the scale factor as you can in Rhino. It is slightly more complicated.To scale to a scale factor you must first determine that scale factor as a percentage. Max does not use fractions.To scale to 1/8″=1′-0″ for example, we must first find out scale factor.
We know it is 1/96 or.66667. As a percentage this is 1.667Now, Select the object you wish to scale.First click and hold on the Scale Tool and select ‘Uniform Scale.’Then click and hold on the Selection Model and select ‘Use Selection Center.’To scale to 1/8″=1′-0″ Right click on the ‘Uniform Scale’ tool.Type in your scale percentage and hit Enter.For abstract scaling create a box that is 8″x10″x10″Open the Create Panel, Select ‘Box,’ Draw your box on the screen.
Enter the size parameters on the create panel.You will now have a box next to your model.Right click on the box and select Object Properties. In the dialog box check the box next to ‘See-Through Object’Now the Box is Clear. Select your Model. Make sure the Scale tool is set on ‘Uniform Scale’ and the selection mode is ‘Use Selection Center’ as described above.Scale your model down until it fits inside the box.Now we must make sure the model is water tight for printing.Delete the box. We don’t need it anymore.Even though we visually scaled down the model, 3D Max still retains its original site. If you right click on the model and open the Object Properties you will see that its dimensions are still greater than 8″x10″x10″.To fix this select your Object. Open the Utilities panel (The Hammer Icon).
Click ‘Reset X-Form’ then click ‘Reset Selected.’This tells Max that we really want our model to have the new dimension that fit inside the Printer Bed.Now right click on your Object, and select Convert to – Editable Poly. This deletes the object history.Now we are ready to apply a thickness to make the model water tight.In Max this is called ‘Shell.’Select the geometry, open the modify panel. Click on the Modifier pulldown and select ‘Shell.’Now in the modifier panel, in the shell settings we have to add a very small shell. The default 1″ is alreadyWAY too thick!Since we did the reset x-form however, we can work at fractions and add a shell of the appropriate size. As this model already had a certain thickness from Maya, we only need to at a nominal shell to print correctly.
Instead of 1/8″ we can use 1/16″ for this particular model.Type 1/16″ into the outer shell window.Now once again check for Normals. We are ok, so right click and convert to Editable Poly one more time, and we are ready to export.Select the Object first, then navigate to the Max Logo – Export – Export. DO NOT USE THE EXPORT SELECTED OPTION IT WILL NOT WORK FOR 3D PRINTING!!!In the export selected dialog select Stereolithography (.stl) as your file type, and name your file.Click ‘OK.’An new dialog will come up. Be sure to check the box ‘Export Selected Only.’Click ‘OK.’Congratulations! You have successfully exported your STL file.Z PRINTNow for the last step.Open Z Print.When prompted open your.stl file.Make sure inches is selected and click ‘Next.’You should see something like this:Excellent.
Now we check for Normals. Go to Edit – Normals – Invert All NormalsNow you should see something like this:Just like in Rhino and Max we have turned all of the faces inside out and now they are black. This is good. If you look closely at the above image you will see a handful of small white dots. These are improperly aligned Normals.However, if all you see are tiny dots like this your Model has been successful. If you see larger white areas then you will have print problems and it will be necessary to repeat the export process until there are no large areas of white.But, this model is ready to go.
Go back to Edit – Normals – Invert All Normals to make the model right side out again.The last thing we do is go to View – Calculate Part StatisticsThis brings up the Part Statistics Dialog Box which tells us how big our 3D Print will be.This model is 8.58 cubic inches. The lab charges $8.00 per cubic inch and always rounds up. So 9x$8.00 = $72.00WHOA!!
That’s crazy, right? If the cost is very high you can go back to Rhino or Max and rescale the object to make it smaller.But be sure not to make it too small.Guess what?!
If you have successfully created a.stl file with no Normal issues its time to truck on over to the 3D print lab and make this dream a reality!Thank You,Hbaal.
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