File > Export All, Export Selection

General Options

File type: Specifies the file type to use for the scene export. The selected file type determines which export options appear in the Export Options window.
Default file extensions: When on (default), exports the file with the extension for the selected File type.

Reference Options

Specifies export options for scenes that contain file references.

Preserve references: If Preserve Reference is turned on, the references within the exported file are preserved. If it is turned off, all references are exported within the file; that is, they are no longer references, but are now objects in the scene. The default is off.
Export unloaded proxies: Exports any unloaded proxy files associated with the current scene.
Keep only a reference (Export Selection only): Exports selected objects in your scene as a referenced file and loads them back into your current scene with the specified namespace options.
Use namespaces: Exports the reference with the namespace you specify. See What are namespaces?.

Prefix with

Specifies how the namespace is generated.

the file name: Specifies that the referenced file name is added to the beginning of object namespace.
this string: Specifies that a text string is added to the beginning of the object namespace.

Include Options

Include these inputs

You can enable/disable export of these specific node types by turning on or off the following:

History
Channels
Expressions
Constraints

Include Texture Info

When on, texture images are included in the export.

File Type Specific Options

Use full names for attributes on nodes

Lets you toggle whether to use full names.

Note

When you export a selection, in addition to the selected nodes themselves, the following associated nodes are also exported:

parents of selected nodes
blind data template nodes
light linker nodes

Maya native file (.ma and .mb) options

For Maya ASCII (.ma) and Maya Binary formats (.mb), the Export All options are the same as the File > Save Scene As options

NoteThe mayaAscii and mayaBinary file formats are the only ones that preserve all the information contained within your scene. Setting the output format for an export using the Export Options box will change your default export format for the current and subsequent export operations. If you set the output format to something other then mayaAscii or mayaBinary and export using that format and then quit without saving the entire file then you can lose data.

Always check the export type in the export file browser to ensure you are writing the file using the expected file format.

mental ray (.mi) file options

See File > Export All, Export Selection (mental ray).

Move file options

Attributes: Type the name of an attribute in the Attributes box and click Add to add the attribute to the list of attributes to use when importing or exporting. If the attribute is already included in the list, a duplicate is not made. To remove an attribute, type the name of the attribute and click Remove. You can add several attributes at one time by separating them with a space.
From Channel Box: Click From Channel Box to combine all of the selected objects in Maya, in the order of their selection, with the channels selected in the Channel Box and place them in the list. For example, if sphere and cone are selected, and tx, sx are selected in the Channel Box, sphere.tx, sphere.sx, cone.tx, and cone.sx are added to the list of attribute to import and export.
Remove Selected: Click Remove Selected to remove all of the attributes selected in the list.
Remove All: Click Remove All to remove all of the attributes from the list.
Precision: This is ignored in file export. For file import, this sets the precision of the file.

When you click import or export, the move file is written or read and only the attributes in the list are affected.

Animation curve options (animExport file type)

You must have the animImportExport plug-in loaded to be able to select the animExport file type and see these options. (See Load or unload Maya plug-ins.)

Precision: Sets the precision of the numbers stored in the file. The choices are:

Float: Eight digits of precision
Double: Seventeen digits of precision
Custom: A setting between 1 and 18.

File Contents: File contents settings:

Use node and leaf attribute names: When turned on, the node and leaf attribute names in the clipboard are written to the file.

When turned off, only the full attribute name is written to the file.
Verbose units: When the Verbose units check box is selected, long unit names are used in the file, otherwise short unit names are used.

Hierarchy: The Hierarchy setting provides control over which nodes are copied within a hierarchy.

Selected: Only the selected object’s animation copies to the keys clipboard.
Below: Copies the animation of the selected object and all objects below it to the clipboard.

Channels: This setting is available when you want to copy only attributes selected in the Channel Box.

All Keyable: All keyable channels of the selected object’s animation are copied to the clipboard.
From Channel Box: Only those channels selected in the Channel Box are copied to the clipboard.

Control Points: This option enables or disables the copy action for all the CVs, polygon vertices, and lattice points associated with a geometry shape (or transform node hierarchically above the geometry shape).

Normally, when a control point is copied, only the selected control point is copied. The Control Points option enables the copying for all the control points associated with an object. This is useful when you are doing control point-intensive animation and don’t want to select each control point to copy the animation.
Shapes: Sets whether the animation of a shape attribute of an object as well as the animation of the associated transform attribute are copied, or if only the transform node’s animation is copied.

Generally, when an object is selected in a modeling window, the transform node (above the shape hierarchically) is selected.

For example, if a camera, NURBS object, or light is selected, the associated transform node is selected for copying.
Time Range: Select from the following options to specify the segment of animation to export from the selected object(s):

All: Copies all the animation information of the selected object or objects to the keys clipboard.
Start/End: Copies only the animation information in the range specified in the Start Time and End Time fields of the selected object or objects to the keys clipboard.

Help Images: When checked, this option displays a diagram of the copy action, and in particular represents graphically the two methods of copying animation information.
Method: Select from the following options:

Keys: Copies only keys within the selected range to the keys clipboard.
Segments: Copies animation curve segments and any keys in the selected range to the keys clipboard.

Note
The Segments method of copying keys creates keys for the copied animation segment at the start and end times in order to preserve the shape of the animation curve, if keys do not already exist at those points.