What is Artisan?

Autodesk^® Artisan^™ is an intuitive paint and sculpting-based interface that delivers high quality, complex results in minimal time. Many brush tools in Autodesk^® Maya^® use the Artisan interface. These tools are called Artisan tools. Artisan tools let you manipulate your geometry in a more artistic manner by allowing you to paint their values and properties with the brush tool.

Artisan Brush Tool Settings

Artisan uses the Maya Tool Settings editor to set tool properties. All Artisan tools share common options, which are described in Common Artisan Brush Tool Settings.

The most common ways to open the Tool Settings editor are:

Click the beside the tool on its menu (for example, Edit > Paint Selection Tool > ).
Double-click the selected tool in the Tool Box.
TipLeave the Tool Settings editor open as you work in Artisan. When you switch tools, the settings change to reflect the selected tool.
If you do not want to leave the Tool Settings editor open, define hotkeys or use the Artisan marking menus to change commonly used settings for each of the tools. For details, see Use Artisan hotkeys and Use Artisan marking menus.

Tailor the settings for your tools and save them to a shelf for easy access. For details, see Create an Artisan tool shelf.

For each Artisan tool, the Tool Settings editor contains a section with settings that are specific to that tool. This unique section appears after the Brush section and its unique settings are described where the tool is described, as follows:

Paint Selection Tool – See Edit > Paint Selection Tool in the Basics guide.
Paint Attributes Tool – See Modify > Paint Attributes Tool.
Paint Cluster Weights Tool – See Edit Deformers > Paint Cluster Weights Tool in the Deformers guide.
Paint Jiggle Weights Tool – See Edit Deformers > Paint Jiggle Weights Tool in the Deformers guide.
Paint Soft Body Weights Tool – See Soft/Rigid Bodies > Paint Soft Body Weights Tool in the Dynamics guide.
Paint Skin Weights Tool – See Skin > Edit Smooth Skin > Paint Skin Weights Tool in the Deformers guide.
Paint Fluids Tool (Maya Unlimited only) – See Fluid Effects > Add/Edit Contents > Paint Fluids Tool in the Fluid Effects guide.
3D Paint Tool – See 3D Paint Tool in the Paint Effects and 3D Paint Tool guide.
Paint Vertex Color Tool – See Color > Paint Vertex Color Tool in the Polygonal Modeling guide.
Paint Scripts Tool – See Painting with MEL scripts and the Paint Scripts Tool.
Sculpt Geometry Tool – See Edit NURBS > Sculpt Geometry Tool in the Polygonal Modeling guide.
Sculpt Geometry Tool – See Mesh > Sculpt Geometry Tool in the Polygonal Modeling guide.
Paint Set Membership Tool – See Edit Deformers > Paint Set Membership Tool in the Deformers guide.
Paint Fur Attributes Tool (Maya Unlimited only) – See Fur > Paint Fur Attributes Tool in the Fur guide.
Paint Vertex Properties Tool (Maya Unlimited only) – See nMesh > Paint Vertex Propertiesin the nDynamics guide.
Paint Texture Properties Tool (Maya Unlimited only) – See nMesh > Paint Texture Propertiesin the nDynamics guide.
Paint Hair Follicles Tool (Maya Unlimited only) – See Hair > Paint Hair Follicles in the Hair guide.