Maya
provides many types of primitive types and shapes such cubes, spheres, cylinders,
and planes.
Primitive
objects can be used as a starting point for a wide variety of shapes and
forms. The most common workflow when using primitive objects is:
- Set the construction options for the
primitive when you initially create it so that it appears in the
Maya scene roughly in the size and shape that you require.
- Move, scale, and rotate the primitive
object into its final position either by direct manipulation (the
move, scale, and rotate tools), or by entering numeric values through
an editor.
- Duplicate the primitive objects to create
multiple copies of the original or create different variations from
your original primitive object.
In this section, you
construct the base for the temple using a polygonal cylinder primitive.
The octagonal shape is created by modifying the creation options
for the cylinder tool before you create the object. If you did not
modify the cylinder options you would create a round cylinder.
To create a polygonal cylinder for
the base
- Select the Polygons menu
set.
NoteUnless otherwise
indicated, the directions in this lesson for making menu selections
assume you’ve already selected the
Polygons menu
set.
You should also ensure
that the Interactive Creation option
for primitives is first turned off by selecting
Create > Polygon Primitives > Interactive Creation to
ensure the check mark does not appear beside the item.
- From the main menu, select
Create > Polygon Primitives > Cylinder > .
An option window appears.
- In the Polygon Cylinder Options window,
select Edit > Reset Settings and then
set the following options:
- Radius: 10
- Height: 1
- Axis divisions:
8
- Height divisions:
1
- Cap divisions:
1
- Axis: Y
- In
the Polygon Cylinder Options window,
click Create.
Maya creates a cylinder
primitive object that is octagonal in shape and positioned at the
center of the Maya workspace. This cylinder is 20 units wide by
one unit high, and has eight faceted sides.
NoteYou were instructed
to reset the option settings as a precaution in case they had been
set differently. This is a good habit to practice when working with
tool options to avoid getting a result that was different from what
you expected.