Summary

By working through the tutorials in this chapter, the world of materials has opened up for you. It might seem overwhelming now, but don't get discouraged. It takes time and practice to develop a thorough understanding of how nodes work together and affect your renderings . Using this fundamental knowledge of materials and texturing in Maya, you have a base to build on. Take a look at what you have learned in this chapter:

• Blinn, Phong, PhongE, Lambert, and Anisotropic The basic material types are confusing at first glance, but are no longer strangers to you.

• Working with material attributes Understanding the basic material attributes is vital to successfully creating a shader, such as plastic or metal.

• Working with Hypershade You've learned how to use Maya's material creation tool.

• Adding materials to the house Using the house from Chapters 5 and 6, you have moved closer to creating a render-worthy model.

• Assigning materials and learning workflow There's no set method for creating and applying materials to a scene, but you've learned a couple of methods to give you an idea of the process.

• Adding textures to basic materials A simple material can look good by itself, but adding a texture can bring the material to life!

• Bump maps You learned how to fake surface deformation by changing the way that light reacts to the surface.

• Using 3D Paint You learned to interactively create textures on 3D objects.