Hi ezanih
Not used the Muscles thing yet, Yes I have maya 2009 unlimited, I used the maya hair system to create the avatars hair, first I create curves in the shape of the hair I wanted then create a nurb sphere then assign a hair system to it from this you can assign the system to the curves, the avatar has 3 hair systems.
1:hair sweeping back
2:eye brow
3:braid
I did not use zbrush for the avatar, but created the texture in photoshop using photos of the avatar and painting. the lips are a cut out photo adjust and made to fit with the Liquify filter then a bump was painted over it.
I have got CS4 but at the moment cannot use the 3D bit because of my graphics card, will have a look at those links..........................dave