Please Help a South African!!

# 1 12-01-2010 , 07:41 AM

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Join Date: Dec 2009

Location: JHB, South Africa

Posts: 21

Hi Everyone

I might have a realy noob question to ask,

I live in South-Africa and the infrastructure here is not completely up to standard if you want to seek a career as a animator

Because of my love for animation movies and love for a Pc, I started my exploration in the 3d world of maya last year june!!

Unfortunitly I cant study maya in south africa, because I havent founded an institute where I can study it, so I started off with online tutorials and playing around nothing serious

But this year I want to fully presue this as a career even thou my chances in SA is 1/100 this is what I want to do!!

And hey the best way to learn is from people doing it already !!
any tips and advice will be apreciated!!

Now my question is, i know that maya 2010 is the latest version of maya
Unfortunitly the only version I could get my hands on was maya 8.5, is 8.5 out dated or will this still do fine?

Sorry for the dumb question, but SA is always behind with everything!!

Kind Regard

Saint-Limitless

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# 2 12-01-2010 , 07:57 AM

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Join Date: Oct 2006

Posts: 57

depending of what you want to do it will be ok =)
there's new functions in maya 2010 but you can do the same thing or near to in maya 8.5

Maybe some tuts will be hard to follow if they are using new things from maya 2010... but the basic is still the same and the tools I use the most for modeling are the same since few versions

Maya modeler - current project Avatar - purplemikey

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# 3 12-01-2010 , 08:36 AM

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Join Date: May 2004

Location: Bowling Green. Kentucky U.S.A.

Posts: 810

..to answer that...I would say that most freelance artists on the net cannot necessarily afford to upgrade their software every time a new version comes out, Studios of course could...
I know personally i cannot purchase an upgrade for Maya every time they are released.
And i would have to believe that everyone keeps this in mind. So, will you have every capability that 2010 has? no...but will you still be able to accomplish good work? learn the ropes? get a portfolio?. yes, all of the above and then some.

G-man

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# 4 12-01-2010 , 08:50 AM

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Join Date: Dec 2009

Location: JHB, South Africa

Posts: 21

Thanks Guys !!

Can you maybe post some links where I can get free tutorial as well , or just some of your fav websites where you have learned something usefull

I will also be supporting SM alot this year will try to buy a Tutorial every month, its just a bit expensive because we work in ZAR but hey to speed up my learning process it has to be done

I would also appreciate it if someone can give some sort of a guidline in makeing a decent portfolio and how it is supose to look!!

Any case, Thanks alot for the positive response

Kind regard

Saint-Limitless

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# 5 12-01-2010 , 09:04 AM

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Join Date: Mar 2008

Location: Bristol, UK.

Posts: 191

Ex Saffi

Hi from an ex Saffie!

I thought about studying animation and CG way back in '98, back then there was even less of a chance! Back then I had a word with the then VP of SGI sub-sahara and he suggested a place called Fifth Dimension in JHB. I notice they still seem to be trading?! At that time they were SoftImage based, but give them a bash! As a warning, they were hellishly expensive then, I'm sure they are now!

Fifth Dimension Design Studios, 14 Sommerset Taurus Rd
Johannesburg, Gauteng 2188, South Africa
021 461 9581

As for Maya, anything from version 6.5 to 2010 will do for learning on. Unlike other software packages, Maya hasn't really chanegd that much under the hood in the last 5 years. If you can try and look for a 8.5, 2008 or 2009 package, they will be MORE than enough to get going. Most tutorials are still based on 8.5-2009.

Go through the free tutorials on this website, then when you've gained some experiance, get a few paid ones.

If you can, try and get some work experience in the States, Canada, UK, NZ etc. Even just being a runner in a studio will give you a huge insight into how things are run!

(BTW: I never ended up in the animation industry, not enough money back then! Now in architecture, my next best choice!)

Good luck!

Jacques

Poly-pushing on a '96 SGI O2

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# 6 12-01-2010 , 04:58 PM

EduSciVis-er
Join Date: Dec 2005

Location: Toronto

Posts: 3,374

Welcome to SimplyMaya! As for a portfolio, pixar has a good overview of what a good demo reel should look like: https://www.pixar.com/companyinfo/jobs/howto.html

Hopefully that's somewhat helpful to you.

-stwert

Website - Blog - YouTube - Vimeo - Facebook - Twitter

-->How to Effectively Ask Questions on Forums<--

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# 7 13-01-2010 , 07:18 AM

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Join Date: Dec 2009

Location: JHB, South Africa

Posts: 21

Thanks a lot for all the support and tips from everyone

Wow cant believe how helpful every is here +rep to all!!

:bow:

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# 8 13-01-2010 , 05:50 PM

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Join Date: May 2004

Location: Bowling Green. Kentucky U.S.A.

Posts: 810

you can google free maya tutorials and find tuns of html based stuff. Tutorial wise.

there are some good books out there as well. but it would be hard to recommend one without knowing your personal area of interest . I.E. Modeling , Animation, Dynamics? ect ect.

as far as learning. I personally have found that one of the best tools of learning is to just model something, anything, post it and listen to the feed back. as i stated a few days ago in another threat, a person can learn much much more from their 'screw ups' then their successes.

So my suggestion would be to pick something, anything..even if its just a random object around your house a table or something, and re create it in maya and post your progress here. I will admit a lot of us are more apt to follow a wip for something that interests them rather then a table. But If you chose that route i will make sure to look for threats started in the wip section with your name to follow.

Hope this helps.
G-man

G-man

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On The Web!
Or
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# 9 14-01-2010 , 06:09 AM

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Join Date: Dec 2009

Location: JHB, South Africa

Posts: 21

Thanks Legend!!

In fact I am busy with the Mech Warrior, I am making small changes thou will post it when I am finished

This will most probably be my first decent design ever, as soon as I get some lone time during the week I will continue again, the model is finished I just have to map uv's photoshop and animate

The tutorials here on SM is awesome and I have learned a lot so far

I just finished my AUTOCAD 2010 and Inventor course last year, it also helps a lot in understanding maya better

Thanks a lot to everyone again for all the support, I have never ever seen a forum where everyone is so help full

+REP TO SM FORUM :attn:

Conquering The World One Pixel At A Time !!!!

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Please Help a South African!!

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