Understanding Maya 3D Piston Tutorial


https://i.ytimg.com/vi/q1cQiz91QVE/hqdefault.jpg



Maya 3D animation software tutorial on rigging a piston using constraints.

source


24 responses to “Understanding Maya 3D Piston Tutorial”

  1. A really helpful and informative tut. Clearly explained, great pacing and didn't leave out any steps. Old version of Maya but all the principles are still current and VERY useful for any project.

  2. Guys I've got a little problem, please help me out. I made some hydraulics for some landing gear, and around one of the hydraulic pistons, such as the one in this tutorial, there is a spring. I think it's called a helix polygon.

    Anyway, I want the spring to squash/stretch and rotate along the hydraulic pistons as they move.
    Is there any reasonable way to constrain them together? Please give a brief explanation.

    Thanx in advance.

  3. I found this tutorial very helpful. Thank you very much for your contribution. I would like to add my little discovery:

    I found that I had a problem with the objects making up my piston rotating against my will as well, and I found that if you change the "World Up Vector" to match what you have set for your "Up Vector", this prevents the objects from twisting when you move the piston along the Z axis. (i.e. 0 0 1 for Up Vector, and 0 0 1 for World Up Vector in my case. YMMV)

  4. Those are called "annotations". I don't have Maya in front of me right now, but the way it works is you select an object, then click Create >> Annotation ( I think ). It'll ask for you to type in a name. Hit enter, and it'll create some shape nodes and a locator parented under your object. Look in the attribute editor for other options.

  5. Hi, I'll have to post a video to explain it better, but here's what I just did: a single bone with an IK handle for the connecting rod, point constrain the rod joint to another joint chain tor rotating the base. Parent the IK handle to your piston. Animated the piston up and down, drive the offset cam rotation with the rod translation.

Leave a Reply