Go into face selection mode using the right-click menu or by pressing F11. Maya draws a blob at the centre of every face in the object:
You just need to click on a blob to select a face. Or you can draw a selection box around a bunch of blobs.
Let's turn on smooth shading (hotkey: 5) so we can see what we're doing. Select one face on the side of the object (seems a bit silly to keep calling it a cylinder!).
Open up the Edit Polygons menu and choose Extrude Face. Drag the blue arrow manipulator outwards:
We can use the Split Polygon and Subdivide tools to split faces into subfaces. Subdividing takes one face and splits it equally into smaller faces, like this:
It's fairly self-explanatory. I'd like to spend more time talking about the Split Polygon Tool. This tool enables you to draw points on a polygonal object and split the object along the lines joining them. It's the tool you probably wished you had the first time you used the Slice modifier in MAX. If you did the subdivision step above, undo back to the point where the face is highlighted. Now choose Split Polygon Tool from the Edit Polygons menu.
The whole object turns green, indicating you're no longer working in face mode, and the mouse pointer changes shape. Hold down V (to enter snap to point mode) and click on the point where the four faces we messed about with in vertex manipulation mode join the newly extruded section. Like this:
Now click somewhere on the edge closest to the camera:
Rotate the view around and click on the opposite edge of the face you just split. Then complete the job as shown below. Remember to use snap to line up the final point with the original faces but don't worry about where the penultimate split goes! The shape is all over the place already!
Press Enter to finish splitting. Now you've got some more faces to play with.
Enter edge mode via the right-click menu or by pressing F10. Select the top edge:
And drag it so it lies flat on top of the edge connecting the four faces with the protrusion:
Now we'll merge the two edges and reduce the polycount (hurrah!). Press 4 to get back into wireframe mode and select the two edges:
Make sure you select both the edges and no more. Wireframe mode will help you to check this. Next open the Edit Polygons menu and find the Selection submenu. Choose Convert Selection to Vertices.
Now you can merge the vertices as before.
If you're wondering why we used Merge Vertices instead of Merge Edges, read the online help for that tool...
One more thing to do: those four faces could be reduced to one and should be to keep the polygon count down. So select the edges and delete them:
If you've used other 3D programs you might have noticed something strange. Maybe you can't put your finger on it. Something about the shape.
It isn't split into triangles! When we talk about polygon counts in games we are concerned with triangle counts. We want the faces of that shape to be split into their component triangles rather than have them be the easy to model geometric shapes they currently are. The Polygons / Triangulate menu item will split the shapes for you. You should use this command when you're satisfied with the shape of your model.
Congratulations! You have created ... umm ... well ... you have created something. I'm not 100% sure what it is you have created but you have created it. Not only that but the techniques you used to create it are more or less the same techniques as you can use to create mods for Urban Justice.
In the next section I'll introduce UVs and texturing. Once you've understood them you will be able to start modding for real. Sure, Maya has six quadrillion other features I haven't even mentioned (approximately forty-seven million of which I don't even know about). Most of what you need to know is already at your fingertips...
| intro | part 1: Setting the layout | part 2: Editing basics | part 3: Vertex manipulation | part 4: Face manipulation | part 5: Materials, texturing and UVs - (i) | part 6: Materials, texturing and UVs - (ii) | part 7: Materials, texturing and UVs - (iii) | part 8: Final notes |