Maya Shading and Texturing - Introducing Maya 2011 - page 318

Photoshop file for different attributes of the shader, as opposed to importing several
image files to map onto each shader attribute separately. This, of course, requires a mod-
est knowledge of Photoshop and some experience with Maya shading. As you learn
how to shade with Maya, you'll come to appreciate the enhancements inherent in using
Photoshop networks.

Try This You'll create a single Photoshop file that will shade this sphere with color as well
as transparency and a bump. Again, this is instead of creating three different image files
(such as TIFFs) for each of those shading attributes:
1. Create a NURBS sphere in a new scene, and assign a new Lambert shader to it. You
can do this through the Hypershade or by choosing Lighting/Shading ➔ Assign New
Material ➔ Lambert in the Rendering menu set. This creates a new shader and assigns
it to the selection, in this case your sphere.
2. Select the sphere, and choose Texturing ➔ Create PSD Network. In the option box
that opens, select color, transparency, and bump from the list of attributes on the
left side, and click the right arrow to move them to the Selected Attributes list on the
right, as shown in Figure 7.39.

Figure 7.39
The Create PSD
Network Options
window

3. Select a location and filename for the image. By default,
Maya places the PSD file it generates under the Sourceimages
folder of your current project, named after the surface to
which it applies. Click Create.
4. In Photoshop, open the newly created PSD file. You see three
layers grouped under three folders named after the shader
attributes you selected when creating the PSD file. There are
folders for lambert2.bump, lambert2.transparency, and lam-
bert2.color, as well as a layer called UVSnapShot .

The UVSnapShot layer gives you a wireframe layout of the
UVs on the sphere as a guideline to paint your textures.
Because the sphere is an easy model, you don't need this
layer, so turn it off. You'll use UVSnapShots later in this
chapter.

You can now paint whatever image you want into each of the
layers to create maps for each of the shader attributes, all in
one convenient file. Save the PSD file. You can save over it or
create a new filename for the painted file.
5. In Maya, open the Hypershade, and open the Attribute
Editor for the Lambert shader assigned to the sphere (in