At SIGGRAPH 2008, Autodesk, Inc. announced Autodesk Maya 2009 3D animation and visual effects software, in celebration of the software’s 10-year anniversary. Maya 2009 includes a host of advancements in modeling, animation, rendering and effects that maximize productivity, optimize workflows, and provide new creative possibilities. Maya 2009 will be showcased at the Autodesk booth (#501) during SIGGRAPH 2008, at the Los Angeles Convention Center Aug. 12-14.
“We are celebrating the work done with Autodesk Maya over the past 10 years by many artists and creative visionaries in film, television production and games, as well as in industrial design and architecture.” said Marc Petit, Autodesk’s Media & Entertainment senior vice president, in the press release. “We designed Maya 2009 as a tribute to creative innovation and production efficiency. The new release will allow artists to raise the bar and deliver even more ground breaking computer graphics work.”
Mike Romey, senior technical director at Zoic Studios was a beta tester for Maya 2009. “The future of Maya is shining brightly with the upcoming release,” said Romey in the press release. “Autodesk Maya 2009 will change the way artists think about dynamics, rendering, compositing and pipelines. With the solid mental ray multi-render pass workflow, production will be far more effective. This new workflow will optimize render times for multiple render layers and, in turn, elevate the quality of work. The creation of nParticles builds on the unified dynamics engine introduced in nCloth, allowing for greater integration of advanced effects.”
Key Highlights of Autodesk Maya 2009
Complexity Managed
While the complexity and size of scenes continue to rise, Maya 2009 provides new tools to make them more manageable. These tools include the new Maya Assets toolset, which enables users to encapsulate a set of nodes into a single container and publish a view of the data suited to the artist’s task. The release also offers a new Render Proxy feature in mental ray, and additional multi-threading work and algorithmic speedups that boost interactive draw, simulation and rendering performance for even the heaviest scenes.
Accelerated Modeling Workflow
Maya 2009 gives modelers and texture artists unprecedented control over polygon modeling and UV texturing through powerful selection management features, efficient modeling workflows and precision UV unfolding and layout options.
Collaborative, Iterative Projects and Pipelines
Tighter schedules and budgets demand that projects and pipelines take full advantage of available resources. Maya 2009 supports collaborative, iterative workflows and promotes data reuse. The software has a new animation layering paradigm that provides animators with increased non-destructive flexibility, as well as an updated Render Pass toolset that offers precise control over render output and optimizes integration with Autodesk Toxik procedural compositing software.
New Creative Tools
Maya 2009 offers an innovative Maya nParticles dynamic simulation module and an extensive Maya Muscle feature set. nParticles is part of the Maya Nucleus Unified Simulation Framework, a ground-breaking approach to creating complex physics simulations that interact directly with each other. Furthermore, to help studios capitalize on the growing popularity of stereoscopic 3D films, Maya 2009 offers a flexible new stereo camera rig, complete with in-viewport stereo viewing.
For a complete list of new features and enhancements in Maya 2009, visit www.autodesk.com/maya.
Pricing and Availability
Autodesk anticipates that Maya 2009 will be available in English in October 2008. Maya 2009 will be supported on Mac OS X for Intel-based Macintosh computers (32-bit version only), Linux (64-bit version only), and Windows (64-bit and 32-bit versions) operating systems.
Autodesk suggested retail pricing is US$1,995 for Maya Complete 2009 (Standalone) and US$4,995 for Maya Unlimited 2009 (Standalone). The upgrade price from Maya Complete 2008 to Maya Complete 2009 is US$899, and the upgrade price from Maya Unlimited 2008 to Maya Unlimited 2009 is US$1,249.
Autodesk Subscription with Gold Support is available for purchase simultaneously with the product or upgrade purchase. The Autodesk suggested retail price for Subscription with Gold Support for Maya Unlimited is US$1,495 per year, and for Maya Complete is US$1,295. Subscription with Gold Support customers qualify for access to the latest software updates, valuable product extensions, telephone and web support, a comprehensive knowledge base and e-Learning materials.
For information about Maya learning tools, visit www.autodesk.com/learning-tools.
Source Autodesk, Inc.
I’d be more excited if they would announce that they are going to fix their video card compatibility issues they have seemed to have since alias was bought by autodesk.
I’m wondering when those lazy pieces of crap will get around to making AutoCAD for Mac again. Lazy pieces of crap!
Yeah Jimbo, I second that!
Lazy pieces of crap!!!
yeah, and max for macs
I would love to have AutoCAD, but, those Lazy pieces of crap can’t get anything done right.
The first version of AutoCAD for Mac wasn’t so hot, so don’t hold your breath. It was just a warmed over version of DOS ACAD shoehorned onto the Mac.
It is crazy that they don’t make a version of AutoCad for the Mac. I used VectorWorks anyway… AutoCad seems a bit bloated anyway.
@anim8ron
Dont hold your breath on that one, though I would like that because of the large amount of plugins and scripts out there for it. I still much prefer maya over max. I just hope for some better compatibility with the video cards and maybe one day autocad will come back to the mac where it belongs.
If AutoCAD was released for OS X Intel, it would break down doors for pros taking everything Apple seriously.
For AutoCAD to do this, it would require something alongside of “effort” and long-term vision, plus displeasing their constituents, so I will never hold my breath that the salesmen CEO’s of AutoDesk will ever let this happen.
When you are the standard, you can rest on your laurels, just like Ballmer$oft. You’ll be retired by the time it comes around and bites you in the butt.
Why only 32 Bit for Mac OS and 64 Bit for Linux and Windows? You’d think they would want to unleash the render power of Mac OSX.
@render node
It seems like Mac is still the bastard step child… It bothered me enough that the video card support is horrid…but its even worse that maya runs alot better in windows than on mac…. that just saddens me alot though I can deal with it cause it hasn’t been much of a problem at all. I think they should be like Apple and have the same focus on Maya 2009 as does apple with 10.6.. Stop adding a bunch of features and code the thing to make use of the most current hardware out there.
@jtc
I agree. Maya on the Mac has to be feature equivalent to other versions and optimized for Macs, not some warmed over port.
3DS Max will “NEVER” be on Mac, since it is developed entirely based on the Windows proprietary Direct3D APIs
Maya isn’t the way it is on a Mac because it is ported from Windows, but due to it’s massively complex legacy code, much of which dates back over 20 years. In 1995, Wavefront Technologies and Alias Systems were purchased by Silicon Graphics, whose proprietary “Unix” (called Irix) workstations were what the two companies and their predecessors had developed their respective products, Wavefront Explorer and Alias PowerAnimator, on. I understand the code has been developed on Windows primarilly, but that does not make it a “Windows” app. It’s just a clumsy collection of oddball functions and components from a half dozen apps developed over a couple decades. It is also kind of like XWindows in that the actual apps are programs running behind the GUI and the big studios completely customize Maya for their own workflows. The default UI is just not designed around any single workflow, and as a result is very clumsy… I’d call it more of a workFLAW.
As you might guess, I have a distinct love hate relationship with Maya, but until until this summer’s release of Houdini 9.5 (which is now on Mac too!) there was nothing. I tried Houdini out a couple months ago, and I am so impressed at my ability to get what took hours or even days to do in Maya can be done in mere minutes, I do not see myself upgrading Maya again. I just won’t need it once I fully learn how to use Houdini for all the same things, and so much more.
“Maya 2009 will be supported on Mac OS X for Intel-based Macintosh computers (32-bit version only), Linux (64-bit version only), and Windows (64-bit and 32-bit versions) operating systems.”
Why *32-bit version only*? Why not take full advantage of MacOS X? The Linux version is 64-bit, so I would like an explanation. Apple should really push on this if it wants to sell high-end Mac Pros.
@ Eric
Your post explains much. I always wondered by Autodesk bought Maya. Now I understand. Maya’s approach to software development, bloated spaghetti code with no clear vision, fits perfectly with Autodesk’s strategy for AutoCAD. It is a marriage made in heaven.
Autodesk has hooked its wagons to Windows, so never expect them to deliver a decent product on the Mac. Let’s just hope both the MS and Autodesk ships sink together.
iDamn Autodesk right now. Just like i’ve done so years ago.
I got the Houdini beta up and running and it works even better than the maya final release. Oh, and did i forget to mention it already is a 64-bit app?
And did we already take a look at the full 64-bit Cinema 4D with an awsome renderer and new GI system? Hell yeah!
Now i know i’ll need to stop thinking about switching and start switching!
These feature list is all so bulloks. These are so buffed up minor adjustments put in a big a$$ marketing stunt. And nParticles? nCloth even isn’t what it should be. It has great potential if it would start to use CPU power. Now it hardly does. The modeling and other enhancement are just some minor tools they propably stole from some dudes or companys who wrote them theirself.
AUTODESK: THIS IS JUST WORTH AS A FREE UPDATE !!
Maya Lite is awesome! You have a fully functional $2000 program for FREE and the only limitation (I believe) is that it adds a watermark to it – not too bad for non-commercial work.
Maya’s a decent app. But I much prefer Side Effect Software’s “Houdini” which was just released for 64-bit intel macs.
http://www.sidefx.com/