I need some specific reasons to give my students to help them stick to learning Maya over Blender

Anonymous — Tue, 03 Aug 2021 11:20:51 GMT

Hello, I am looking for some specific reasons to give my students to stick to learning Maya over Blender.
I teach 14-18 year olds Maya in the UK for both VFX and Games.

I would say that in a class of 25, at least five 14-16 year olds already have experience in Blender and another 10 start learning it in addition to Maya outside of class. I do encourage them to learn Blender but always in addition to Maya.

When asked why they must learn Maya I always say that despite Blender being free, open source, easier to install (no student licencing woes), beautiful viewport rendering, having arguably more intuitive modelling tools (e.g. real-time booleaning), node editor and rendering workflow, Maya is still used by a greater number of studios than Blender as part of their pipelines and deep down it can do far more.

When asked for specifics as to why Maya is better, my usual response is:

Most of those ‘intuitive’ modelling tools in blender create horrendous topology which would be a nightmare for other modellers or textures to deal with and cause serious LOD issues in game engines (although unreal engine 5 seems to make that a non-issue now).
Most existing industry artists are trained in Maya and re-training them would cost more than the savings made from free 3d software. The people making big decisions like software choices are also likely to be older (like me) and more resilient to change.
Versions of Maya used by big studios are often heavily customised with in-house tools and plugins for well-tried and trusted workflows. Switching to Blender would risk this reliability in projects where the time and profit margins are already very tight.

My background is in using Maya for freelance VFX and Games assets rather than studio-based so when students ask for actual specific examples especially for the first and third points I am at a loss.

Searching on forums and youtube usually only reveals the 3 generic points above, even from experts like the flipped normals channel.

My question is: can anyone give me any specific built-in tools or processes, that are definitely better (in at least some situations) in Maya or any names or examples of actual custom tools or plugins that solve problems that blender cannot do as reliably. What are some examples of these fabled advanced processes that experts can get Maya to do but which blender could not?

Otherwise my student’s attitude is that we must learn Maya because it’s what the old farts like me know and when faced with crashes or errors in Maya their first response is ‘I can do this so much faster in Blender’ which starts to develop a unanimous hatred for Maya as a tool.

Thanks a million in advance for any response that can help me defend Maya!

Re: I need some specific reasons to give my students to help them stick to learning Maya over Blender

Christoph_Schaedl — Wed, 04 Aug 2021 19:43:52 GMT

Main reason for Maya is pipeline and custom tools. Studios invest years of development time to get them running.

As long as you are modeling its fine to work with Blender but as soon as the asset goes into rigging and sim you have to stay in Maya or Houdini.

Next is USD. The pipeline of the future is build around USD so you need a DCC that is able to work with USD Stages. Not a basic USD import export. You need to modify the USD data on disc.

As long as big studios use Maya you need to learn it. Or you apply to a Blender based Studio.

In the end all that counts is your skill not the Tool.

Re: I need some specific reasons to give my students to help them stick to learning Maya over Blender

Christoph_Schaedl — Wed, 04 Aug 2021 20:22:06 GMT

An other point are updates and plugins. Most big studios dont allow plugins and does work on a froozen pipline. Means they work still with maya 2017. Artists arnt allowed to install software. Same would apply for Blender. You stuck for years on the same version.

But all this isnt true for small and indie studios.

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I need some specific reasons to give my students to help them stick to learning Maya over Blender

Re: I need some specific reasons to give my students to help them stick to learning Maya over Blender

Re: I need some specific reasons to give my students to help them stick to learning Maya over Blender