Symmetrical Modeling Tips&Tricks for Maya (plus MIGS recap)

I dunno about others but I usually place my cursor over the point which I wanna move when I don't wanna loose track of it, so gesturing is actually detrimental in this case. But, I mean MMs are good since they give people options in the way they wanna work. I've been Maya user since version 1, so I've tried a lot of techniques to figure out what works for me. I did script a few MMs myself, and the majority of requests from co-workers were about simple toggle scripts.

The only MM I still use is the Save command, which I placed among Vertex/Face/Edge context to remind myself of saving every time I switch between components. :)

edgeArchitect - a nice trick with MMs tough is that you can access the menu items simply by gesturing. Meaning that you never have to actually see the menu. If you Shift+CTRL and quickly swipe up (north) with your RMB, it will toggle the reflection on/off without ever having the full menu pop-up. This can also be done via the w hotkey btw. Hold "w" and LMB gesture up and it will very quickly toggle that option on/off.

Problem with these marking menus is that they block the view of a model and distract from the work process. Anything that blocks the screen during the work process calls for a lunch or at least a coffee break. :)

edgeArchitect - you can also toggle it on/off quickly using Shift+CTRL RMB marking menu. Just hold Shift+CTRL and swipe/gesture up with your RMB and it will toggle symetry/reflection on/off.

Here's a quick toggle script I made to make the switching easier:

global proc rv_symToggle(){
int $symState = `symmetricModelling -q -symmetry`;
if ($symState != 1){ symmetricModelling -e -symmetry 1; }
else {symmetricModelling -e -symmetry 0;}
};
rv_symToggle();

Woo, cool~ Thanks a bunch!!

squatch - hold both CTRL+Shift and click the RMB. This will give you options/settings for whatever tool is active.

Thanks for the tutorial~

How do you open that marking menu at 3:37 for the insert edge loop tool settings?

Thirstypilgrim - sorry I meant which version of Maya?

I have windows XP SP3, so I downloaded the windows 32bit. Is that the correct one? It seemed as though most of the other tools worked, but the one I needed, the symetrical mesh modeling tool demonstrated above, gave me this error. Thanks for you attention,
Thirsty

Thirstypilgrim - what version of BonusTools are you using?

ERROR: Cannot find procedure "bt_mirrorInstanceMesh

sweeeeeet

yea good tool. I think the guy below has something good to add. The seam is kind of annoying for us. the mirrored instance seems a bit of a hack. Mirror for all poly tools out of the box should be standard i second that. this instance mirror copy then merge back together 1990 workflow is pretty slow and outdated. even with scripts that can help you speed it up. when you combine your model back together you sort of loose all the history of the inserted edgeloops for example. so its not great, but acceptable.

Hey Steve!
The last time I saw u during one of yer presentations in Baltimore, U mentioned yer desire to see the reflection option for all Maya Poly Tools.
That discussion inspired me to write something similar ( an auto mirror scriptJob ).
Please check it out and pillage anything usefull.

claydough.net/cly_pivotReflectionModeling.aspx


I was using instances as well @ first but there r a few issues ( distracting hard origin seam, freeze transforms are not possible without an additional hack )

thanks for all yer hard werk
-Roger Klado