CG References & Tutorials

[updated 27 Jan 2010]

Cutter Text Editor

mental ray Scripting

Cutter & mental ray

• preferences
• setup for CD vol I & II
• setup for CD vol III
• getting started

Maya Scripting, Mel & Python

Cutter & Mel [+ notes on Vista]

• getting started with Cutter (mel)
• getting started with loops (mel)
• querying UI widgets (mel)
• secondary geometry (mel + py)
• using smart transforms (mel)
• keyframe & expression animation (mel)
• align y-axis to vector (mel)
• recursion (mel)
• recursion & trees (mel)
• curves & expressions (mel)
• quick reference I (mel)
• quick reference II (mel)

TCL Scripting

Cutter & Tcl

• overview
• downloads
• the command line
• command line arguments
• quick reference I
• quick reference II
• lists
• glob
• file filtering
• misc examples
• align y-axis to vector

RenderMan Rib Basics

• setting up a basic camera
• transformation & attribute basics
• camera transformations
• left-hand & right-hand coordinate systems
• introduction to modeling
• pre-baked ribs
• keyframing
• stereo rendering & anaglyphs
• RenderMan booklet [pdf's]

The RenderMan Shading Language (RSL)

Cutter & shader writing

• shading language overview
• datatypes, variables & memory usage
• what is a surface shader?
•   writing surface shaders
• what is a displacement shader?
•   writing displacement shaders
• directional light source shaders
• intro to class-based shaders
• flames and opacity
• layered shading
• using smoothstep
• using noise
• cellnoise
• texture channels
• rotating texture space
• repeating patterns
• high frequency aliasing
• edge effects (aka facing ratio)
• blobby shading effects
• shader to shader messaging
• writing a smoke displacement shader
• displacement shading domes
• aov - secondary images
• fake sub-surface effects
• point cloud & brickmaps
• sierpinski point clouds
• nebula point clouds
• point clouds as accumulation buffers
• trace sets
• selective occlusion
• problems with quadric surfaces
• bumps from lights
• polar coordinates & famous curves
• cellular automata

RenderMan Curves

• curve basics
• renderman curves & normals
• maya curves to rman curves
• post processing curve widths
• post processing curve normals

RenderMan Shadows

• depth map shadows
• raytraced shadows

RenderMan Ray Tracing

• basic ray tracing - reflections
• basic ray tracing - refractions
• ambient occlusion
• surface names & ray names

RenderMan Procedual Primitives

• implementations in python, tcl & 'C'
• basic randomness
• ripoints on a sphere
• blobbies

RenderMan Artists Tools (RAT)

• various scripting topics

RenderMan Studio (RMS)

Cutter & RiMel/Rman

• setup for mel, rman, slim & "it"
• setup for python
• introduction to ri scripting
• sample ri scripts I
• rat & rms rib comparison
• scripting slim palettes
• batch rendering without alfred
• curves & shared geometric attributes
• freeze transforms
• exporting pre-baked ribs
• using a custom light

Slim Scripting

Cutter & Slim

• terminology
• appearance & template documents
• parameter block quick reference
• sourcing a template

Devkit

Cutter & Pixar's Devkit

Lsystem

• introduction
• an Lsystem for rib & mel
• sample scripts I
• sample scripts II
• renderman procedural primitive

Space Filling - Hilbert curve

• concepts, python & tcl code
• mel code

Noise

• perlin noise in python, tcl & 'C'

Expressions

• tutorial
• quick reference

Vectors

• addition/subtraction
• normalizing

Regular Expressions

• whats in a number?