Technology

M 7.0 is the industry standard software program for three-dimensional modeling, animation, and dynamic effects. The software also has great promise for landscape architectural use. Maya is the combination of three separate software packages: 1) Wavefront’s Advanced Visualizer (the world’s first three-dimensional modeling program), 2) Thompson Digital Image’s Explore, and 3) Alias’ Studio and Power Animator. The two Alias software products were produced by a unique collaboration of artists and computers scientists. From this beginning, Maya 1.0 was first released in 1998 for the SGI computer running a version of UNIX. In 1999 a Windows NT version was released; a Mac OS X beta version followed in 2000. The result is a large program with over 26 million lines of software computer code. For comparison purposes, computer aided design (CAD) tectural Association School of Architecture in London, have also focused their design studios on integrating Maya as a design medium. The complexity of Maya is offset by the flexibility of the software to create any solid, surface, particle, or organic form. There is an almost unlimited number of free tutorials for learning the program. A Google search for Maya tutorials returned up 3,970,000 distinct web pages (May 2, 2006). Though usually not specifically oriented to landscape architecture practice or education, completion of the tutorials gives the user an intimate understanding of a particular aspect of the software. It is recommended that users complete several tutorials to better understand the program at a conceptual level. Maya also has seven learning movies, which can be viewed every time the program is opened (essentials, move, rotate, scale, create view objects, component selection, secret menus, keyframe animation, and preview render). The Help menu also has nineteen folders containing between nine and twenty-four separate tutorials. To compensate for its complexity, Maya uses devices such as a fourtiered status line to change menu items and organize functions. The four tiers in Maya Complete represent four different work modes with different tools: 1) Animation, 2) Modeling, 3) Dynamics, and 4) Rendering. The Maya Unlimited versions software typically has 850 thousand lines of code. This complexity puts Maya in a class of its own and allows a level of individual designer expression and graphic control unique in the software world. This level of digital finesse makes Maya a perfect medium for three-dimensional artistic and design expression. Autodesk, the corporate parent of AutoCAD, purchased Alias in January 10, 2006. The combination of AutoCAD’s market share and Alias’s innovative software could create some interesting options for landscape architects. Some of the threeand four-dimensional (time) features of Maya may start appearing in AutoDesk’s mainstream CAD software. Maya software is being increasingly used as an emerging digital design medium in architecture and landscape architecture university programs. Landscape architecture programs at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology in Australia, North Carolina State University, University of Oregon, and Pennsylvania State University have made financial and curricular commitments to integrating Maya software into the design sequence of their courses. At Penn State, students are modeling Australian plant material and creating botanically correct three-dimensional planting plans. Architecture schools, such as the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation at Columbia University and the ArchiTechnology