I Can't Edit My Model Normally

Q :Why are the points/edges/etc I select on my model colored orange/red/yellow, and why does moving them affect more of my model than I want them to?

A: You turned on Soft Selection [most likely by hitting the "b" key] Hitting the "b" key again will turn it off, or you can take the long route and open the tool settings and toggle it there.

NOTE: this mode can be activated and used within the UV Texture Editor as well.

Missing Manipulators

Q: I can't see my move/rotate/scale manipulators, why?

A: Hit the + or - key to resize the them.  Also, if the rotate tool just won't show, it could be a display problem, you might need to update or roll back your graphic drivers. In all fairness, I've closed and reopened Maya and had the problem go away [yeah what the hell right?]

Models Distort When Rotated

Q: Why do my models stretch and distort when I try to rotate them?

A: Sounds like a case of double grouping, check your Outliner and ungroup them.  This can occur after a lot of extract, duplicate face operations pile up in addition to user grouping that doesn't take this history into account. The grouping gets messy with the extra transformation nodes(nodes that store size, position and rotation information).

Blocky Artifacts on Model

Q: Why does my model have these blocky patterns when I render it?

A: More than likely, you have a duplicate of your model in the same exact position as the original or your model has lamina faces (faces that sit in the exact same space, sometimes due to the user forgetting that they extruded some faces that they didn't bother moving around or undoing). Identical geometry sitting on top of each other can result in garbled shading in the rendered image.

Models Have Floating Vertices

Q: How can I cleanly delete edges and vertices?

A:You can select the edges and hit the delete key but that will leave vertices behind and you might unknowingly create messy geometry, on the other hand, if you wanted to redraw the edges while keeping the basic shape this method could come in handy.


The clean way to do it is to select the edges/vertices and use the "Delete Edge/Vertex" polygon procedure in the "Edit Mesh" menu.

Missing Channelbox Inputs

Q: I just created a new cube
 and I'm trying to change the number of divisions in the channel box but there are no inputs why?

A: You need to turn on construction history in order for Maya to keep track of such things. It's the little icon in the upper right side portion of the screen with the white page on it. If you're using a version previous to 2009, then the icon looks more like a scroll than a flat sheet of paper.

NURBS vs Polygons vs Subdivision

Q: What are the differences between polygons, subdivisions and NURBS?

Polygonal, Subdivision, NURBS spheres from left to right

A:
Polygons are surfaces made up of faces, each face is an enclosure of edges, whether it be three edges, four edges, or more (n-gons). These surfaces can be made up of many faces, as many as your computer can handle or just a single face. Each edge runs in a straight line and the point where these lines meet is called a vertex. And since polygon edges flow in straight lines, they easily create hard, faceted surfaces but of course more faces are required to form smooth, curvy surfaces, effectively increasing the object's resolution or "poly count".  Of course, there is a polygon count threshold a given computer can handle before it starts to struggle. Many modern renderers have a feature that allows polygon objects to be smoothed at render time, this allows users to have lower counts for smoother, less hassling real time interaction. Poly objects can be combined and welded together, cut, sculpted, extruded, extracted, UV mapped etc.

 NURBS geometry is made of patches generated from curves. They easily form curvy rounded surfaces and placing points closer together enables the user to create sharper corners. These surfaces can be stitched together, trimmed, sculpted etc.

Subdivisional surfaces allow the user to focus on detailing regions instead of making the entire mesh heavier, hence the name subdivision. It feels like a hybrid of NURBS and polygons, easily generating smooth and rounded surfaces like NURBS while utilizing many polygonal tools.

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 So they are all capable of taking you to the same destination just using a different road, it's not uncommon for a modeler to convert back and forth between different geometry types. But at the end of the day it's all about your preference so try them all.

NOTE:  As of Maya 2014 the subdiv surfaces tools have been removed from the Maya user interface, they are still available just hidden since the modeling method largely fell out of use.