week 1

session 1

Basic 'C' Programming Language Concepts

This first session will concentrate on downloading, unzipping and distributing a number of Maya customization scripts. Also, the students installation of Maya, RenderMan, Visual Studio Community (Windows) or XCode (OSX) and Cutter will be checked.

How many of the following topics will be covered will depend on the number of "issues" encountered when confirming the students workstations are correctly configured.

Topics

• course overview
• intro to the 'C' programming language
• compiling and linking a program using Cutter on Linux & OSX
• compiling and linking a program using Cutter on Windows
• BASICS_C_DEMO.c
• how a constants handled (#define, const and enum)

session 2

Basic 'C/C++' Programming Language Concepts

Review the student index pages.

Topics

• printing values - program output (printf() and C++ std::out)
• BASICS_CPP_DEMO.cpp
• datatypes, variables and visualizing their use in memory
• variables, their values and their memory address
• access a variables data via it's address in memory
• MEMORY_CPP_DEMO.cpp
• declaring pointer variables
• dereferencing pointer variables
• structure and procedures?
• declaring and allocating memory for structures

week 2

session 3

C++ Arnold Shader Plugins

Topics

• revision of the 'C' language topics covered so far
• basic concepts of the C/C++ programming language
• Cutter and Arnold public development
• using example shaders
• Arnold documentation "Creating a Shader"

session 4

C++ Arnold Shader Plugins

Topics

• development of a simple (red_left) shader

week 3

session 5

C++ Arnold Shader Plugins

Review the technical breakdowns of the red_left shader.

Topics

• implementing front/back shading
• implementing color ramps using the mix() and smoothstep() functions

session 6

C++ Arnold Shader Plugins

Topics

• continue the implementation of the side_mask shader
• developing the side_mask technical breakdown

week 4

session 7

C++ Arnold Shader Plugins

Review the technical breakdowns of the side_mask shader.

Topics

• applying color according to distance
• 3D shading effects and user coordinate spaces

session 8

C++ Arnold Shader Plugins

Topics

• implementing a height2color shader

week 5

session 9

Open Shading Language (OSL)

Review the technical breakdowns of the height2color shader.

Topics

• Cutter & the Open Shading Language
• using Cutter to test an OSL shader
• the Arnold OSL workflow

session 10

Open Shading Language (OSL)

Topics

• developing an OSL version of the C++ height2color shader
• Ai User Data Float Tutorial

Follow the convention : `mtoa_constant_` when adding a user attribute.

week 6

session 11

Open Shading Language (OSL)

Topics

• focusing on Arnold shader development
• Ai User Data Float Tutorial

Follow the convention : `mtoa_constant_` when adding a user attribute.

session 12

Revision: Open Shading Language

Topics

• continue developing the mel and python scripts for moom shading
• moom_assets.zip

week 7

session 13

Open Shading Language

Topics

session 14

Open Shading Language

Topics

• continue development of the moom shader

week 8

session 15

Open Shading Language

Student presentation and review of the technical breakdowns of the moom shading assignment.

session 16

Open Shading Language

Topics

• materials - closures

week 9

session 17

Open Shading Language

Students will work on their personal Arnold OSL utility or material node.

session 18

Open Shading Language

Students will work on their personal Arnold OSL utility or material node.

week 10

session 19

Open Shading Language

Students will work on their personal Arnold OSL utility or material node.

session 20

Final Review

Students present their personal Arnold shading technical breakdowns.