Mental ray aborts render, file texture not found

If you like to skip the texture file use the following flag
-texture_continue

Normally, standalone versions of mental ray abort as early as possible when a texture file cannot be read, to avoid spending a lot of time on unusable images and letting the farm controller know as soon as possible. If this option is specified, mental ray will continue and use transparent black or red-and-black checkerboard defaults (depending on the shader) for missing texture files.

Toxik preferences files

If you are new to Maya Composite and are looking for the Preferences files, you can find them here:

 1) The "default.txproject" file which is located by default in

            C:UsersUserNameDocuments oxik 

or within Toxik go to Edit ---> Project Preferences, under the Information Tab you will see the path and name of the file.

This file is your project preferences, so will hold for example, render settings and composition settings.  You can have multiple project preferences file and therefore can easily change project without have to reset all the paths.

2) The "preferences.txuser" file which is located by default in

        C:UsersUserNameDocuments oxik2010

This file is your user preferences, so will hold for example, color palette, hotkey catalog information and bookmarks.   This file is saved automatically when you change a preferences within Toxik, simply go to Edit ---> User Preferences

3) The"Hotkey Catalog.txsetup" which is located in

        C:UsersUserNameDocuments oxik2010Hotkey Catalog

This file contains your hotkeys.  Within Toxik you can go to Edit --> Hotkey to see or update them

4) The "toxik.ini" file which is located in:

        C:Program FilesAutodeskAutodesk Toxik 2010etc

This file contains the environment variables.  For example

    toxik::mediacache::factor 80

This file is only created when Maya Composite is started interactively, so for example, a render node will not have a toxik.ini.

backburner debugging tips

Tips for debugging Backburner First Steps: - On the licensed workstation launch the Backburner Manager. - On the unauthorized, unlicensed workstations launch the backburner servers. - Start > Programs > Autodesk > Backburner > Server - Do this on all render slaves : - Configure them to point at the manager machine. Here is how: - In the backburner Server windows, choose Edit>General Settings> and disable "Automatic Search" checkbox. Type in the actual name of the Manager machine, click OK, then close and reopen the Server window. - Restart Manager, Server and see if that works. It should show "successful...

How to add a shape node under a transform node

Sometimes shapes can get disconnected from their transform, this can happen accidently or not.  To reparent the shape simply;

1) Open the Outliner

2) Select the shape you want to reparent

3) Press the CTRL key and select the transform node

4) Open the script editor and type in parent -s

This will reparent the shape node under the transform

Autodesk Maya Composite 2010 Hotfix 1

http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/ps/dl/item?siteID=123112&id=14186150&linkID=9242259

Autodesk Maya Composite 2010 Hotfix 1 includes a fix for severe playback speed performance degradation on MacPro machines with hyperthreading (MacPro 4,1).

Mental ray error on Quad i7 processor

python general docs

With Maya 2010 there is a new entry in the regular docs

User Guide > General > Python > Tips and tricks for scripters new to Python

Even not so new scripters may be interested in reading about:

Registering a Python function as a MEL procedure using:
    maya.mel.createMelWrapper()   
    The above is great for using Python functions with the new "Container Rmb Menu" attribute on the container node.
    It also helps work around some of the more difficult callbacks that need to  receive args from Maya.

Using Wing IDE with Maya
Debugging Python scripts in Maya
Custom UI using a Python class

thanks to John Creson for the tip

Maya Composite file formats

Here is a list of supported files that can be imported into Maya Composite (Toxik ) 2010

Format File extension Supported bit depths for imports
Bitmap .bmp 8
Cineon .cin 10
DPX .dpx 8, 10, 16
HDR .hdr 32
IFF .iff 8, 16, 32
JPEG /JFIF .jpg, jpeg 8
Open EXR .exr 16 bit float, 32
Photoshop .psd 8
PICT .pict 8
PNG .png 8
QuickTime .mov 8
SGI .sgi 8
Targa .tga 8
TIFF .tif, .tiff 8, 16, 32

Part 2 || Overriding __str__() for Maya Python Objects

It’s a fabulously day in Toronto, crisp and sunny, I am loving it! J Today I will do my second posting to this posting “Overriding __str__() for Maya Python Objects” from September 14th, 2009. I will talk about how we know in the MMatrix documentation where to read that the operators we need to use are formatted like this (row, column): self(0,0), self(0,1), self(0,2), self(0,3), self(1,0), self(1,1), self(1,2), self(1,3), self(2,0), self(2,1), self(2,2), self(2,3), self(3,0), self(3,1), self(3,2), self(3,3) For this part of the code: #New __str__ function for Making the matrix readable.... def myMatrix_str(self): return "[[%g,%g,%g,%g][%g,%g,%g,%g][%g,%g,%g,%g][%g,%g,%g,%g]]" % (self(0,0), self(0,1), self(0,2), self(0,3),...

Maya composite and media cache

After ending a session the media cache doesn’t get cleared, only the information that is stored in the RAM gets cleared.
The media cache discards stored tiles as it is filled up and needs to make room for newer tiles being created as an artist works.
So if multiple artist are using the same machine it is a very good chance that one artist might clear another artist files stored in the media cache depending on the space allocated for the media cache.

Thanks toKen Larue for his tip