Create expansive worlds, complex characters, and dazzling effects

• Bring believable characters to life with engaging animation tools.
  
  
• Shape 3D objects and scenes with intuitive modeling tools in Maya® software.
  
  
• Create realistic effects - from explosions to cloth simulation.
  
  

Create serious effects procedurally with Bifrost for Maya

• A new visual programming environment using dynamic solvers enables you to create blockbuster-worthy effects quickly.
  
  
• Build custom graphs using the Bifrost Graph Editor.
  
  
• Create stunning effects - from snow and sand to dust storms and explosions - with ready-to-use graphs.
  
  

Render your most complex projects with Arnold

• Arnold is built to manage complex characters, scenery, and lighting challenges.
  
  
• Arnold is integrated with Maya, so you can see high-quality previews and iterate changes quickly.
  
  
• Save time with Arnold's artist-friendly UI and simple, intuitive controls.
  
  

Features

Dynamics and effects

Bifrost for procedural effects
A new visual programming environment using dynamic solvers makes it quick and easy to create blockbuster-worthy effects procedurally.

Ready-to-use graphs
From snow to dust storms, create great-looking effects right out-of-the-box with prebuilt graphs.

Bifrost Fluids
Simulate and render photorealistic liquids.

Interactive hair grooming
Generate realistic clumping effects in hair and fur for more natural-looking hair.

Deep adaptive liquid simulation
Simulate high-level details just where you need them with the new adaptive solver for Bifrost liquids.

Bifrost Ocean Simulation System
Create realistic ocean surfaces with waves, ripples, and wakes.

Maya nCloth
Create realistic deformable materials.

Bullet Physics
Create realistic rigid and soft-body simulations.

3D animation

Cached Playback
Faster animation playback in Viewport 2.0 enables artists to review animation right in the viewport and minimizes the need to produce Playblasts.

Geodesic voxel binding
Produce high-quality, production-ready bound characters in less time.

General animation tools
Toolset for keyframe, procedural, and scripted animation.

Time Editor
Make high-level animation edits with a nondestructive, clip-based, nonlinear editor.

Shape authoring workflow
Fine-tune your characters and animation more quickly and easily.

Animation performance
Speed enhancements make your scenes even faster.

Parallel rig evaluation
Get quicker playback and manipulate faster with the integrated performance profiler.

Performance capture
The new Butterworth and Key Reducer filters help you refine animation curves, particularly when using motion capture data.

3D rendering and shading

Beautiful working environment
Arnold improvements make the Viewport 2.0 preview closer to the final Arnold render for better creativity and less wasted time.

Arnold integrated with Maya
Use Arnold RenderView to view scene changes in real time, including lighting, materials, and camera.

Look development with Hypershade
Shade complex scenes more easily.

Color management
Efficient library enables faster, more consistent Boolean operations on polygon geometry.

3D modeling

UV editor workflow, look, and feel
The UV Editor interface has been overhauled, and includes a new UV Toolkit with better tools and functionality.

Revamped sculpting toolset
Sculpt and shape models more artistically and intuitively.

Polygon modeling
Efficient library enables faster, more consistent Boolean operations on polygon geometry.

OpenSubdiv support
Accelerate performance with interactive workflows.

Motion graphics

MASH nodes
The MASH toolset gives you new nodes (curve, signal, world, placer, and more), as well as updates to existing nodes.

3D Type
Create branding, flying logos, title sequences, and other projects that require text.

Improved vector graphics workflow
Import or copy and paste SVG files into Maya.

Motion Graphics toolset
Quickly create complex procedural effects and animations with instanced objects.

Pipeline integration

Pipeline flexibility
Create, customize, and integrate Maya into complex production pipelines more easily.

Scripting and API
Create Maya scripts and write plug-ins in Maya Embedded Language (MEL) or Python scripting language.

Data and scene management tools
Manage large data sets and heavy scenes with specialized tools and workflows.

Scene Assembly tools for smarter data
Create large, complex worlds more easily, and manage production assets as discrete elements.