Creating Production-Ready Hero Assets using Mari

Mari, Maya & Gaffer Workflow with Michal Zsigmund

VFX Artist Michal Zsigmund guides artists through the process of using Mari and Gaffer to create stunning, production-ready hero assets for film and TV. Beginning with an exploration of Mari, Michal discusses how to leverage Mari and its Extension Pack to craft high-quality detailed textures, including how to utilize the Smart Mask system that comes with the pack. He then walks through how to export a mesh from Maya using Alembic before diving into Mari’s new Bakery System, introduced in the latest version, which is helpful for baking essential utilities that fuel the Smart Mask system. 

From there, Michal focuses on creating the essential diffuse, roughness, and bump maps, sharing the specific techniques that he uses in production to generate professional maps. Artists will also learn how to transfer masks to create secondary high-frequency bump details. Once the texturing phase is complete, Michal exports the textures and transitions into building out the scene using Gaffer. He breaks down each node within Gaffer – the open-source, node-based lighting and look-dev tool developed by Image Engine (similar to Katana) – and explains how each function fits into the studio pipeline. 

This workshop is designed for intermediate to advanced users with a foundational understanding of texturing and shading workflows.