3 Reasons I switched from Maya to Blender

[@felixxcatus]

I've mapped one of my mouse side buttons to be middle mouse, using my thumb to navigate has become second nature

[@ArmoredColony]

I imagine it's a lot more comfortable. I saw a guy use the S key to orbit, but that was in 3ds max.

[@vasileiovu6272]

I just checked emulate 3-button mouse option in Blender so no more middle mouse button navigation needed. Also Blender is pretty awesome to work with a graphic tablet.

[@ArmoredColony]

Oh really, how do you navigate when you enable that option? And I agree. The less buttons you have to click on the stylus the more comfortable it is to use, but I feel it's the opposite when using a mouse. Whatever the case, I change most things to Blender Navigation if the option exists, to make going from one app to another more seamless.

[@vasileiovu6272]

@@ArmoredColony ctrl+alt+LMB to zoom, shift+alt+LMB to pan and alt+LMB to rotate. I know that you can assign the same in other softwares, except CAD software like Fusion 360 and Plasticity, they have only presets to choose from. With a graphic tablet it's better to have a small sized if used for modeling, i have a medium sized tablet and a laptop, so it's not that comfortable, but it was quite nice when using with a Desktop PC. With this emulate 3D mouse button option and graphic tablet, you don't have to click buttons on stylus and it feels more natural to your hand.

[@andreyradq6944]

TY SO MUCH for the video "Fixing Seams in your Normal Map" you made 4 years ago. I whould never notice that i need to unlock normals and remark hard,soft edges -_- The bake looks much better now

[@ArmoredColony]

I gotchu bro

[@macronomicus]

The keymap feature is great in blender. I recommend putting 3d view rotate as well as zoom to selection on thumb mouse buttons, if your mouse has them, I agree about middle mouse going out fast lol. There are multiple for each if you search, since laptops have trackpad you can switch those worthless ones to your new custom keys, that way the default middle mouse etc can remain too.

[@ArmoredColony]

@@macronomicus that's a good idea. I already have zoom to region on a side button (I love to control the zoom by drawing a rectangle and zooming into that shape).

[@charbelchagoury3755]

Can you update your blender maya script? The lattice tool isn't working properly on the latest blender verion

[@ArmoredColony]

I noticed that problem and released an update but I think that fixing it for 4.1 broke it in older versions of Blender, basically reversing the problem. The description should have a GitHub link to the latest addon update. Let me know if it helps or not

[@charbelchagoury3755]

@@ArmoredColony awesome, thank you, I'll try it out, really appreciate it

[@charbelchagoury3755]

@ArmoredColony just tried it and it's working perfectly, thank you much appreciated

[@joege0rge]

i only clicked on this vid for the Fire Prelate armor nice to see my interests continually merging

[@ArmoredColony]

Haha. Made me laugh when I put it on. My character went from skinny to obese in a split second. Figured it might make someone else laugh.

[@luisroden1631]

The mech design is fire! Also, I set the Blender interface theme to "Maya", best of both worlds : )

[@ArmoredColony]

LoL, and thanks. It's an old project, I just needed some filler video. I was going for a Destiny ghost type thing.

[@blind8000ify]

Thnkz for the Video! The recycle selections its awesome! Do u have any plan to do a course to switch from maya?

[@ArmoredColony]

Thanks for watching. You think people need such a course?

[@blind8000ify]

@@ArmoredColony Yes! like me i try to switch to blender like 2 times but was too complex to learn everything without a guide, even the terminology its different and if u mess up any hotkey ur screw the hole blender functionality. I have a script for bevel vertex but only works on the corners not the inside vertex with faces arround... i try to replicate ur bevels steps on maya and its a pain...

[@ArmoredColony]

@@blind8000ify I wouldn't mind making such a course, but it's not something I can suddenly create in an instant. Also, I'm in the middle of creating other courses so I wouldn't recommend waiting for what I make. Transitioning from one software to another will always be frustrating (maybe blender most of all) but don't let that become your excuse for not doing what you want to do. If I could learn blender then you can do it as well. If you don't like one blender tutorial, there's hundreds of others you might enjoy more, just keep trying.

[@louissnuggleton4544]

any chance you could do a tutorial series for people that want to switch to blender?

[@ArmoredColony]

What are you switching from?

[@louissnuggleton4544]

@@ArmoredColony used maya first, then tried max, then modo and now blender. got hard ops/boxcutter, mesh machine, machinetools, gob. downloaded your toolkid (which is hella nice btw) and am switching some keys in your files. really just looking for blenders advanced modeling workflows (mostly subd, flatten faces, selection tricks, bevel/chamfer mechanics and creasing capabilities) . most blender tutorials really focus on this middle poly workflow or try to teach you how to crawl. edit: forgot the most important thing. quick ways to change pivot position and alignment

[@ArmoredColony]

@louissnuggleton4544 haha, glad it's useful. Feel free to change whatever you can. I originally made my addon to suit my needs, so I'm happy you were able to switch the keys to fit your needs a little better. I have a flatten script somewhere in there (Armored Flatten I think I called it). I remember trying to script something similar to Maya's dynamic pivot; I think I made something basic and discarded it because I wasn't experienced enough with scripting in blender yet. I can probably make something better now. I also miss Maya's Weld Tool; should probably make that too.

[@louissnuggleton4544]

@@ArmoredColony god. if you make mayas cut tool and weld tool ill pay up to 30 bucks (individually) for it. i miss the cut tool the most really

[@ArmoredColony]

I believe you. Maya didn't have a lot of tools, but the few it did have were really good.

[@mr.j7899]

Finally someone who's not a Maya or Blender fanboy. Both of them has it's pros and cons. Blender is amazing for modeling, but the shortcut keys really annoy me. But I'm sure I can get used to it if I try hard enough. The only thing that Autodesk offers new for modeling in Maya 2025 is the Smart Extrude. You be the judge.

[@ArmoredColony]

Tell me about it. I was actually using Plasticity at this very moment XD Whatever tool fits our current needs.

[@A-n-t-o-n-y]

I've been using MMB for navigation for years in several CADs , but I've found Maya Alt-navigation is much better. Set it in Modo, and now in Blender.

[@ArmoredColony]

I like Maya Nav because it's really comfortable when you're using a mouse (I also set my Modo to Maya navigation), but I find it annoying when you need to use a stylus, for instance, when sculpting. Because sculpting is an actual thing in blender, I ended up getting used to it completely unintentionally.

[@michalborowiecki7338]

Hey! I love the toolkit addon! Long time ago I tried to match my blender ui to Vitaly's softimage, I failed. Then I discovered your channel, got the addon and man, these scripts are gamechanger. I really like this fast workflow and custom keybindins. I saw you're using recently released Blender 4.1. Is there a chance you update the addon due to changes in smoothing?

[@ArmoredColony]

Just updated it on Github and Gumroad. There's now 2 Autosmooth scripts: the new one for Blender 4.1 and the older way which I renamed to 'Autosmooth (Legacy)' If you don't have the addon with URL buttons in the preferences you can get it here: github.com/ArmoredColony/ARMORED-Toolkit or armoredcolony.gumroad.com/l/toolkit

[@SW-lw6mt]

I was so reluctant to switch from Maya to Blender too but now I can't go back to Maya for modelling - I do really miss using Arnold and xgen though.

[@ArmoredColony]

I miss the Blinn material. It's so dumb but I like how they looked in the viewport :p I didn't miss Arnold because it didn't have GPU rendering originally.

[@SW-lw6mt]

@@ArmoredColony Agree about the Blinn, I do find the Maya viewport (without gradient) easier on the eyes for some reason. I like realistic skin and hair renders, so nice in Arnold, especially hair.

[@ArmoredColony]

@@SW-lw6mt yeah I switched from the blue gradient to the solid gray as well. I try to do the same across every app

[@axl5771]

the only thing i miss from Maya is how fast i could place or orient pivot point to change mesh then. Yes, in Blender there is "create orientation", "g"+"g" and 3d cursor but its not dat fast and ez to use

[@SW-lw6mt]

There's an addon called Friendly Pivot, not free but very handy.

[@ArmoredColony]

@@SW-lw6mt I thought you were going to say, not free but friendly :p

[@ArmoredColony]

The new Smart Extrude looks fun too.

[@AephVeyniker]

​​​@@ArmoredColony It's not that great, SMART EXTRUDE is half baked in comparison to 3ds max, doesn't work on slanted faces leaves a whole lot of mess. Even 3ds max smart extrude can fail on medium complexity surfaces. But when they work smart extrude is awesome. But overall not much fun about it since deleting vertices in Maya is a problem in of itself. blender punchit add-on substitute only works on subtracting in comparison and only on single connected 'island' of faces AND it can't be cyclic, max doesn't have those limitations and Maya lags heavily with smart extrude when selecting a couple of faces.

[@ArmoredColony]

So everything is terrible but Max is least terrible. Gotcha. The new features always look so nice in the trailers.

[@ventiladordesuco]

I think it's a combo, I always wanted to use realtime viewport and oh boy I didn't expect cycles and evee being so nice to me. Plus all the free add-ons that come packaged with Blender already plus the easy of use of the shader editor. I mean, Maya is great if you are a studio and can afford your custom tooling and Maya itself, also, you can and will buy everything else Maya isn't great at. Is there a better solution for UV? I'm in! Sculpting, painting, oh, there's 200 dollar per seat addon? Bring it... So, yeah, I know Maya fan boys are just people that have worked on the induatry and can have it all, but if you really think about it, Blender is taking on Houdini, Zbrush, After Effects, you name it. It's not perfect, but can be very powerful to do some damage.

[@ArmoredColony]

Agreed. It's so nice to have software that is so complete, and it's always exciting to see what's new in blender. I remember having a fun time UVing in Modo but that was a long time ago; although I think it was mostly because Modo has macros you can create and hotkey right then and there (no scripting or anything). I think more than fanboying it's the time and difficulty it takes to transition to other software. All the apps are so different from eachother, so it's hard to fault people who want to stick to what they know.

[@abmubbumba]

I tried your points in maya 2025.2 and they are still valid. I just payed over 1K though to keep the subscription for current projects alive ... painfull.

[@ArmoredColony]

:O thanks for letting me know. Plus, I do not miss Maya's loading times. On my pc it used to be like 25 seconds before I could do anything, and that was with an NVME drive.

[@illia.m]

oh you are alive

[@ArmoredColony]

Yeah, I was playing call of duty

[@MetalGearMk3]

Only reason to switch is because Autodesk, enough said.

[@ArmoredColony]

It might be dumb but it's the truth.

[@grimmcreeper192]

You’re not, don’t worry

[@grimmcreeper192]

Blender is so much faster than Maya and has more meaningful updates. I honestly don’t see any need for using maya as opposed to Blender when factoring the price.

[@ArmoredColony]

I came to the same conclusion. I do miss Maya's dynamic gizmo from time to time; and the new Smart Extrude looks like fun (like Blender's Punch it addon but as a native tool).

[@Damian_DH]

I use the 3 of them but Maya is the one i hate the most. 3ds Max and Blender are similar the switching doesnt hurt too much but Maya... man u go try to do a grid fill on Maya... the best u could get is a Poke and be happy with that.

[@ArmoredColony]

Man, they still don't have a native grid fill? And that's why I left. They take forever to add useful things that everyone else already has.

[@Damian_DH]

@@ArmoredColony This is what happen when u are too comfy with no competition over the years with an already stablished workflow that lasted for more than 10 years. 2024 and these dudes still using F9 F10 and F11 shortcuts for vertex edge and face selection who tf use those F's man. Another thing is they dont have inset is an extrude with an offset.... that wasnt family friendly when i was navigating through the tools at all. My bosses repeat like dinosaurs "Maya is industry standard" and i was like yea i know mf but u are teaching how to model and this software is not optimal for poly modelling u have better options like Blender even 3Ds max is better.

[@ArmoredColony]

@@Damian_DH surprised they don't let you use Max either. But I guess if they're paying the bills you gotta do whatever they say.

[@Damian_DH]

@@ArmoredColony I asked them the same question wouldnt be better to use MAX Cat system for beginner rigging is super handy and its interface is more family friendly even the edit poly is easy to understand. The reply i got was something like Only the Indians and the Arabs use Max, "Maya is industry standard". I was like Bitch i swear...

[@ArmoredColony]

XD

[@MetalGearMk3]

Wait until you discover Plasticity hehe

[@ArmoredColony]

Already have. Used it to create a rough base for these: armoredcolony.com/b/robocaps Which I detailed further in Blender because I wanted a subD model.

[@navidpourghanbari7371]

people are still modeling these days? is it not better to sculpt, retopo then bake details instead of just modeling from A to Z? 😒

[@ArmoredColony]

Depends on what you want to make. I do prefer sculpting, but for super clean subD meshes, sometimes you just gotta poly model.