@Seamonkey - Thanks again - that worked like a charm.
@Cekuhnen - I’m beginning to see what you mean by powerful, the control one can have over …everything is really HUGE.
JoOngle
also you can click that small box icon in the menue instead of selecting the word of the command. for example extrude has such a small box next to the name extrude face!
I never had issues with the IPR. man do il ove that one. Blenders preview renderer is such a dream. I love that they made scrip cycles so it only refreshes shader information instead of geometry but in contrast to Maya you can move the cam and that gest updated as well. thats is so usefull for shader creating. big thangs to the coders for that.
however maya can crash when you DO NOT CLEAN UP the IPR FOLDER.
yes maya basicaly exports the scene for the IPR and after some time you can collect more than few MBs of data.
No - not yet, who knows - in the future maybe, if they want me that is?
Cleaning up that IPR folder - got it! Thanks for the tip.
(going to hit the sack now… better be early and ready for the long journey ahead tomorrow)
Thanks everyone for your help during this weekend, it has made it possible for me
to put some of the routines back in control so I’m somewhat prepared to model stuff
right from the start. Thanks 
Nighty…
I guess you will learn them soon enough, but maybe handy to know.
F8 toggle edit object mode
F9 edit mode with vertex edit (no toggle)
F10 edit mode with edge edit (no toggle)
F11 edit mode with face edit (no toggle)
(and no F12 is not render 
)
F3 Modeling Buttons mode.
Set Polygons > Tool options > [x] Keep faces together if you want single verteces extruded out of a single vertex.
On selected face ctrl-RMB gives a selection wheel.
shift-RMB gives an tool wheel (extrude etc).
W,E,R stands for M,R,S and Q is selection pointer
4,5,6,7 shading modes. (The blender Z’s)
And … g repeats last action. (spacebar -> recent commands gives a nice list)
Cool, thanks for the tip! Sure come in handy
My first day on the job:
ARGH! It was a rendermonkey assignment. My agent was even
more surprised than me because he explained it would be
a designer/modeling position.
…when all it was - was sitting there and splitting render-layers
ALL DAY…all week! And that I travel 7 hours each day to do…
Oh well…live and learn.
be happy, better start slow that to fast!
for a newby maya can be quite a monster!
Lol, you have an agent? Does he work on a commission basis or do you have to pay him a regular fee? Also, does he find you much work?
To be honest, one way or another you are going to end up doing a repetitive task and no matter if it’s modelling, animating or whatever, you will likely hate it at times.
Sometimes it’s better starting with the jobs with less responsibility. You don’t want to be the guy that 10-20 people rely on to get a job done and find you can’t deliver. I’ve been there and it kinda sucks.
If it pays ok and gets you in the door then it’s a start. Nonetheless, there are very few jobs I’d spend 7 hours daily travelling to do. Do you sleep on the journey? When are you supposed to get any time to yourself?
Nah, I’d either move closer or ditch the job, assuming you haven’t done so already. The most you should be prepared to travel to a job in a day is 2 hours return.
Can’t you set up your own business and network? I found some local guys where I live and the amount of contacts I get access to is amazing. I never even thought there were so many companies locally - some international, who pay lots of money for doing pretty basic stuff like programming websites and things. I’m getting into all sorts of things from film to flash animation to website design. 3D has to go on the backburner sometimes unfortunately but you just have to go where the money is and hope you have the free time to keep doing what you like.
The important thing is contacts (no doubt why you have an agent) and it’s weird because even though the people I work beside don’t really deal with any 3D stuff, their clients are often interested in it. So rather than think about whether or not a job allows you to do what you like, think about whether or not it will allow you to do it indirectly. Kind of like how you might make friends with an ugly chick just to sleep with her much more attractive friend ;).
Here’s my 2 cents. This is reeeaaally basic stuff that I’m sure there going to teach you, but just in case they don’t:
Hold down the space bar to bring up the “hot bar”. Basically this puts menus with all the commands available to you next to your cursor. For me this is faster than using icons on the side of the screen (or even worse, the menu at the top of the screen). Still not as fast as pure hotkeys, but better than nothing.
The “g” key is your best friend. Pressing g repeats the last command. I’ve found this to be very useful for modelling.
Goodluck! I found that picking up Maya was pretty easy after learning Blender, and I’m sure you will too. One thing that still gets me is when I go into blender mode while working in maya. Its pretty entertaining for anyone who happens to be watching at the time, but embarrasing for me :o
JoOngle:
Try 3DBuzz.com.
They have a lot of GREAT FREE video tutorials, and their video training is awesome!!
Many of their “VTMs” are free, though some require you to be a member sponser, which is only $35 a month.
In your case, I would get the first Maya VTMs, then it would probably be good for you to be a member sponsor, so you can download the other two Maya training issues.
Good luck 
(BTW: Go to the upper navigation bar and click “Video Training” and follow the links :))
@Cekuhnen, Yes - agree, and after all - a job is a job.
@osxrules - Well - sort of an agent, because these days
companies prefer to hire extra hands during high-stress periods
to get jobs done on time, so there are lots of companies recruiting
“reserves” that they can have in their archives to offer their clients
and I got hired by such a company, but only for a week for now.
It was sort of a “test” week - If I performed well for their client
I’d probably be hired for other clients or the same client later on.
As for moving - the client I work for is so big that they own their
own apartments everywhere so next time they’ll give me a room
for a small fee - if they should decide for me to return for more
jobs. This of course - is ideal.
As for setting up my own business, I’ve thought about that but
found it to be too much work for too little pay. Several of my
Friends in Denmark (Pretty good artists!) have been freelancing
for many years - and the first thing they did was run for a
position in ANY company the first chance they got - simply
because freelancing is a nightmare. 60 % paperwork is killing
the creativity - and all for a measly amount of “barely enough
to make a living” penny. Heh…even the taxation authorities
of this country advised me to get “hired” on projects instead
and get an ordinary project salary rather than start my own
company, it simply doesn’t pay!
@Sketchy - Thanks for the tip (and yes…you’re right about that, pretty
much run around the basics already - but there’s room for lots of more
stuff to learn) But after the assignment - I’m straight back to Blender,
A lot of people there where totally amazed of how far Blender has come.
(And yes - right again…I too go into Blender mode…and press G to move
an object instead of the maya shortkeys for translations.
Oh…and Maya isn’t that hard…or any other 3d program if you’ve
done 3d for many years, it’s just a matter of finding the tools you’re
used to - adapt - and learn some more. Nothing more - really.
It only took me a few hours on Monday and the job I was set to do
got pretty routine back after…it require me to load scenes, select
objects, group them, layer them, render their shading features into
separate layers, saving and naming and numbering these. This
takes quite a lot of fiddling around in Maya because you have to
find out how these objects are related to each other and separate
them properly. Adjust material properties, separate material qualities
changing the render-environment, check-on-resolution schematics
to keep everything on printed standards,
Quite a lot of work, especially the “forever-process”
of naming them by object, type and number. Both new layers and file names.
@Laughing Cheese - yeah - Already did that last weekend, I spent
every day (friday, Saturday, Sunday) Plugging video-tutorials and
reading tutorials. Fairly easy, but time consuming as I still think Blender
has a faster modeling workflow (way faster).
(PS: Maya people talk a lot about wings)
hey the outliner will help you a lot with finding objects and understanding their relationships!
Yep, thats the one I use. (To multiselect objects like specular lamps) to export them for use in special scenes etc. Also to multiselect object-parts that form bigger objects etc.