Hey all,
I am a big fan of reading technical books so I don’t always have to be in front of the screen. My question to you all is : What books did you liked and are important for technical artist? Are there some must read books or is there a book that explaings very well the “x” programming language?
Books about scripting, shaders, tools, programming languages, pipelines, …
Though not strictly a technical book, the Universal Principles of Design by Lidwell, Holden and Butler is essential reading.
We design stuff right? So it’s important to get these fundamentals right.
For example, if you don’t know it check out the Pareto Principle. To paraphrase, 20% of a system is used 80% of the time, that could be the controls in a car, or your GUI for your latest tool, so it’ll give you a visual trend for the organisation of your UI design. Win
Or check out ‘Chunking’ and it’ll change your menu designs. Win
Anything by Bill Buxton, the man is an interaction design genius.
Nice tip Seth, enjoying Bills articles a lot!
Punish the enemies wow gold hot the slaves to resign them. You’ll get 15 in no experience. Then direct up to Garfrost for a fun wow gold engagement.
Are there any good book rigging ?
The Art of Rigging. Actually don’t have a hard copy of book 1 or 2, but those are most definitely cool. Cheap as well.
I also like ‘Art of Rigging’ book. I wouldl ike to recommend ‘Mel scripting for animators’ if you use Maya but you may get ideas from it for other apps.
Autodesk’s new friendly rigging video tutorials are also recommended.
I’m a big fan of ‘Complete Maya Programming’ both the first and the second.
[QUOTE=JayG;6038]I’m a big fan of ‘Complete Maya Programming’ both the first and the second.[/QUOTE]
+1
The first one does a lot to lay out working with Mel and Maya’s API and the second one deals a lot with 3D math and how Maya handles itself.
As someone that has no formal training in writing code (Like I find is the case with a lot of my peers) I really liked “Code Complete” - An awesome book on code construction! Given the scope of most of the day to day tools and projects a TD does, it seems to make sense to spend some time educating yourself here, not just looking at pretty design and patterns 
Ideally a whole TD department would read this book (or similar) and use it as a basis of setting coding standards, doing code reviews etc. I find that many TD’s have very individual coding styles and that the code base at studios are often a pretty mixed bag of tricks.
And how about this one? Amazon.com
Damn, I am a maxuser but it looks that there are no books for rigging in max :s.
Maybe it’s better to make time for learning maya …
I like Python for the absolute beginner and Python for Rookies. Both good reads and not as dry as some other programming books.
[QUOTE=Nysuatro;6066]And how about this one? Amazon.com
Damn, I am a maxuser but it looks that there are no books for rigging in max :s.
Maybe it’s better to make time for learning maya …[/QUOTE]
I’d recommend anything by Brad, but most of those Inspired books tend to be too novice and out of date.
If you’re serious about rigging, learn Maya. If you must rig in Max, get Paul Neale’s DVD’s from CGAcademy. They are YEARS out of date, but still the best resource around.
Digital Lighting and Rendering- best book on lighting, I have come across.
David Perry on Game Design: A Brainstorming ToolBox - simply ammazing…
Stop Staring: Facial Modeling and Animation Done Right - you can’t ignore this one if you are studying facial modeling and rigging.
Paul Neale’s DVD’s - @ Rob, agreed
Jason Schleifer’s Animator Friendly Rigging - totally rules, not for gaming though.
The Illusion of Life: Disney Animation - I know there is nothing technical in it, but its the best damn book on animation. The Bible.
Reading through this book and several others as I work through some computer science classes in my spare time.
Code Complete
The RenderMan Shading Language Guide
Rather interesting book,
This book for XNA/C# (Wrox) is OK at best, IMO, but some good general information.
This one too is “meh” at best as well, though some good general information,
Beginning C++ Through Game Programming
This one on C++ is a little too simplified, IMO
Programming in C
This is the book recommended for the computer science course I’m going through, rather nice, though of course it’s mainly from a procedural approach, but good, low-level information
Thanks Rob, Parts of the book are showing its age now but a large part of it is still very valid… but it does not have as much coding in it as the other books mentioned though by design.
[QUOTE=bclark;6195]Thanks Rob, Parts of the book are showing its age now but a large part of it is still very valid… but it does not have as much coding in it as the other books mentioned though by design.[/QUOTE]
Hmm…Time for a new Edition?
For the record, i STILL have my copy on my bookshelf at work…great book.
Ha, The new edition is Rigging Mentor :0)