# arnold materials Maya has a set of default materials you can use to build a variety of basic surfaces. Options include Lambert, Blinn, and Phong. You can learn more about how to [[materials - add new|add a new material in Maya]]. A more complex material system called Arnold ships natively within Maya. Arnold has many more parameters and options for building professional-level materials. With the increased power comes increased complexity. This page is just an introduction to the tools. I encourage you to explore deeper. Material parameters for both Arnold and default Maya can be edited in the Attribute Editor however more complex work needs to be done in the [[materials - hypershade editor|Hypershade Editor]]. Remember, you will need at least one Arnold light to illuminate the scene and will need to render with Arnold to see the materials correctly. --- ## aistandardsurface material A good starting place for is the **aiStandardSurface** material. It is a basic material with a ton of tweakable options to create anything from glass to metal to plastic. ### adding aiStandardSurface 1. Right-Click on an object and select **Assign New Material…** at the bottom of the menu 2. In the pop-up menu, choose **Arnold >Shader** in the left-column 3. Choose **aiStandardShader** in the right column ### editing aiStandardSurface The default shader is a shiny, reflective light-gray color. There are a ton of options you can tweak in the Attribute Editor. Here are a few important ones… - color - surface color or image texture - transmission - transparency for making glass, water, etc. - emissions - glow effect for making fire, lights, etc. ## presets Maya ships with a good selection of preset Arnold **aiStandardSurface** materials so you don't have to start from nothing. These materials can be used as-is or as a starting point to build your own materials. After applying an **aiStandardSurface** material to an object, go to the top of the Attribute Editor and press the **Presets** button. A pop-up will appear with different materials. You can apply a material at Full Strength or at a percentage that will blend with the existing material settings. Maybe you want to add just a bit of chrome to your existing plastic material? > [!info]- maya materials > > there are some pretty good Arnold materials pre-installed. here are places to find more more. These all have free materials, however several have paid plans with more materials available. > > - <https://freepbr.com/t/maya/> > - <https://texturebox.com/free> > - <https://visualact.com/product-category/free-materials/> > - <https://docs.arnoldrenderer.com/display/A5AFMUG/Material+Library> > - <https://matlib.gpuopen.com/main/materials/all> materialX - does this work with maya? > - <https://polyhaven.com/> - for HDRI lights, textures, etc. --- Learn more… - [Academic Phoenix Plus](https://www.academicphoenixplus.com/) has an exceptional video series explaining Arnold materials in-depth - [textures.com](https://www.textures.com/library) has amazingly detailed models and Arnold textures - [Denoise Arnold Renders](https://docs.arnoldrenderer.com/display/A5AFMUG/Arnold+Denoiser) is a tutorial on how to clean up the grainy look of your renders --- tags: #3d #maya #resources home: [[! 3d modeling- maya]]