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Maya for Beginners: Complete Guide to 3D Animation in Maya (Udemy.com)

Learn everything you need for 3D animation in Autodesk Maya: Modeling, Texturing, Lighting, Rigging, Animation, Dynamics

Created by: Video School

Last updated March 2026

Our take

Based on the ratings of 8,648 students, a sample of their written reviews and the syllabus, as the course stood in March 2026. No course pays to be reviewed.

This is a start-to-finish tour of Autodesk Maya built around one project: a Dia de Los Muertos scene with an animated skeleton. The syllabus covers modeling, UVs and texturing, lighting, rigging, keyframe animation, the MASH motion graphics toolkit, and cloth and smoke simulation, across 154 lectures and about 30 hours. It is pitched at complete beginners, and it is the only Maya course among the 3D modeling picks on our site, which are otherwise Blender, Fusion 360 and AutoCAD. If the goal is film or game animation with the industry tool, this is the one to look at.

Lucas Ridley, who worked on Ready Player One, teaches it with Phil Ebiner of Video School. Reviewers like that he explains each tool clearly without repeating himself or talking down, and one says it was their first course and they never got lost. The complaints cluster around pace. Two one-star reviews say he moves too fast for a true beginner and doesn't elaborate enough, and one older review calls his Q&A replies impatient. Some also find the delivery a bit dry or repetitive early on. Those are a small minority: 91 percent of the 8,647 ratings are four or five stars.

Value is good for the length, and the course was refreshed in March 2026, so the interface shown should match current Maya. Learners need a three-button mouse and the 30-day Maya trial, which is a real constraint: Maya is not free after that, unlike Blender. There are no quizzes or assignments, so everything is learned by following along. For anyone set on Maya rather than a free tool, this is an easy recommendation, as long as pausing and rewinding doesn't bother you.

Best forComplete beginners who want Maya specifically, not Blender, and are happy to build one Day of the Dead scene from start to finish.
Skip it ifYou want a slow, hand-holding intro; a couple of one-star reviewers say Lucas moves fast and assumes you can keep up.

Pros

  • Explains each Maya tool clearly without the condescending repetition reviewers dislike in other tutorials
  • One continuous project: a Day of the Dead skeleton scene modeled, textured, rigged, animated and rendered
  • Refreshed in March 2026 and captioned in 20 languages, including Vietnamese
  • About six hours of bonus animation demonstrations plus a looping blob effect mini-course

Cons

  • Two one-star reviewers say Lucas moves too fast and doesn't elaborate enough on the basics
  • No quizzes, assignments or exercises; it is follow-along only
  • Needs a paid Maya licence after the 30-day trial, and a three-button mouse
This course is excellent, well-organized, and very easy to follow. Everything is explained clearly.
Abdulrahman Fathy, a student

Listed as all levels but really for first-time Maya users; anyone past the basics will only want the rigging, animation and FX sections.

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What you will learn

  • You will become comfortable using Autodesk Maya to model, texture, rig, animate, dynamics, light, and render
  • Build and design your own 3D objects
  • Animate your 3D objects with keyframes
  • Modeling, shading, texturing, lighting beautiful designs
  • Rendering your projects for high quality playback
  • Rigging a 3D character for animation
  • Simulating dynamic effects like water, cloth, and smoke
  • You will know how to put together an entire 3D animated scene!

Course content

11 sections · 154 lectures · 30 hours of video 2 articles

  1. 1Introduction to the Maya for Beginners Course 3 free previews5 lectures · 8 min
  2. 2Maya Introduction 2 free previews3 lectures · 25 min
  3. 33D Modeling 1 free preview33 lectures · 6.6 hours
  4. 4Look Development - UV, Shading, Texturing, Lighting24 lectures · 3.6 hours
  5. 5Rigging31 lectures · 3.9 hours
  6. 6Animation24 lectures · 4.2 hours
  7. 7Bonus: Animation Demonstration4 lectures · 5.9 hours
  8. 8FX21 lectures · 4.6 hours
  9. 9Bonus Mini-Course: Looping Blob Effect7 lectures · 33 min
  10. 10Congrats!1 lecture · 2 min

Who it is for

The instructor says it suits

  • We designed this course for complete beginners who want to get started with Autodesk Maya.
  • We designed this course for anyone that wants to learn 3D animation, and the tools used by professional animators in the film industry.
  • We designed this course for beginner Autodesk Maya users who want to take their skills to a more advanced next level.

What you need before you start

  • You should have Autodesk Maya to follow along with the course
  • Autodesk provides a 30-day free trial of Maya from their website
  • 3-button mouse

How it compares

Against the other 545 rated Udemy courses in 3D Modeling on CourseDuck:

  • Rating4.6 out of 5higher than 56% of them
  • Reviews8,648#8 of 546 by number of reviews
  • Length29.9 hourslonger than 94% of them
  • Last updatedMarch 2026more recently than 88% of them

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Course Description

You can do your own 3D animations in Autodesk Maya!

Learn everything you need to know to get started - taught by a Hollywood professional!

As the industry standard 3D animation software, learning Autodesk Maya is a great skill to help you land a job in the film, music and gaming industry. In this course, you'll learn how to create your entire animation from scratch. 

What will you learn?

  • Getting started with Maya and understanding the interface

  • Modeling your own objects and scenes

  • Shading your objects

  • Creating proper UVs

  • Texturing your objects 

  • Lighting your scene and creating shadows

  • Rendering your project

  • Rigging characters to prepare for animations

  • Animating with keyframes

  • Motion graphics animation (MASH) toolkit

  • Simulating dynamic effects like cloth and smoke

  • Putting together an entire scene

Learn by doing real world projects!

Throughout this entire course, you'll be working on a Dia de Los Muertos inspired scene with a complete animated skeleton. By the end of the course, you'll truly be inspired by your own skills, and confident in using Autodesk Maya.

What do you get when you enroll?

  • 25+ hours of easy-to-follow tutorials

  • Bonus animation demonstrations

  • Downloadable project files for every step of the course

  • Premium support to help you as you take the course

Why learn from us?

Lucas Ridley is a professional 3D animator who has worked on Hollywood films such as Steven Spielberg's Ready Player One. His students love him, and we're sure you're going to enjoy this class.

Lucas breaks down the most complicated steps of animating in Autodesk Maya, so that you can easily start animating on your own! 

Phil Ebiner is the founder of Video School Online, and has taught over one million students around the world with our top-rated courses. We only partner with the best instructors, so you'll know that you're getting a great course with this one!

Our 30-day 100% money-back guarantee!

 We want you to be happy. If there's any reason you aren't enjoying the course, and getting what you expected, we'll refund your money.

We can't wait to see you in the course!

Cheers,

Phil + Lucas

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Instructor Details

Video School

Learn creative skills, from absolute beginner to advanced mastery. 

Video School exists to help you succeed in life. Each course has been hand-tailored to teach a specific skill from photography and video to art, design and business.

Whether you’re trying to learn a new skill from scratch, or want to refresh your memory on something you’ve learned in the past, you’ve come to the right place.

Education makes the world a better place. Make your world better with new skills!

Our courses can be watched 24/7 wherever you are. Most are fully downloadable so you can take them with you. You can also view them on mobile devices with the Udemy mobile app.

All courses have a 30-day money-back guarantee so that you can check it out, make sure it’s the right course for you, and get a refund if it’s not!

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Reviews

4.6

8,648 ratings on Udemy

Select a bar to show only those reviews.Select the bar again to show every rating.

By Generation Exodus on 6/24/2026

yes definitely, its still early days but I feel comfortable with the presentation and the delivery is not overbearing like a lot of video tutorials, this is exactly the way it should be presented, clear and concise. a lot of tutorial videos, the person making it, re explains in condescending ways, repeating something they just taught you, when its un needed. this course doesn't have that frustrating delivery method. so great job. looking forward to the rest of the course.

By Jonah Rinberg on 1/15/2026

A bit dry in presentation, but overall nice and beginner-friendly. Appreciate the friendly tone keeping learners from getting overwhelmed by the UI

By Ashvi Thakkar on 10/30/2025

"Good course, but limited support" This course is good overall and covers the topics well. However, the biggest drawback for me was the lack of support when you have doubts there's no one to answer your questions, so you're left to figure things out on your own. Better doubt-clearing support would make this course much stronger.

By Utkarsh Agrahari on 9/21/2025

A couple of areas could benefit from deeper explanation, but the course itself is fantastic. I had trouble with beveling edges—the corners distorted and didn’t look like the instructor’s mesh—but the lessons still gave me a solid foundation. For the price, quality, and breadth of content, this is one of the best beginner Maya courses out there. The structure, clarity, and project-based approach really helped me grow.

By Kseniia Kotliarova on 6/2/2024

It was written that as a beginner 3D artist, who has only taken the first steps on this path a few days ago, I honestly declare: Most of this course made me angry, and the rest of the time I learned what humility is. It was very difficult. The course is very condensed. I had to turn to the internet for almost everything because there was so much information, all very compressed, and I had a lot of questions about how and why. I think that if I weren't so stubborn, I would never have finished this course in my life. My advice: If you are really just starting to try yourself in 3D, start with something simpler. And if your level of English is below average, leave this course alone altogether. However, if you are already a confident beginner, this course might be for you.

By 栩栩栩 on 2/12/2022

Finally finish it after 4 months of study. It is an amazing course overall because it is a well-structured systematic and highly efficient learning material. Takes time to understand everything but the Q&A session helps a lot. Things can be improved: (1) The last few classes about texturing and rendering are rushing (especially rendering). I was expecting a more detailed introduction in the render settings. (2) I see Lucas are not really answering new questions in FX part probably because there are plenty Q&As already. But the problem about the alembic cache export format question does not have an answer in Q&A session, so I suggest still have a look at the new questions when you are free because it took me about 5 days to figure it out. But anyway still an fantastic course, kinda fall in love with self-learning after taking this course. Also you could split this course into 5 or 6 courses and sell them individually but you didn't, so I sincerely appreciate your effort of creating such great course! Definitely 5 stars. Wish you all the best.

By Mathews Joseph on 10/21/2020

Definitely, I recommend every beginner to this course because it is really wonderful course. I could learn many things from this course. The best thing I want to highlight he was very helpful clearing my doubts whenever I am stuck. Yeah, definitely I recommend this course for beginners who want to start to do animation in Maya. Thank you.

By Paulina Gomez Arrieta on 7/30/2020

I started not knowing one bit of Maya or animation in general. After doing this class and really taking my time doing every single step along with the instructor, I can say that I had enough material to enroll to an online animation school, got accepted and now taking classes to become an animator. Thanks a lot for this amazing class and for all of you having doubts, if you put in the hours, it will pay off!!

By Pete on 3/3/2019

I gave this course a 3 star ratings first, and then I changed my mind. I am leaving a 5 stars for the course. I think Lukas has put great effort in this course. I was hoping to learn more about animation but I guess I could just enroll in other classes specifically for animation! Thanks Lukas for the course!

By Subham . on 12/28/2018

I have completed this course. It's been a wonderful journey for me. This course is the best thing that has happened to me in this semester break. This course has everything that is required to be better 3d artist in Maya in all perspective. The instructor Sir, Lucas Ridly is very attentive to every problem one can get into. He responds to every question very precisely. Through out the course I was engaged in what I am doing. It is this course that has made me do well in Autodesk Maya. It was very much enjoyed by me. Thank you Lucas sir for such a great course.

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Overall Score : 92 / 100