How to set up Arnold cameras in the Maya user interface

Maya is a 3D modeling software that provides various tools for creating 3D models, from simple shapes to complex organic forms. In this article, let’s discover how to set up Arnold cameras in the Maya user interface with iRender!

Maya is a 3D modeling software that provides a multitude of tools for creating 3D models, from simple shapes to complex organic forms. Additionally, it has an advanced animation system that lets you add movement, deformations, and other effects to make your models come to life.

Arnold is the production-quality render engine that comes included with Maya.  Arnold is an advanced Monte Carlo ray tracing renderer built for the demands of feature-length animation and visual effects movies.

So how to set up Arnold cameras in the Maya? Let’s explore now!

To change the Arnold camera settings, you need to use the Arnold tab in Maya’s Attribute Editor for the camera object (make sure you scroll down past the standard Maya ‘Camera Attributes’ tab to the tab marked Arnold and expand it).

Camera Motion Blur enables you to turn camera motion blur on or off. ‘Use Global Settings’ will use the value set in the motion blur tab from the MtoA global render settings. This option can be useful when there are multiple cameras in a scene that may or may not require motion blur. 

Using Global Shutter (enabled by default) signifies that the camera should use the values from the Render Settings, in the motion blur tab. When you want to set a specific shutter in the camera, you can disable Use Global Shutter and then it will be taken into account.

Let’s explore other options for setting up Arnold cameras in the Maya below!

This cyl_camera node provides a cylindrical view, which is useful for creating panoramic views. A common use of this camera projection is to allow the creation of environment maps (in ‘lat-long’ or latitude-longitude format) for later use as reflection maps or for environment lighting. Note that Depth of Field is not available for this camera type.

• Horizontal Fov: Controls the field of view in the horizontal axis. 

• Vertical FOV: Controls the field of view in the vertical axis.

• Projective: The Arnold cylindrical camera can operate in two modes.

• • • With ‘projective’ set to off, all rays have a common origin – they are cast from the center of the cylinder. In the vertical direction, the camera acts as a pinhole camera, and in the horizontal direction, it acts as a spherical camera. 
    • With ‘projective’ set to on, the camera is more of a true cylindrical camera; in the vertical direction the camera acts as an orthographic view, and in the horizontal direction it acts as a spherical camera.

This fisheye_camera node provides a fish-eye lens-type view. The depth of field and aperture controls are similar to the standard perspective camera, but the fisheye camera also provides control over the field of view.

This ortho_camera node provides an orthographic view. There is no perspective, so objects do not get smaller as they get farther away from the camera.

This perp_camera node provides a perspective view, like a regular camera. This is the ‘standard’ camera type that you will probably use most often. In addition to a normal perspective, this camera type also provides controls for the depth of field, and the focal length of the camera, as well as controls, to do with the aperture of the camera. This allows various camera lens effects, including bokeh, to be simulated.

See more: What’s new in Maya 2025.2?

• Radial Distortion: Radial distortion, with negative and positive values resulting in a pincushion and barrel distortion respectively. Real-world lenses can show such distortion when using, for example, a very short focal length or a high zoom.

• Radial Distortion Type: A lens radial distortion compatible with the 3ds Max physical camera. It is selectable through persp_camera.radial_distortion_type cubic_inverse. The classic cubic type is still the default. 

• Lens Tilt Angle: Controls lens tilt angles concerning the projection plane. The horizontal and vertical angles are specified in degrees. This is useful in architectural renderings to compensate for perspective transformation for vertical lines. 
• Lens Shift: Shifts the lens position. This is useful to recenter the subject after using tilt. The shift is given in normalized screen coordinates: +1 will move the frame center to the right or bottom edge. Note that lens shift will affect the render in a different way than screen_window, notably with distortions or vignetting since one is a lens effect and the other just selects the part of the rendered image that will be output. 

The spherical camera is a camera lens that has a spherical appearance. A common use of this camera projection is to allow the creation of environment maps (in spherical map format) for later use as reflection maps or for environment lighting.

To get the full spherical range, the camera’s screen window must be set to [-1,-1] to [1,1]. Note that the same mapping could be achieved in the cylindrical camera with careful setting of the Horizontal FOV, Vertical FOV, and Projective parameters but the spherical camera is provided for convenience.

This is a generic VR camera implementation. It features two cameras offset by a distance with a specific 360º projection. Its main advantages are:

• • • It works with any scene component that can be rendered in an offline renderer: meshes, hair, particles, volumetrics and complex shading networks.
    • An easy learning curve to begin to create VR content. Just add the VR camera to your existing project.
    • Modest hardware requisites to reproduce the content. Any platform that can reproduce a video with the required projection is fine to experience the generated content.
    • Content that is easy to distribute either as a video file or via video streaming. It can be reproduced using dedicated software or an app or with web standards like WebGL, or WebVR. It also works with Google and Facebook 360 3D videos.

In contrast, VR camera has some disadvantages

• • • Poles: By default, poles will show very evident artifacts. This requires you to adjust the stereoscopic effect for each scene and smooth it near the poles, thus diminishing the effect.
    • Tilt: Due to the way the stereoscopic effect is done, tilting your head will destroy the stereoscopic perception.
    • Parallax: When you move your head along any axis, there is a change in the viewpoint that the offline VR scene can’t take into account. This can diminish the immersion of the experience since we can only react to head rotations.

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Image source and reference: help.autodesk.com