How Do You Activate Bake Animation in Maya?

To activate bake animation in Maya, follow these steps:

Select the object(s) you want to bake the animation for.
Go to the Animation menu and choose "Bake Simulation".
In the Bake Simulation Options window, select the desired settings.
- Start and End Frames: Specify the animation range you want to bake.
- Bake Attribute: Choose the attribute you want to bake (e.g., translate, rotate, scale).
- Sample By: Determine the sampling rate (e.g., at every frame, every other frame).
Click "Bake".

Maya will then create a new animation curve for the selected attribute(s), effectively baking the simulation into the object's animation.

Practical Insights

Baking animation can be helpful for optimizing scene performance. If your scene has complex simulations or dynamic effects, baking them into animation curves can make rendering faster.
Baking animation can also be used to create more control over your animation. By baking a simulation, you can easily adjust the animation curves and create more precise movements.

You can bake a cloth simulation to create a smooth animation of a flowing cloth.
You can bake a rigid body simulation to create a realistic animation of objects colliding.