Alkesh Nanavaty shows how to set up a simple VFX shot by projecting and baking textures.

Projecting textures is common when setting up visual effects shots, yet it is only one of the components you’ll need in certain situations. Take, for instance, if you have a background plate and you’d like to apply simulation to some of the geometry. You don’t want the texture projection to appear to slide.

Check out this tutorial from Alkesh Nanavaty, who shows a workflow for projecting and baking textures in Maya, working with SynthEyes, Maya, and Nuke for compositing the completed shot. “In compositing, you can create further derbies, smoke, dust, etc., to augment the shot as required.”