Maya Shading Faceted or Too Smooth
Soften and harden edges
Also known as: Maya soften edge · Maya harden edge · Maya smooth shading · Maya hard edges · Maya normals angle · Maya faceted look
Quick answer
In Maya, a mesh looks faceted when its edges are hard and too smooth when they are soft. Select the edges or the whole object and use Mesh Display > Soften Edge to make shading smooth, or Harden Edge to make it crisp, and set the edges between faces that should look sharp to hard. For control by angle, use Mesh Display > Set Normal Angle. Smoothing the preview with 3 is not the same as softening normals.
How to fix it
Soft and hard edges are exported with the model as smoothing information, so set them deliberately before sending a game model to an engine. Hard-surface models usually have hard edges on their bevels' borders and soft shading across flat surfaces, or use weighted normals for cleaner results. Check the model in the engine, and bake normal maps with the same edge settings you export.
