Rob Jones:
Its imperitive that you set up a new project when creating a new Maya file - this will then act as a database for your project where you can keep your textures and scene files and all renders. Its a lot easier to access than a messy hard drive if you name it correctly.Clean up your Hyper Graph and Outliner as you go along - this allows you to render in Layers more easily. Big objects eg - houses etc as one group under another Group of Houses. Not only does it make the file run faster but if its not in shot you don't need it THERE at that time.
Referencing files allow you to look at other peoples work to the latest save each time you open it up. This will save you importing it each time and then deleteing and importing and deleteing and OMG LOOK AT THAT HYPERGRAPH! Its easier with Referencing however I need to experiment with that.
Rendering in Layers makes you file run smoother if its not all visible AND its possible to tweak Occlusion layers, specular, diffuse, shadows, lights, anything on its own layer!!!
