option 2 forces me to use a program like Maya,

No it doesn't. It means you need to use some trivial matrix maths. Using Maya/Max et al, is just over-complicating a trivial problem.

Exactly, I agree.

OpenGL does not specify a default up axis. It depends soley on your camera transform.

Just some nit picking, but you can program OpenGL without any matrices or transforms at all, if you want. OpenGL no longer has a "camera transform" concept, and 'y' is up on the screen as default.

glRotated(90.0,1.0,0.0,0.0); or glRotated(-90.0,1.0,0.0,0.0)

This is deprecated OpenGL functionality, please don't recommend it. And if you would use it anyway, it is not recommended as it use double precision. That may cost a lot of performance.

OpenGL does not specify a default up axis. It depends soley on your camera transform.

Just some nit picking, but you can program OpenGL without any matrices or transforms at all, if you want. OpenGL no longer has a "camera transform" concept, and 'y' is up on the screen as default.

glRotated(90.0,1.0,0.0,0.0); or glRotated(-90.0,1.0,0.0,0.0)

This is deprecated OpenGL functionality, please don't recommend it. And if you would use it anyway, it is not recommended as it use double precision. That may cost a lot of performance.

OpenGL does not specify a default up axis. It depends soley on your camera transform.

Just some nit picking, but you can program OpenGL without any matrices or transforms at all, if you want. OpenGL no longer has a "camera transform" concept, and 'y' is up on the screen as default.