C4D and Renderman ?

[ThirdEye]

It will not be possible till someone writes a connection.

[Ikari]

there is a beta-stated RIB-exporter for cinema4d, its not really fast and, as i'm working with pixie (opensource REYES-renderer like Renderman) i use it quite often for exporting geometry, aka polygons, but didnt use it for anything more, so mapping etc. is just...luck ;)

but, this is better than nothing

http://savards.fuzehost.com/ribexporter/download.htm

[Galo]

Lame, cause C4D deserves renderman, im gonna send maxon an email, maybe they keep it in mind for R9 :-) thanks for the link.

peace
Galo

[jono338]

I think the point is most people think that Cinema's renderer is already pretty spiffy, and FAST, so why bother ...

Cheers,

[Galo]

Cause it's almost an industry standard and you can win a lot of clients by implementing this feauture.

[ThirdEye]

Originally posted by Galo
Cause it's almost an industry standard and you can win a lot of clients by implementing this feauture.

Usually the studios that need this feature are able to code their own connection, if it hasn't been developed it means it hasn't been necessary so far. The only official connection to prman is Maya's (MayaTORenderman) which has been developed by Pixar. There are a few other connections but most of them have been developed in house by some major studios (for example Maxman and Mayaman by Animal Logic). Probably Softimage|XSI has been connected by a few studios to prman but i have no news about that.

[jono338]

I would have thought it was easier to get clients by doing good work ... I don't think Pixar hired Victor Navone because he was using Hash Animator, and if you're arguement is correct, they made a big mistake because he WAS using Hash Animator.

[Ikari]

i think, side effects' Houdini does have an avaible, official conncection to Prman...read this somewhere

[ThirdEye]

Dunno if HDN's connection is official, i know it's very good for sure. After all HDN's standard renderer, Mantra, is a REYES renderer if i'm not wrong.

[tjnyc]

Mantra is a hybrid renderer. From what I have heard it produces quality on par with PRMAN if not in speed. It is also great for volumetrics and smoke renderings. It also supports a connection to Mental Ray.


Cheers,

[stew]

If it's just about a plain RIB export, many programs have that included (Wings3D, Blender, Poser, Pixels:3D (hips with a REYES renderer that reads RIB), just to name a few). Writing a basic RIB export is straightforward and not very hard. If you want shader translation as well, then things are getting more complicated.

[dantea]

houdini also exports lights, shader assignments, etc...
with 6.5, it has a RSL shader builder as well.

[Gendou]

i'd love to find a good learning book for houdini. it's particle and animation functionality are mind-blowing. I like the interface and it's way of thinking.. but it seems that getting to grips with the tools is the hardest part. I've got to dig back in to the 3dbuzz Hdn lessons.. if anyone knows a book or good tutorial reference (other than vizlab and odforce) please post some links.

regards,
-gendou

[rubyscooby]

We are currently in production on a major motion picture and we developed a renderman interface for Cinema 4D r9 which we are using at this moment. We are rendering with air but it also works with PRman. We needed it to intergrate crowds generated in massive with cinema 4D scenes and render it all together.

ruby

[ThirdEye]

We are currently in production on a major motion picture and we developed a renderman interface for Cinema 4D r9 which we are using at this moment. We are rendering with air but it also works with PRman. We needed it to intergrate crowds generated in massive with cinema 4D scenes and render it all together.

ruby


it'd be nice if you could spend some more words about its capabilities if possible, and if it'll be an opportunity for everyone (payable or free) once the film is done. Great news though.

[danb]

it'd be nice if you could spend some more words about its capabilities if possible, and if it'll be an opportunity for everyone (payable or free) once the film is done. Great news though.

I second that. If this were made commercial or free this would be some pretty big news for cinema 4d. I think it would actually open more peoples eyes to cinema 4d as an alternative solution to max, xsi, or maya for renderman renders. Keeping my fingers crossed.

[rubyscooby]

Well let's see.

1. Has an interface that is fully intergrated in cinema which allows you to choose the renderer. (AIR or PRman)

2. It also allows you to bring in other RIB files created in Mayman, Massive or Houdini and lets you render it with you scence.

3. Full GI control

4. FAST!

5. Low memory usage

6. Displacement mapping supported along with DOF and motion blur

Everything works to a certain degree to this point. Some C4D noise types still need to be intergrated and renderman shader interface still needs some polishing to make it easier to use. We are also still working on the compositing tag to give externally created RIB archives channel ID's.

I am sure it will become available eventually.

ruby

[lllab]

wow this sounds cooool!

cheers
lllab

[danb]

Well let's see.

1. Has an interface that is fully intergrated in cinema which allows you to choose the renderer. (AIR or PRman)

2. It also allows you to bring in other RIB files created in Mayman, Massive or Houdini and lets you render it with you scence.

3. Full GI control

4. FAST!

5. Low memory usage

6. Displacement mapping supported along with DOF and motion blur

Everything works to a certain degree to this point. Some C4D noise types still need to be intergrated and renderman shader interface still needs some polishing to make it easier to use. We are also still working on the compositing tag to give externally created RIB archives channel ID's.

I am sure it will become available eventually.

ruby

Oh come on you're just pulling our chain. Just kidding that sounds excellent. I hope it is available soon.

[moka.studio]

it sounds really great to have these kind of tools being developed by a studio.
Goes to show, if there is a need for it, someone will come up with a solution !
- and I am also oe to think that, even with C4d AR rendering merits, it can only be good to open c4d to other render engines.
Keep us posted on this Ruby,
jp

[AdamT]

Very exciting! Keep us posted on your progress--both on the RIB exporter and on your movie project if you can.

[LucentDreams]

As exciting as the RIB cnnection sounds, it seems to me no one else caught the fact that they are using it to also combine Crowds form MASSIVE with scenes from CINEMA. Someonesusing cinema and Massive together, now there is big news imo.

[ThirdEye]

As exciting as the RIB cnnection sounds, it seems to me no one else caught the fact that they are using it to also combine Crowds form MASSIVE with scenes from CINEMA. Someonesusing cinema and Massive together, now there is big news imo.

Damn you're right, i've read massive as an attribute and not as the name of the WETA Digital app! We arrive third here, first Maya, then Softimage (or rather Mill i'd say), now us. Great news. :)

[LucentDreams]

Btw Ruby, its great to see you here at cgtalk, surprised but very delighted.

for those that don't know, Ruby was a compositor on The Never Ending Story, man, makes mewant to get back to some really corny 80's music.

Ruby, do youhave a personal site or company site for the production, you have such an empty signature.

[Rev9]

As exciting as the RIB cnnection sounds, it seems to me no one else caught the fact that they are using it to also combine Crowds form MASSIVE with scenes from CINEMA. Someonesusing cinema and Massive together, now there is big news imo.


I noted this as well.. I was the one whining about AI styled implants to jump ahead of the competition a few weeks back.. Hoorah.. There will be a way shortly.. And we will kick these folks ankles until they release the goodies to the C4D community.. They will make piles of money and Maxon too. Now to get Massive's price down to small studio level..

Ruby..Does the RenderMan interface run on OS X? Is MASSIVE PC only?

Best
BT

[Per-Anders]

It sounds very impressive. Fingers crossed that both connections see the light of day for all Cinema users.

[umblefugly]

Animalogic also used to mae softman which was a softimage connection of sorts for Renderman.

[rubyscooby]

Think there was a misunderstanding. We are using our RIB interface to actually be able to render crowds (yes from the software Massive) in our Cinema scenery , but it all gets rendered together in Air meaning we are just incorporating RIB files generated in Massive with the ones we create in Cinema, so no Massive in Cinema per say. Massive works like that with Maya or XSI. You can't load the crowds into ANY progam! You just render them.

Hope that clears things up a bit.

ruby

[mauves]

He Ruby,


Is there a special reason to use Cinema 4D in the production pipeline? Why go through the hassle of writing a new RIB exporter for Cinema 4D, when you could use Maya or MAX with already existing RIB exporters?

Don't get me wrong here, I think it's great news for cinema 4D. Access to a REYES renderer puts the app and it's users in a whole new realm. Give me FAST production proven animation renderers over the Maxwell renderer any day. I was just curious that's all.

Before this news I was thinking that for Cinema 4D users like myself to have access to production proven photorealistic renderers, we just had to learn a new package, of the hard and complex kind like MAYA or XSI. Which wasn't a very pleasant prospect but that I was thinking about doing because there wasn't a choice really. So this is really great to hear.


cheers

[danb]

He Ruby,


Is there a special reason to use Cinema 4D in the production pipeline? Why go through the hassle of writing a new RIB exporter for Cinema 4D, when you could use Maya or MAX with already existing RIB exporters?

Don't get me wrong here, I think it's great news for cinema 4D. Access to a REYES renderer puts the app and it's users in a whole new realm. Give me FAST production proven animation renderers over the Maxwell renderer any day. I was just curious that's all.

Before this news I was thinking that for Cinema 4D users like myself to have access to production proven photorealistic renderers, we just had to learn a new package, of the hard and complex kind like MAYA or XSI. Which wasn't a very pleasant prospect but that I was thinking about doing because there wasn't a choice really. So this is really great to hear.


cheers

Well one reason i can think of is the price. If you have the knowledge and skills it would be a better investment to write your own exporter,for free, than to spend another $6,000+ to get maya/renderman connection. Just my thinking. I know i would do it if i could.

[mauves]

Well one reason i can think of is the price. If you have the knowledge and skills it would be a better investment to write your own exporter,for free, than to spend another $6,000+ to get maya/renderman connection. Just my thinking. I know i would do it if i could.



OK Dan I understand, but for a company who's producing a major motion picture I think that 6000+$ wouldn't be a too big hurdle to overcome. I mean writing the RIB exporter takes time and if it isn't done on a voluntary base, it costs money also maybe even more than 6000$. Especially since on motion picture MAYA and XSI seems to be most used.So there must be something why they absolutely need to have a RIB exporter from Cinema 4D. That was what I was curious about.

cheers

[LucentDreams]

Well as Ruby has mentioned cinema Scenery twice, i would deduct they are using cinema 4D for environments mostly, whihc along with matte painting specifically is quickly becoming a cinema 4D strongsuit, and cinema/bodypaint are quickly becoming the app of choice for such work. framestore, Sony Pictures Imageworks, MPC, its definitely starting to get sutdio recognition in one area. Sort of shows which areas need more work, the ones realted to the areas cinema isn't being used for like Character animation.

[Per-Anders]

OK Dan I understand, but for a company who's producing a major motion picture I think that 6000+$ wouldn't be a too big hurdle to overcome. I mean writing the RIB exporter takes time and if it isn't done on a voluntary base, it costs money also maybe even more than 6000$. Especially since on motion picture MAYA and XSI seems to be most used.So there must be something why they absolutely need to have a RIB exporter from Cinema 4D. That was what I was curious about.

cheers

They may just prefer working in C4D. Maya & XSI... well Maya is a great pipeline and technical tool, but is not very artist centric, you spend a lot of time making a pipeline with it for every project to try and fit some sort of workflow, so why not do the same with C4D if you prefer to work in it? XSI is more artist centric than Maya but is let down on the technical side (it's SDK is weak) and is still no where near as easy/fast to use as C4D in my oppinion (and both are weaker poly/subd modelers than C4D, though both are stronger animation wise by quite a large margin), and I'm not even sure of the state of any RIB exporters for it either. Max could be quite a huge outlay, and don't forget training costs and time lost also have to be factored in. Changeing software costs a lot more than just the price of the seats required.

I would also assume that Kai is right, and that C4D is not being used for it's animation side where both XSI & Maya are leagues ahead, but instead for backgrounds/mattes, which is something that C4D/BP is pretty good at. Of course for the shots they're working on they may not require a great deal of individual character animation.

[rubyscooby]

I actually come from Maya and was a bit skeptical at first about Cinema. It's got a beautiful render and bodypaint while not being perfect does a great job. One of the reasons we are using Cinema is that its faster, as our scenes are very complex. Scene size is twice as big in Maya. And I don't even want to get into Maya camera matching. Z-brush displacement works better than in native Maya renderer. Simple and fast. We do you use Maya for animation and some complex uv layouts. We also use Mayaman to export animations to RIB so we can render them togther with our Cinema RIB's. Same thing as we incorporate the massive crowds.

ruby

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