Cinema 4D Core value question

[Geespot]

If I was going to get one more module which do you recomend for an animator

MOCCA is a must for character animation

[Per-Anders]

the core app si what you're talking about. and yes it's very useful.

the modules are just added things like the advanced render module gives you radiosity and caustics (surface and volume), and good depth of field. but the render engine is no slouch normally (and to be honest i hardly ever use radiosity or caustics), of course the default render engine supports hdri for reflections but to get the most you'll want radiosity.

thinking particles is just a very much more controllable particles system, like maya's. but cinema core comes with a good if simple particles system anyway, and there are some excellent free plugins that give you extra power there.

for animators the mocca is probably a must. softik easier bone setup all the rest.

bodypaint 2 is great, totally inbuilt texturing, imo much better (and cheaper) than deeppaint+deepuv.

the core app itself is very good and solid, i would suggest jsut trying out the demo, and if you want to see what it's like sans modules then you can rename the modules folder to whatever and it should load up as the base app without the modules. (though it'll also remove pyrocluster which you get in the base app afaik but that's nothing much to worry about, just a voxel rendering system like hypervoxels).

[LucentDreams]

Thanks to Bjorn's little expresso magic, the chraracter rig for my CD can be done entirely without any mocca, or it can be done entirely with SIK and DB maps, so mocca I would say isn't impossible to do without, but at the same time I wouldn't advise it, the bone tool, cappucino, there are manythings beside softIK that are also handy.

Most important module for any C4D artist imo is BP. After that depending on what your doing I'd say either mocca or advanced renderer (are you a character animator or an architecture//illustration/stills artist) If your going into serious effects animatin stuff then TP and PC would be very useful if not necessary. Dynamics Also could be handy in this area.

[jmcalpin]

I am focusing on animation so tools geared in that direction are what I am looking for.

I played with the 7 demo a while ago but hadn't really got into modeling in it.

I am use to modeling in wings and lightwave.


Would any of you know the basic tools to use in Cinema 4D for box modeling.

Basically teh tool for making a box is easy enough. But How do I do the folowing:

Subdivide?

Tweak/pull points around?

cut new geometry (knife/split/break a poly to add detail basically)?

extrude?

For ex LW users is there a spin poly command or a way to reflow the edges easy?

I did the electric plug and cord tut but it really didn't help with the basics of box modeling in cinema. If anyone knows of a tutorial that might show me how to box model in Cinema it might help too.
I'll look around the forum for tuts in the mean time while I get the demo to play with.

thanks,


Jason

[Per-Anders]

the box object can be subdivided any which way you want. if you just want subdivisions along any length then look in the attributes manager and change the settings there. if you want overall subdivision then make the object editable ("c" key or the icon) then go Structure->Subdivide (then you get some more options ot play around with).

Tweak pull points around any way you want. Switch to points mode (or edges or polys) and select any elements you want to modify with the standard move/scale/rotate tools, or any of the other tools... you can also use the magnet tool for falloff effects or standard tweaking without selecting points (try using the nearest point method and radisu set to 0 for wings like tweak mode).

subdivide etc all work on the selected polys only, so just select your polys you want to break split before cutting them. also the standard knife tool is just the "k" button (or form teh menu).

extrude and bevel are in the structure menu, or just hit D for extrude and I for extrude inner (bevel by default has no key assigned to it, but you can change key assignations from the COmmand Manager, in fact it's all customiseable, if you want a text interface just right click on any of the icons and choose Text and then right click and Uncheck Icon to get rid of the icons altogether).

there's a plugin to do spinpoly, in fact there are two i can't remember wher eyou get them from but i'm sure someone else will chip in wiht the addresses. theres a free one, that just does quads like the lightwave one, and one that costs $5 which also handles tri's and groups.

anyhow, have fun, and feel free to ask any questions about doing anything in cinema. don't forget to check out the Active Tool manager when using different tools for options on those tools (like select visible elements only with the selection tools, or keep groups in extrude etc), also other hints and tips for lightwave users, once you've put a mesh inside of a hypernurbs object for subdivision surfaces hit q to toggle them on and off like tab in lightwave, and for instant lasso selections the preset key is 8, live selections is 9, for swapping between the selection tool and the last tool it's space.

hope this gets you started.

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