March2005

Volume 02 Issue 03 March 2005 | $3.99

HIGHLIGHTS IN THIS ISSUE: MAXON GERMANY CEO

Interview with MAXON Germany CEO, Harald Egel, on Page 4.

INTERVIEW

Read the interview with the popular and talented CINEMA 4D artist, Bernardo Barbi, on Page 15.

CHARACTER MODELING

“THE PRIZE FIGHT” Round 2 is complete! Page 47 Part 2 of Mark Gmehling’s Character Modeling Tutorial on Page 26.

© Mark Gmehling 2005

3D ATTACK QUICK INDEX PAGE 4-6

Interview with Harald Egel by Tavy Ann

PAGE 8-9

3D Fluff Volume 2 Review by Mark Gmehling

PAGE 10-13

Simple IK and Reverse Foot Rig by Sebastien Florand

PAGE 15-18

Interview with Bernardo Barbi by Tavy Ann

PAGE 19-20

Plugin Review - Structure - by Gary Zullo

PAGE 21-25

Basic Modeling - Lookout Tower P2 by Bram van Gerwen

PAGE 26-30

Character Modeling Part 2 by Mark Gmehling

PAGE 31-35

Landscape Tutorial Part 2 by Georg Niedermeier

PAGE 36-40

Emorpher: Power of PLA Morphing by Sebastien Florand

PAGE 41-44

Clothilde Drapes by Jamie Hamel-Smith

PAGE 45-46

Fireworks with Thinking Particles by Bjoern Marl “Srek”

PAGE 47-49

“THE PRIZE FIGHT” Round 2 by Tavy Ann

PAGE 50-54

Best of CINEMA 4D Gallery

PAGE 55

Editors Notes

PAGE 56

ATTACK TOONS by Sir Gong

PAGE 57

The 3D Attack Team

Interview with Harald Egel - CEO Maxon Germany

By Tavy Ann

Interview

design applications. Would you mind sharing with our readers a little insight on MAXON's beginnings and the development of CINEMA 4D?

Mr. Harald Egel, MAXON Germany CEO, recently took the time to answer a few questions and bring a little insight for 3D Attack and our readers, to MAXON's beginnings and the development of CINEMA 4D. We hope you will enjoy getting to know a little more about MAXON and the German Headquarters CEO. Tavy: Mr. Egel, thank you so much for taking time from your busy schedule to speak with 3D Attack and share a little about yourself, CINEMA 4D, and MAXON with our readers. Why don't we begin with you introducing yourself to our readers.

Harald Egel: I'm one of the three CEOs and founders of MAXON and mainly responsible for the international sales and marketing in the company. In this position I'm travelling a lot to promote our products and meet many people. Different cultures and foreign languages were always one of my interests, so I would like to say my job fits perfectly to me.

Tavy: In the CG industry, CINEMA 4D is one of, if not, the most innovative and cutting edge 3D

Harald Egel: Originally we started as students with a book project for Atari ST computers in 1985. But very soon we convinced our publisher that there is a market for a monthly magazine. So in January 1986 the first issue of our Atari ST Computer magazine was launched.

Later magazines for Commodore Amiga and Apple Macintosh were added. For eleven years, magazines were one of MAXON's main pillars.

As our magazines were partly focussed in programming and optimizing the computer hardware, we had good contacts to many programmers at an early stage. So in 1987 MAXON entered the software business and over the years got one of the leading software companies for Atari ST and Commodore Amiga in the German-speaking countries.

We published more than 50 software titles for these computer platforms. One of them was a program called Fastray, which later in a newer version was renamed to CINEMA 4D. So here the story began.

The first version of CINEMA 4D was developed by two brothers, Christian and Philip Losch, who are still part of the core development team today.

In the mid-nineties the Atari and Amiga markets were declining more and more, so we decided to take the next step and bring CINEMA 4D (this time as version 4) to the Windows and Macintosh platforms.

We used the chance to start from the scratch and ported only the algorithms in order to reorganize the program structure. More programmers, who worked on other

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MAXON products before, joined the team and in 1996 MAXON presented version 4 for these two new platforms in English and German. At this time we started to target the international markets and two years later we founded MAXON Computer Inc. near Los Angeles. More and more localizations were added and CINEMA 4D's reputation as a rocksolid, fast and easy-to-learn program started to grow worldwide.

Nowadays you can find our products in almost every country in the world.

In 2000, after the release of CINEMA 4D R6, we added BodyPaint 3D as the ideal painting and texturing tool for CINEMA 4D. MAXON opened offices in the UK and Japan and joined the Nemetschek Group.

With Release 8 we established CINEMA 4D's modular concept in order to let the customer choose what features he needs and what not. It is well accepted and now we can offer just the base package or different bundles tailored to special markets.

BodyPaint 3D exchange plugins for most of all other bigger 3D applications were added.

Tavy: With more than 100 new features, CINEMA 4D Release 9 is of the most impressive upgrades in MAXON history. Where does MAXON go from here? What can CINEMA 4D users look forward to in future upgrades and releases?

Harald Egel: The next release will be R9.1, which is available as a free download from our website.

CINEMA 4D and BodyPaint 3D are under permanent development. Of course I will not reveal any feature lists of upcoming releases here, but I can say it is our philosophy to make our programs as easy to use

Interview with Harald Egel - CEO Maxon Germany

By Tavy Ann

Interview

as possible, and so our key development will always be improving the workflow. A good example is Clothilde, our Cloth tool in R9.

With just some clicks you can easily animate cloth and fabrics. You do not need hours to set up the scene to create waving flags, clothes, curtains etc.

Besides that, connectivity is very important these days. We will definitely add more import/export filters or exchange plugins. I.e. R9.1 contains an interface for multipass rendering to Apple's Motion. Maybe I should mention, at this point, that the feedback and comments from our users and clients is very important to us. We are collecting these informations, and what finally gets into the next releases depends to some extent on them.

Tavy: Let's talk a little about CINEMA 4D's render engine. We know that it's "kind of" open, but what about the possibility of opening it even further? In the near future do you see the reality of using Renderman, for example, with CINEMA 4D? Harald Egel: With Release 9 we added some functions to our Software Development Kit which makes it possible to other software companies linking their render engines to CINEMA 4D. So i.e.

Maxwell announced already a CINEMA 4D support. We are open to everybody and other manufacturers are in contact with us but, I cannot tell here if and when these solutions will be released.

Tavy: More and more we are seeing CINEMA 4D and BodyPaint 3D used in television and film. MAXON surely has their foot in the door in

this industry, but not quite as far as some of your competitors. Why do you think the industry is holding back and not using CINEMA 4D as a "full blown" 3D application? If they are, could you give us some examples?

Harald Egel: One of the possible reasons MAXON products are maybe used less than some competitors is that we entered the 3D market internationally much later than them. Another reason could be that in the first instance the trust in a local product is probably stronger than in a foreign one. For example in our home markets, the German speaking countries, we are well established for many years.

Also in this industry everybody knows each other over the years, which helps a lot when you plan to establish a new product I guess. It took quite a while to prove that MAXON's products are playing in

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the same league as the competition and now we are on the right track, with both BodyPaint 3D and CINEMA 4D. Good examples are studios like Sony Pictures Imageworks, Cinesite or Framestore, but there are many more now.

Tavy: With MAXON offices in Germany, The United States, Japan and the United Kingdom, can you give us a quick breakdown of your target markets? Who's using CINEMA 4D? Hobbyists, architects, designers, professionals, etc...?

Harald Egel: Products like CINEMA 4D are used in many markets and these again differ from country to country , so it's hard to give a global answer. In the States we target especially film and broadcast, games and visualization. In Europe we are additionally very strong in the architectural and print publishing markets, but less in the game mar-

Interview with Harald Egel - CEO Maxon Germany

By Tavy Ann

Interview

ket. Asia is a mix out of all these markets, but of course we have a very good stronghold in the hobby market as well. This is historical as our entry level versions were always at a good price point and easy to learn.

Tavy: CINEMA 4D users are some of the most dedicated 3D application users on the globe. And MAXON is, by far, one of the most supportive 3D application manufacturers there is. Whether it be customer service, tutorials, technical support or MAXON employee's jumping in to lend a helping hand on the many CINEMA 4D forums on the web, MAXON is always there. Would you please share with our readers the philosophy behind MAXON's fantastic customer service.

Harald Egel: Thank you for giving me the chance to share some thoughts with you. And as a last word to the readers: Please give us your feedback. It is very important to us. We at MAXON cannot develop our software to your needs without it. We have a suggestion form on our website:

Harald Egel: It is our company philosophy to treat each customer as if it was our only customer. In this regard we are hiring our employees.

At MAXON we are having very dedicated and enthusiastic people and many of them just turned their hobby into a job.

They are even busy after hours as they simply like 3D and communication with the users. Additionally, I dare to say our employees like to work for MAXON as we are offering a very friendly working environment.

That reflects in the customer service as well.

Tavy: Once again, thank you for taking time to share with 3D Attack and our readers. We are looking forward to the great things MAXON has to bring in the future.

Please feel free to leave our readers with any last thoughts or comments you may have.

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www.maxon.net/pages/support/suggestions_e.html which we are constantly evaluating.

Please use it. I promise in return you will see many great new features in the future versions.

3D Fluff Volume 2 - Radiosity Interiors Review by Mark Gmehling aka Macling 3D FLUFF TRAINING FOR CINEMA 4D - VOLUME 2 RADIOSITY INTERIORS In volume two Janine Pauke is focusing on one of the most difficult to handle topics in any 3d application: achieving realistic lighting using radiosity.

DVD Review

The Dvd comes along with about 160 minutes of video tutorials, the required codecs for mac and pc, all project files that are explained during the video tutorials and a goodies folder that contains seven high-res HDRI Images and some other interior scenes you can play with after you gained your radiosity experiences during the video tutorials.

The video tutorials are divided into eleven parts that guide through the whole process of material tweaking, lighting and rendering in order to achieve acceptable render times while using the advanced renderer modules radiosity settings: 1. The main radiosity setup 2. Basic theory of radiosity and global illumination 3. Setting up and adjusting direct lighting 4. Setting up materials and adjusting their illumination settings 5. Adjusting shadows 6. Setting up and adjusting indirect diffuse lighting 7. Scene setup 8. Render setup 9. Adjusting antialiasing settings 10. Final photoshop improvements of the multipass rendered layers 11. Final photoshop improvements of the flattened image All explanations in the video tutorials are understandable for the intermediate 3D Artists and also bear lots of

interesting informations for the advanced CINEMA user. (By the way: the not native english speaker will have no problem following Janine’s english explanations.)

But the most important point is: Janine’s explanations teach a global technical understanding of the radiosity settings and their relations to the main scene setup which makes you able to improve the radiosity rendertimes of your own scenes enormously.

We all know the joke: "How many 3d artists are needed to render a great radiosity image?"

(Ten.- one who sets up the render and nine who kill the artifacts in pho-

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toshop.) The funny answer contains some truth as we all know, because in production we all have to deal with deadlines and a straight workflow is the most important thing.

3d Fluff Dvd Volume 2 concentrates on teaching a straight workflow: Keeping the rendertimes low at the beginning and only increasing special settings when its needed during process. This means, not only the radiosity menu. The detailed setup of a whole scene and the materials to fasten the rendering is explained too.

One of the chapters teaches and technically explains the different

3D Fluff Volume 2 - Radiosity Interiors

DVD Review

Review by Mark Gmehling aka Macling

antialiasing and GI accuracy settings of each scene object via compositing tags for example, is part of Janine’s workflow.

Finally , there is some photoshopartifact-removing needed, but that's the result of an easy bill: Compare the rendering time of lower radiosity settings + photoshop retouch with an exponential lower radiosity rendering speed that renders no artifacts.

The photoshop tweaks (video ten and eleven): Janine’s demonstrations are worth watching even for the advanced photoshop user and may convince one to invest some money into a Wacom Tablet, if you haven't already.

All in all ,an interesting Dvd even for the advanced C4D User, which teaches a technical understanding of the relations between the differ-

ent radiosity settings, and will fasten your radiosity workflow for sure.

I'm looking forward to following the third volume of 3D Fluff Training for CINEMA 4D and hope Janine is already working on it.

Without a doubt, five of five attack points!

Mark Gmehling

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Website: www.3DFluff.com Price: $79.95 USD Rating: 5 out of 5

Simple IK and Reverse Foot Rig

By Sebastien Florand aka “Fluffy�

Hello guys, 1 - In this exercise, we'll learn how to setup a simple IK leg chain using Mocca2. I will be using "Mr Burp" here, ready to leave for his Hawaiian vacations, as reference [Image01].

Image 04

Image 02

Image 05

Tutorial

create a new bone, so just adjust it to whatever length and orientation is needed [Image06].

Image 01

You'll notice that I have quite a lot of different parts for that fellow in my hierarchy. For ease of use, I put everything inside a Null object that I put inside a Hypernurb.

This will allow me to activate/deactivate the Hypernurb in one spot, hence switching between Low-res and Hi-res easily, and will also allow me to use the bones to deform everything that is contained in that Null at once, even though they are separate parts [Image02]. >> First of all, start creating a bone, from the"objects>deformation>bone" command menu. This bone is the pelvis bone, that will support the whole hierarchy, so it will be at the top of every other bones, at the same level than the meshes - inside the Null object. Place it at the waist level and keep it oriented as it is generated [Image03].

Image 03

>> Next, duplicate that bone (Ctrl+click and drag bone in hierarchy - make it a child of the Pelvis bone), and make it a Null bone, by checking on the "Null" box in the "object" tab of the attribute manager, when selecting that bone. The bone should turn a green sphere object, that's a Null bone. Drag that bone on top of your first leg (here I start with the left leg), as that's where the leg should be placed [Image04]. >> Duplicate that bone, uncheck the Null box, make it a child of the first Null bone and rotate the bone so it fits the leg of your character. Scale the bone using the Model tool until it reaches the knee area [Image05]. >> Using the Move Tool ("E" shortcut by default), and pressing "Ctrl" key at the same time, select and drag the tip of the bone. This will

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Image 06

>> Repeat the process to create a foot bone and toe bone [Image07] [Image08].

Image 07

Image 08

Simple IK and Reverse Foot Rig

By Sebastien Florand aka “Fluffy� >> Don't forget to name your bones properly, it's easier if you can identify things right away. The bone hierarchy we just set up was for the left leg, so add a capitalized "L" after each bone name, we'll see later that it is a useful way of naming and renaming as we do a symmetry. >> Select the Null bone at the top of the hierarchy and apply the "Setup IK Chain" function from the Mocca toolbar - this will place an IK tag on each bone, set the Null bone tag as Null, and create a Tip Effector object, as well as a control for that Effector [Image09] [Image10].

a Root Goal from the Mocca toolbar.

A "chin Root Goal" null is created, and placed as target in the IK tag of the chin bone (you can see the IK tag display a small blue link thingy).

Take that "chin Root Goal" Null out of the hierarchy, as it should not be affected by IK or the hierarchy when I move my pelvis bone. Rename it "KneeL".

Select the chin bone tag and check the "use as Pole" parameter, it will tell Mocca how is oriented the plane of rotation for that IK. It will display a blue plane between the waist and ankle [Image11].

Image 09

Tutorial

Image 12

Root Goal and Tip Goal using the same button in the Mocca toolbar.

Take the "toes Root Goal" out of the hierarchy, and leave the Effector created at the end of the bone chain where it is, it will maintain the tip of the bone oriented based on the position of the "toes Tip Goal" Null position [Image13].

Image 10

>> Erase both Null objects Effectors, as we will setup everything manually. >> You can hide the mesh if you prefer, for better viewing of the bone chain. Select the chin bone and add

Image 11

>> Select the foot bone and assign a Root Goal. Take it out of the hierarchy [Image12]. >> Select the toe bone and assign a

11

Image 13

Simple IK and Reverse Foot Rig

By Sebastien Florand aka “Fluffy� >> Still with the toes bone selected, apply this time an up vector to the toe bone, and move that "toesL Up" Null object created out of the hierarchy [Image14].

twisting when we slide the foot sideways, for example). I also reset all my other Null Goal rotation values, so they are all aligned with the world axis, a lot better for animation, and cleaner.

Everything else now is mostly up to the way you setup your Null Goals hierarchy. It will drive the reverse foot control, as well as the normal foot IK. Image 15

Tutorial

Here is what looks like my bones chain in the viewport, and where it is located in the object manager.

[Image16]

Image 16

2 - Tweaks before we are done:

Image 14

>> Select the "footL" bone tag, and drag the Up vector "toesL Up" that we just created in the Up Vector box [Image15]. >> Finally, drag the "kneeL" Null object a bit in front of the knee area, as it is still placed on the bone. This Null will guide the orientation of the knee.

Ok, so now our IK is roughly setup, it seems long and difficult, but it's really not that hard once you are used to it.

But first, let's create a Null object that we will use as center of rotation for the foot. We could use the "footL Root Goal", but it is not located properly for my character, and if I rotate the foot, it will send it through the ground. Name that Null object "FootL Control". This Null object can also be replaced by a polygon shape or a spline, if you like to have visual reference in the viewport. It doesn't really matters, just make sure nothing appears at render time, and that the axis is properly positioned. >> Move the "Foot Control" object at the calf level, roughly where the foot should rotate [Image17].

Here, I made some minor adjustments for that specific rig, as my character didn't have straight legs but angled outward, so I had to relocate the Up vector on top of the foot, and closer to it (as it spawned at nearly head level). I also reset the rotations to 0 on every rotation axis, compared to the World axis, that way I have a nice straight Null to control my Up Vector.

For those of you who don't have a clue on what is an Up vector, it is simply a Null target that will orient the bone on its Z axis, thus preventing it from twisting when moving the IK chain (will prevent the foot from

12

Image 17

>> For reverse foot, you should have the "toesL Root Goal" as the center of rotation, and it should drag the back of the feet with it, which is

Simple IK and Reverse Foot Rig

By Sebastien Florand aka “Fluffy� controlled by the "footL root Goal" Null object, so put the "footL Root Goal" as a child of "toes Root Goal" and put everything as a child of the "Foot control" object, so all the foot goals will move in normal foot IK when you rotate that object. Have a look at my hierarchy if you find it confusing. You can rename the "toes Root Goal" Null to "Reverse footL control" if you want to have a clear reference when animating, or whatever is more obvious to you.

[Image18]

Image 19

based on the World axis (provided your character is placed as the center of the world, and symmetrical).

The "Match search" parameter should be increased if your weight maps don't mirror properly (it happens sometimes when using several objects), it will increase the tolerance of the tool, and expand the search for similar vertexes.

Tutorial

You may remember that we earlier named our objects using a capitalized "L" after each of them, that's where the "replace" box comes in handy.

Image 18

>> The last thing to do now is to select all IK tags and increase the Goal strength and Up Vector strength to 100%, that way the bones will stick better to the bones.

3 - Mirroring things: We are done for that foot, you can now start to paint weight maps using Claude Bonnet. I won't explain that part of rigging and will show you how to use the symmetry to mirror bones hierarchy and Claude Bonnet maps without hassle. >> Select your bone hierarchy to mirror, starting from the "NullL" object, and click on the "Bone mirror" command from the Mocca toolbar [Image19]. >> Check everything except "Clone animation" which won't be of much use since we didn't animate anything yet, and make your mirror

Set "Replace" from "L" to "R". It will rename your mirrored objects and replace every capitalized "L" by a capitalized "R" (stands for "Right" for those who didn't follow) - quite useful [Image20].

Image 21

For animation, you can now focus on the Pelvis, Foot controls, reverse foot controls and knee controls movements, that's it ;) Next time, we'll see how to assemble the spine and arms. I hope you'll enjoy your future IK setups, and don't hesitate to contact me on the 3D attack forum if you run into any problems.

Cheers, Fluffy

Image 20

>> As you can see, everything has been mirrored properly and renamed. The only object that wasn't mirrored was my "FootL control", that I created apart from the IK chain. It is simple enough to fix, just take all the "R" named goals out and duplicate that Null on the other side, putting all the "R" named goals inside it, as shown [Image21].

And you are done!

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This month MAXON is sponsoring our C4D Quiz with some great prizes. By answering a simple question and sending an e-mail with C4D Quiz in the subject line and your answer to 3d attack@3d attack.net you could win the following: 3D Guru Vol 2 and a MAXON Polo Shirt Explore the depths of CINEMA 4D R9's new and improved modeling toolset in the second volume of The 3D Guru series. Learn techniques that will aid in the character modeling process, including topics such as n-gons, HyperNURBs, Soft-selections, edgeloops and more. Over 4 hours of CINEMA 4D R9 character modeling training in our popular video format.

Question: CINEMA 4D is used in many industries. Which are mentioned in the Solutions area of the MAXON website?

MAXON will be giving 5 gift packages containing one 3D Guru Vol 2 and one MAXON Polo Shirt. That means 5 entrants will win! All entries must be received no later than March 31, 2005. We will announce our 5 winners on our forum at www.3d attack.net on April 1, 2005 and via e-mail. Enter at 3d attack@3dattack.net today and KEEP ON ATTACKING!

Interview with Bernardo Barbi

By Tavy Ann

Bernado Barbi

Interview

Tavy: Bernardo, thanks so much for taking time to share more about you and your work with our readers.

I know you have an extremely busy schedule and time is valuable, once again, thank you. Why don't we start with you telling us a bit about yourself.

Bernardo: My name is Bernardo Barbi. I am Brazilian, 27 years old, born on an island called Florian贸polis on the southern coast of Brazil where I began to work in advertising as a designer. I worked for some years as an advertising art director until I became acquainted with the 3D universe where I began my study of CINEMA 4D. I fell in love with the software and it is my principal work tool today. I am an enthusiastic lover of this beautiful software and I am following its development with enormous pleasure. I am one of the few professionals that use this software in Brazil, but I am sure that it will become very popular here. At present, I am working at the Platinum studio, in Rio de Janeiro. www.bernardobarbi.cjb.net Tavy: Would you mine sharing with us a little about Platinum Studio?

Bernardo: Platinum is an image creating studio that works for advertising agencies in Brazil and throughout the world. I already knew

about Platinum's work when I was invited to work with this excellent team of professionals. When I joined them, Platinum was using other 3D software. I introduced CINEMA 4D and bet on its capacity. Within a few months, CINEMA 4D became our principal tool for image creation. I am proud of having contributed to the studio with my work and this

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tool. Platinum is one of the major prize winning studios in Brazil, with prizes won in Cannes, the New York Festival, EPICA, among others. www.platinumfmd.com.br Tavy: What is your educational background? Do you have any formal training in 3D/CG?

Interview with Bernardo Barbi

By Tavy Ann

Bernardo: My professional development originates in advertising work.

As a designer and CG artist I am self-taught, as I believe is the case with the majority of Brazilian CG artists. We have to study hard to compete with the large international centers. I believe that is the reason we have excellent CG artists in Brazil.

Interview

Tavy: Can you give us a quick overview of your professional career?

Bernardo: My career has been fully given to design, always working with advertising agencies as the art director, up to the time when I discovered 3D.I am devoted to photography and design. 3D was a means to bring together the two passions.

Nowadays, I work only with 3D.

Tavy: Octopus! What a fabulous project. Can you tell our readers a little about this great project?

Bernardo: Octopus! I loved being a part of this work. It was widely acclaimed and represented a challenge. The work was commissioned by an advertising agency in Brazil and is a good example of the kind of work Platinum does in image creation.

When I began to work with Platinum this project was on standby. I took over the 3D part and was able to work with Cinema 4D up to the end.

I cannot forget that this is a work that brought together a number of professionals.Technical data and Making of: http://www.cgnetworks.com/story_cu stom.php?story_id=2585&page=

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Tavy: When starting a new project where do you find your inspiration?

Bernardo: My inspiration issues from the possibilities and the capacity offered by 3D in creating all kinds of images. I take in consideration that photography, the form, and the fact that creating images is limitless.

My time is shared by commercial and personal works. Individually, I do a lot of studies and have less time available than I would like.

Professionally, I apply my personal expertise and am moved by daily challenges and the excellent team I work with.

Tavy: Can you share with us some production tips, your work flow?

How do you start a project and where do you end it?

Interview with Bernardo Barbi

By Tavy Ann

Interview

Bernardo: All my work begins with research and planning. Photography research, form and light, are fundamental. I love composing 3D elements with images.

Tavy: Of all your works what are you the most proud of?

Bernardo: My last job is always the favorite, for technical reasons and evolution, I believe, but Octopus! is surely the one I am most proud of.

Tavy: Who are some of your favorite 2D and 3D artists?

Bernardo: I love Mark Ryden paintings; he is one of my 20 preferred 2D artists. Among 3D artists, I have not one I like most; I simply like good works and follow the evolution of artists that use Cinema 4D, like Pupi, Cartesius, Gianlucca Mattia, Janine, Carles Piles, ThirdEye, Mostyle, Rui Batista, among others.

Tavy: When not busy working on personal or professional projects, what do you like to do?

Bernardo: Music. I adore music! I do parallel work in music producing, working with some bands and writing my musical compositions. Some of these that I produced are on my

web site, should anyone be curious about them. If I were not working with 3D I would certainly be doing professional work as a music producer.

Tavy: What version of CINEMA 4D are you currently using? What other software apps?

Bernardo: I use version 9 of Cinema 4D. I believe the evolution of Cinema 4D has been fantastic.

Another software that is part of my work is Zbrush. I like very much the way Zbrush sculpts, and I think the working together of these two tools is fantastic.

Tavy: Are you currently working on any new projects, or maybe a future project you can tell us a bit about?

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Bernardo: Individually, I am doing a lot of character studies, working with Cinema 4D and Zbrush together. Professionally, we have a new job similar to ET, which Platinum developed for an agency in Portugal. It is for the same client.

Tavy: Thanks again for sharing with us Bernardo. Your a wonderful artist and I'm honored that you took time from your day to talk with us. Do you have any advice or words of wisdom for the thousands of aspiring 3D artists across the globe?

Bernardo: I thank 3D Attack magazine for sharing this space with me.

As already mentioned, I am an enthusiastic lover of this wonderful software called Cinema 4D and of the work 3D Attack is developing and which is working out as much

Interview with Bernardo Barbi

By Tavy Ann

as Cinema 4D. A word of advice to the artists spread throughout the world is to publish their work, independently of the software they are using. Technique and the study of classical theories like photography, light and form are fundamental.

Thanks to all!

Interview

Bernardo Barbi

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Plugin review: Structure

By Gary Zullo aka MrPixar

Plugin Review

Hey there fellow attackers! Have you ever wondered how people create all those great greebles and nurnies on their models without spending infinite amounts of time modeling them all by hand? I know I have. What's a greeble or a nurnie you ask? Well, simply put a "greeble" or "nurnie" is a non-specific gadget added to an object in order to increase detail, like little gizmos you would place on a spaceship, or a cityscape. Don't want to do it by hand? Me either, enter Structure…

This plug-in will save you an almostunbelievable amount of time and is surprisingly easy to use. Once installed (as with all standard C4D Plug-ins, you just need to drag the plug-in into C4D's plug-in folder) you will notice a new item in the plug-ins menu ("Structure R1.3": See Image 1). Upon selecting the plug-in a new object will appear in the Object Manger (more about that in a minute).

ated. You can apply the Structure modifier to a polygon selection of to the entire polygon mesh. As with all the options of Structure… the choice is yours.

The control panel for Structure is quite complex in what it allows you to do, but is presented in a logical manner to minimize confusion and maximize your potential and output.

It can be accessed by double-clicking the icon of the Structure object in the Object Manager. Once you access the power of the plug-in you can see that it is well-laid out and each part pretty much explains itself.

The settings cover you from which components are generated to how they will look (e.g. Height, Width, and Bevel etc. etc.) and until you make the object editable you can modify anything you need to and "update"

3) 4) 5)

T-Shapes C-Shapes Bar-Shapes

You can decide which shapes are used in the generation process by clicking each "shape" to enable or disable them Here are some examples of just what types of things are possible with the Structure plug-in. Each example took me 30 minutes or less to generate, render and composite if needed. To me, that is pretty impressive since it used to take me 30 minutes just to figure out which shapes I wanted to greeble, then figure out how I wanted to actually do it …

Example of using structure in a space-tech scenario: The entire scene took 30 minutes to render at a rate of 3, two renders (upper left and lower right) as well as compositing time.

Structure 1.3 is a plug-in for R8+ that allows you to randomly create greebles and nurnies to your heart's content quickly and easily. This plug-in is actually an object modifier/generator that lets you easily create some complex structure on any polygonal surface and it works by creating a "Structure" object then you drop any polygonal object as a child of it and the greebles are cre-

The different types of shapes Structure can generate:

1) 2)

Cube-Shapes L-Shapes

19

Example of using structure in a cityscape type scenario: This entire scene took approximately 15 minutes to build (including about 10

Plugin review: Structure

By Gary Zullo aka MrPixar minutes to tweak S&T) and render.

Imagine how long this would have taken if I had to model the "buildings" by hand

time to generate the structures (since it is actually creating new geometry), I think there is some room for improvement.

Things I liked:

2) Another area I would like to see improved is with the control panel.

Currently, once a set of structures are generated you cannot randomly re-generate them without turning the modifier off then back on. I'd like to see a "random" button added to the panel so that when pressed it randomly generates structures based on the parameters specified EACH TIME. Given those two relatively minor points I have to say that this plug-in is actually one of those must haves if you need to created details on technology pieces or cityscapes quickly and with amazing results. It's certainly a very nifty and handy tool to have in one's toolbox :

Plugin Review

1) The intelligent way Structure grouped polygon objects once made editable. Based on the way you tell Structure to generate the shapes it will group them as follows: "Base", "Base Top", "SuperStructure" and "Superstructure Top". This makes it a breeze when it comes time to texture all that geometry!

2) The relative ease-of-use to power ratio. Even though the plug-in is a single-area utility it is quite good at what it does. It's specialized, and it does what it does happily and repeatedly.

3) Since Structure is an object modifier/generator is can work in much the same way that any other generator or deformer works ‌ it can be enabled and disabled as needed.

Great touch!

Things I'd like to see improved on: Not much actually, but ‌ 1)I would like to see a speed improvement of structure generation on polygon sets larger than 100 or so. Currently, when applying the structures to polygon sets (either by selection or entire meshes) it does take a progressively longer time to process the structures with larger sets. While it should be considered normal and acceptable that it takes

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20

Basic Modeling - Lookout Tower Part 2

By Bram van Gerwen

Tutorial

This tutorial is the continuation of Part 1 in the February issue. You can use your scene you created then, but I advise using the included TowerPt2Start.c4d file to avoid inconsistencies. And a finished part 2 file is also included for reference.

We continue our modeling on the tower by creating the spiral staircase inside, this will be done simply with some splines, instances and the arrange function. Select the Cylinder and rename it to 'Central Pillar' and copy it. Now create a new empty scene and paste the central cylinder into it without moving it, we want the cylinder to remain in the exact same place so we can simply copy/paste the stairs we are going to create back into the Tower Start scene without having to place it in the right spot.

The first element we create is the step. Create a Cube and set the sizes to X 110, Y 27 and Z 30. Also enable the Fillet and set its Radius to 2 for a nice rounded edge. The next step is to make the paths along which we want the steps to be arranged.

For this we will use two Helix splines, one for arranging the steps and one as a rail spline to aim the steps toward the central pillar.

Create a Helix spline (Objects -> Spline Primitives -> Helix) and set its Plane field to XZ to align it correctly with the pillar, as you see its base is in the middle of the pillar so set its position to Y -260 in the coordinates manager to move it to the bottom of the pillar.

The height of the helix can now be set to 490, a little lower than the height of the pillar so the steps won't exceed the pillar height. We want

the steps to make only one full rotation round the pillar counter-clockwise so set its Start Angle to 360Âź and its End Angle to 0Âź like in picture 1/A.

The arrange helix is now finished and for clarity rename it to 'Arrange Helix'. Duplicate this helix and rename the duplicate to 'Rail Helix'.

Set the Start and End Radius of the rail spline to 50, this is the radius of the pillar and thus the rail will wind perfectly along the pillar while maintaining the same rotation angle and thus allow the steps to target it without tilting the wrong way, see picture 1/B for reference.

Our current step has a length of 110 and the radius of the pillar is 50, the steps will be arranged according to their object axis which is in the exact center of the object. This means that if we want the steps to touch the pillar when we arrange them we need to set the Start and End Radius of the Arrange helix to 100. This is the sum of 50 from the cylinder and little less than half of the step length. If we leave the radius values at 200 the steps will float clear of the pillar which is not realistic.

Having done that we need to make instances of the one step we have so far. Select the Cube, rename it to 'Step' and use the Duplicate function (Function -> Duplicate), set it to 19 duplicates and enable create instances option and hit Apply. The instance object is a sort of alias to

21

your original object, it will represent the original object it is linked to without actually duplicating the geometry, this way when you make a change to your original object it will be immediately be visible in all the linked instances. The duplicate function has created a group of instances in the object manager, drop the Step object into it to have all steps in one group.

We are ready to arrange the steps now so call the Arrange function (Functions -> Arrange). This will give you some options in the attributes window. Set the Mode to 'Along Spline'. The along spline parameter fields will now become visible. Drag the Arrange Helix to the Spline field (under position), then enable the rotation field and drag the Rail spline into it, in the rotation part set the Align parameter to +X, this will keep the steps horizontal when arranging, see picture 2.

Now select all 20 steps, make sure you don't have the null object of the group selected, and hit Apply in the arrange options and you can see them being neatly arranged across the Arrange spline while targeting the Rail helix and remaining horizontal like in picture 2. But we can easily see that the steps are not deep enough to create connected steps, this is where the usefulness of the instance comes into play.

Select the Step object and change

Basic Modeling - Lookout Tower Part 2

By Bram van Gerwen

its Z value to 50 and hit enter, immediately you will see all the steps gaining in length and the gaps between them are closed.

Tutorial

The spiral stairs are finished, rename the group to 'Spiral Stairs'.

Copy the group and paste it into the Tower Start scene, you can switch open projects in the Window menu.

Set the H rotation of the spiral steps group to 95Âź in the coordinates manager, this will make the stairs reach the hole in the ceiling perfectly. We are finished with the staircase now.

Next we will create a row of ornamental supports for the battlement.

This will be done by means of modeling one support object and placing it in an Array object that can make automatic instances along a certain radius, very handy to make circles of objects while using only one object.

Create a new empty scene and create a cube and rename it to 'Support Ornament'. Set its properties to the following values: X 17, Y 51, Z 7 and its Y segments should be set to 3. This will make a very small object so zoom in on it. Make the ornament editable an select 2 upper polygons on a wide side like in picture 3/A. Select the Extrude tool (Structure -> Extrude) and set its offset to 7, the same as the Z length of the object, disable the realtime update and hit Apply. Ctrl click the lower selected polygon to deselect it and hit the New Transform button in the extrude options which should still be active if done right. We now have the basis of the object, and can add some details.

Go into a side view and zoom in on the object, then select the live selec-

tion tool, disable 'Only select visible elements' in its options and drag over the side of the object to select all side polygons, check picture 3/B for reference. Then select the Inner Extrude tool (Structure -> Extrude Inner), set its offset to 2 and then Apply. Inner Extrude extrudes along the same plane of the selected polygon instead of extruding in height along the normal of the selected polygon. With the extruded selection still active on both sides select the Extrude tool and set it to -2 and apply, this will extrude the selections inward creating a nice raised edge.

Create a hyperNURBS object (Objects -> NURBS -> hyperNURBS) and drop the ornament into it. We can see it being smoothed nicely, all we need to do now is add a couple of knife cuts to sharpen some of the roundings.

Deselect All polygons (Selection -> Deselect All), select the knife tool and set its mode to Loop. Cut two loops near the edges of the object along the width like in picture 3/C. Now switch to a side view, set the knife mode to Plane and set the plane field to X-Y and make two cuts like in picture 3/D. Then set the mode to X-Z and make the third cut near the bottom of the object, also in pic 3/D. The ornament is now finished so copy the ornament hyperNURBS object and paste it into the Tower Start scene.

Create an Array object (Objects >Modeling -> Array), rename it to 'Ornament Array' and drop the ornament NURBS object in there. You

22

will immediately see a couple of duplicates being arranged around the tower. Depending on which side you started to model the ornament it might be turned toward the tower instead of away from it which is what we want. If the flat side is not oriented toward the tower select the ornament object inside of the hyperNURBS and set its H rotation value to 180 and hit enter, you can immediately see all the array duplicates rotate 180Âź, see picture 4/A.

Switch to front view and set the Y position of the array object to 226.

This will align the ornaments nicely with the start of the battlement, but they are still not touching the tower, so set the radius of the array object to 223 to move the objects closer to the tower. Now that the ornaments are fitting nicely to the tower we can increase the duplicates, set the Copies in the array object to 36, creating a nice circle of supports, see picture 4/B. Now that the array is in place we can make it invisible for now by clicking the dot twice and do a little tweak on the windows, the straight top of the windows doesn't look that well so close to the ornaments.

While holding shift select the polygons adjacent to the tops of the windows like in picture 5/A, then select the move tool and move the polygons down over the Y-axis until the tops are nicely rounded, see picture 5/B, make sure you don't drag them too far so they start overlapping the

Basic Modeling - Lookout Tower Part 2

By Bram van Gerwen

Tutorial

selection 2 times so the entire murlon tops are selected. Then select the extrude tool and extrude with 4 offset. Almost done on the battlement addition, select the knife and set it to plane, set the plane field to X-Z and make 2 cuts at the top and bottom of the slanted sides of the

polygons below them. After this change select the loop selection tool (Selection -> Loop Selection) and select the front polygon loop in all three windows like in picture 5/C, select the extrude tool and set the offset to 3 and subdivisions to 1 and apply. The windows look much more defined after this action. Only the undersides are a bit to rounded still, select the knife tool (Structure -> Knife), disable restrict to selection, set the mode to Plane and the plane field to X-Z, then make a cut near the bottom of the windows, picture 5/D. While we're at it, make 2 cuts along the tilted surface under the battlements near the top and bottom like in picture 6/A. We'll continue on with an addition to the battlements.

Select the Rectangle Selection tool (Selection -> Rectangle Selection), disable 'only select visible elements', and in a side view drag a square over the top polygons like in picture 6/A. If you drag too far and select the row below it as well you can use

Selection -> Shrink Selection to remove them from the selection.

When the polygons on top of the battlements are selected use the Extrude tool, set it to 4 offset and apply, make sure subdivisions is set to 0, we want to make slanted tops on the murlons so we need the extrusion to make sharper corners.

Make another extrusion of 30 meters with the new transform button, result in picture 7/A. Now we need to make the top parts smaller, this can be done for all the tops in one go by using the Normal Scale tool. Every group that is in the selection sort of has its own central point by which each group will be scaled when using the normal scale tool.

Select the Normal Scale tool (Structure - Normal Scale) and set the scale field to 0% and hit apply once and new transform twice to scale the groups down, try to make a habit out of disabling the 'realtime update' option. If you look at the coordinates manager you will see the size of the current selection, we want the tops to be placed a little more inward so change the X and Z sizes to 420 each and apply, you will notice that with this standard scale method the entire group was scaled as a whole instead of by their own centers, result in picture 7/B. We now need to extrude the entire 'cap' of the murlons so we need to expand our selection, grow the

23

murlons to sharpen the edges, see picture 7/C. It's time to make the door and make the frame of the doorway a bit nicer.

We will make the door frame and the door by extracting a spline from the geometry of the current frame. select the polygons around the door like in picture 8/A and use the Select Outline tool (Selection -> Outline Selection), with the tool active click on the polygon selection and its outline edges will be selected. Now that the edges are selected use the Edge to Spline tool (Structure -> Edit Spline -> Edge to Spline), this will create a spline of the selection as a child of the tower body in the object manager. Select it and drag it out of the tower body.

Make the tower body invisible for now, then select the Point Tool (Tools -> Points) and with live selec-

Basic Modeling - Lookout Tower Part 2

By Bram van Gerwen

Tutorial

tion select the outer spline and delete it, we won't need that part, result in picture 8/B. Because the spline was extracted from straight polygons it is still linear and has no roundings, set its typ to B-Spline and the Intermediate points to Adaptive, this will give the corners automatic roundings without the need to use tangents, also enable Close Spline so there are no gaps in the spline.

Rename the spline to 'door spline' and select the Object Axis tool (Tools -> Object Axis), with this tool you can move the axis without the object moving. Switch to 4 views and you will see that the spline has taken its axis point from the geometry of the tower, which was simply at world 0, not a disaster, but we need to move the axis if we are to scale the spline properly.

So with the axis tool active set the Y position to -105 and the Z position to -215. This spline will function as an arrange spline first for a group of bricks which will be the door frame and second we will use it to create the door.

The axis now has a correct position to scale the spline, first switch back to the Model Tool (Tools -> Model) and set the Z position of the spline to -206, this will move the spline a bit back into the door frame and this way the bricks won't stick out when

arranged. In the coordinates manager set the Size field to Scale, set the Y-scale to 0.98 and the X scale to 0.92 and hit Apply, this is very subtle because we want the frame bricks to touch the inner door frame.

Switch to the Model Tool and create a Cube, rename it to 'Doorframe Brick', set its size to X 14, Y 6 and Z 14 and enable a fillet with a radius of 1, a nice flat brick. Just as with the spiral staircase we must create instances of the doorframe brick, this time duplicate the instance 35 times.

Select all 36 objects (not the null) and call the Arrange function, set it to Along spline and drag the door spline to the spline field, enable rotation and set it to +X and hit Apply. There, the bricks have been nicely arranged inside the door frame along the door spline, see picture 9. Now it's time to make the door.

Making backups of your arrange splines is usually a good idea if you are going to use them for other things, but not necessary here.

Switch to front view, select the door spline and in the coordinates manager set the size field to scale again, set the Y scale to 0.90 and the X scale also to 0.90 and hit Apply. The more we downscale the less perfect the spline will fit, so we need to make a couple of point

24

adjustments. Select the rectangle selection tool and go into Point Mode, drag across the lower half of the spline to select those points, you can grab the Y handle on the axis to move the points down without having to go into the Move Tool (Tools > Move), see picture 10/A. Now select the upper thinner part of the spline and move them a bit up, also go into scale mode with this bit and scale them a bit thinner across the X axis only so they are clear of the bricks, see picture 10/B, in the Scale Tool it's also possible to grab the axis handles and drag to scale, very handy.

The door spline is ready to be used to create the door, create an Extrude NURBS object (Objects -> NURBS -> Extrude NURBS) and drop the spline into it. The basis for our door is created, but we notice a lot of artifacts on it because the spline we extracted still has the curvature from the tower geometry, we need to flatten it, we are going to use a cube to flatten the spline against.

Create a cube and place it directly behind the spline, see picture 11, from the front view the spline must fit into the cube. Select both the Cube and the door spline and select the 'Project Spline across Surface' tool (Structure -> Edit Spline -> Project...). You will get a window where you can select a projection

Basic Modeling - Lookout Tower Part 2

By Bram van Gerwen

Tutorial

field, select XY plane and hit OK. If done correct the spline will be flattened against the surface of the cube, the cube is no longer needed and can be deleted. With no more artifacts on the door we can give it some nice caps.

Select the Extrude NURBS object and in the caps tab set the Start and End field to Fillet Cap, change the radius of both caps to 1. Now select the Object Axis tool and set its position values to X 42, Y -116 and Z 202, this will place the Extrude Nurbs object axis to the right of the door and will be able to function as a door hinge when we rotate that object, but depending on how far your cube was from your spline you might want to grab the Z axis and move it to corner of the door.

Switch back to the Model Tool and

move the Extrude NURBS object a bit forward into the doorframe so that it fits snugly, you can select the rotate tool now and grab the green rotation handle to open the door or change the H value by hand to open it, I opened mine 78Âź.

You'll notice the door is a bit thick, in the extrude NURBS object options change the last 20 value to 8 for a nice firm door.

That was it for part 2, you should now have a tower that looks like picture 12. More next month.

Have fun modeling, Bram

25

Character Modeling - Part 2

By Mark Gmehling aka Macling

Tutorial

Hey there Attackers! In this second part of my Newbie poly-by-poly Character Modeling tutorial- I'll focus on finishing the characters head by adding an ear and neck to the head and close the rest of the heads surface.

As always I try to make all steps easy to follow even for newbies or users/switchers of/from other 3D applications. I'm using C4D Rel.9, but you'll be able to follow even if you use an earlier version.

If you just want to follow this part and didn't follow part one, notice that I'm using the free easy-clone plugin- available here: http://www.spot4d.co.uk/plugins_eas yclone.html. Just download it and place it in your C4d plugin folder…A useful tool.

OK- lets go! I open the head I left in the past issue and switch to sideview(F3) to define the chin profile and neck by adding ten points with the add new points tool- make sure you selected the head object in the object manager/you're in point mode and you're holding the ctrl key while clicking to add points- PIC01. Then I rectangle select the new created

points and easy-clone them two times (Remember I always disable "only visible" in the rectangle selection tool attributes and use the live selection for selecting only visible areas) to move(E) them along the xaxis lining up with the vertical mouth poly flow- PIC02. Then I use the

Bridge Tool(B) to connect the point rows to polys PIC03/04- Switch your Hypernurbs on and off to get a clearer view.

Remember that you can realign the polygon direction by the Align Polygons Command in the Functions menu if you get black lines on the new poly surfaces (in earlier Cinema versions you find this command in the structure menu).

These lines are caused by wrong polygon normal direction which is caused by bridging in a contraclockwise direction. I don't really care about the clockwise direction while bridging or creating new polygons- I use to realign the polys via the functions menus align normals or reverse normals command.

Ok- now I tweak the points by moving(E) the outer polyrow a little bit back and tweak single points to define a rounded chin shape and a little fold below the mouth -PIC05.

Now I easy-clone the outer point row two times again and move the cloned point rows along the x-axis and back to the z-axis lining up with the mouth polyflow and bridge the

26

points to polys PIC06/07. After that I lift up the outer pointrows and lower

the pointrows at the symmetry axis to define the rounded shape of the neck- look at PIC08/09.

Now I go on to close the side of the head: I select the points shown in PIC10 and easy-clone them and move them along the z-axis lining

up with the polyflow. Then I bridge(B) them to polys PIC11.Now I repeat the same procedure with the points shown. Then I roughly

Character Modeling - Part 2

By Mark Gmehling aka Macling

bridge them together. After that I tweaked the points to prepare the base of the ear -PIC16/17. Before I go further I tweak the new vertical polyrows to ensure a round head-

tweaked the polys as alwaysPIC12/13 and focus on adding an ear:

Tutorial

shape from top view(F2) which means I'm moving(E) the new vertices slightly outward along the xaxis- PIC18.

delete the two polys shown herePIC22 and create them again but with another edge direction-(I used the Create new Polygons Tool in Point mode- PIC22/23) to define the ear "helix".

BLOCKING OUT THE EAR: A realistic ear is one of the most difficult tasks in organic modeling- I’ll show you a way here to block it out of an existing head mesh on the base of only a few polygons. I'm going to prepare an area consisting of eight polygons in the next steps which will be the base of the ear.

Now I live-select the eight polys shown in PIC24 and extrude themPIC25. Once again I change the Now I select the polys shown and extrude them inner(I) one time and shape the ear form basically out of these new points- PIC19/20. After that I extrude the tweaked polys (D) and then rotate(R ) them slightly in

I want to model it quite detailed, but not photorealistic: Switched to sideview(F3) I easy-clone the points shown three times- each time moving them back in z-directionPIC14/15- and as always paying attention to line them up with the other vertical polygon flow. Then

polyflow by deleting the two polys shown in PIC26 and create them with a flipped direction again(again

z-direction towards the front and move(E) it slightly back in z-direction-PIC21.

Next step is extrude inner(I) one more time, and now its going to be a little bit tricky: I need to change the polyflow- to do that, so I have to

27

switched to point mode with the create polygon tool)- PIC27/28.

Character Modeling - Part 2

By Mark Gmehling aka Macling

Back in polygon Mode I select the seven polys shown in PIC28 and extrude(D) them PIC29- after that I tweak the new points slightly to cre-

scale(T) them in a little bit. Then I tweak the bottom points to smooth the result out a bit.

Tutorial

To define the so called triangular fossa I change the polyflow of the polys shown in PIC35 with the known procedure- deleting in poly mode and creating again with the create poly tool in point modePIC36. ate points to define the inner ear helix or so called "Antihelix"- look at PIC30/31.

inner(I) -move(E) them inward (scale in x-direction a little bit to flatten them slightly) and adjust the points in Point mode to smooth out the result of the extrusion- PIC41/42.

The last step to finalize the ear is

the earhole/ the so called "meatus": I select the poly shown -PIC43 and extrude inner (I) them slightly and move them inward and extrude(D) I tweak the points and extrude inner(I) these polys-PIC37-move them slightly inward and scale(T) them smaller in y-direction and after that in x-direction to flatten themPIC38. Now I move(e) the points

And I change the polyflow a third time-delete these polys-PIC32 and create them with a flipped direction again- PIC33. Now I select these

again- PIC44. Look at PIC45 to see the extrude shape. OK- that should

(Pointmode) to smooth the "trifossa" shape -PIC39. eight polys shown in PIC34 and extrude(D) them inward and

Now I add the so called "concha" like this: selecting the six polys as seen in PIC40 and again extrude

28

be enough detail I think.

You will notice: the most time con-

Character Modeling - Part 2

By Mark Gmehling aka Macling suming part is the point-tweaking. I recommend you “google” a useful "human ear" pic that will guide you while point-tweaking. Before I go further I select all ear polys with the rectangle selection (with only visible disabled in sideview(F3)) Be sure to deselect (CTRL-select) the mouth cavity polys you might have selected too! I scale(T) move(E) and rotate(R) the ear into right size and place- Look at PIC46/47.

have to be tweaked to get a nicely rounded shape.

in the back head area- I bridge(B) new polys as seen in PIC56- a quite

Tutorial

After that I select the twelve points shown in PIC52 and easy-clone them one time, move them slightly back in z-direction and scale the yaxis smaller to bridge(B) them together - PIC53. I use these points to define the fold the jaw creates, so dirty solution, but I'll fix that later.

Now I switch to sideview(F3) choose the create new Points tool and ctrlclick five new points.

CLOSING THE HEAD-SHAPE: Moving on I close the head shape by easy-cloning pointrows several times and bridge them to polys. I start in sideview(F3) and select these three points -PIC48- easyclone them five times- orienting at

the horizontal polyflow to close the cheek area with the Bridge Tool(B)look at PIC49.

Then I select the two points shown PIC50 and weld them- PIC51 (Functions-Weld) together. (In earlier Cinema Versions you find this command for example by clicking the vkey: a menu appears containing the weld command.) Now the points

I move(E) the still selected points slightly inward in x-direction- PIC54.

To go further in closing the head I select the points 15 shown in PIC55

I easy-clone these points- PIC57 four times and move them along the x-axis, paying attention to line up with the vertical polyflow- PIC58- I bridge the points and the back head is closed. It’s point tweaking time again.

and easy-clone them- move them back to line up with the horizontal polyflow (…just scale(T), rotate(R) and move(E) the cloned pointrow to fit in the desired area) and bridge the new points to polys. You'll notice that I tweaked the points in a weird manner- PIC55- I did this because I want to reduce the number of polys

Now I focus on the neck area.I select the two points shown in PIC59 and weld (Functions-weld) them- PIC60. Then I bridge(B) the two faces shown in PIC61 to fill the gap- after that I select the points shown in PIC62 and weld them as before- the neck is closed too and

29

Character Modeling - Part 2

By Mark Gmehling aka Macling

Tutorial

looks nice after some point-tweaking.Take a look at PIC63/64 to see

where I did the last tweaks.

OK that's enough for this issueNext time I'll make some major

tweaks with the global head shape (and the mouth )- I refine the mesh a little bit and I'll add teeth and begin the modeling of the torso area. If you have questions, don't hesitate to contact me via pm at 3d attack.net. CU on board/ Keep on ATTACKING!

30

Landscape Tutorial Part 2

By Georg Niedermeier aka Sad

After you have done this select the sphere and the cylinder in your Object Manager and group it by clicking Objects -> Group. Doubleclick the newly created Null-Object and type the word Tree. Now you have given a name to the new object.

Tutorial

As promised, in the first part of our landscape tutorial, we will now focus on some details which we need in order to gain a realistic landscape: Fields, Buildings and other stuff.

We won't focus on a super realistic environment, but on a realistic overall appearance.

First of all let's create some minimalistic trees: create a cylinder that makes up our trunk and a simple sphere to simulate foliage.

Don't make it too big because it has to fit our landscape. The sphere of our tree has a radius of about 31 and 9 segments which makes it slightly lowpoly, but as I have said earlier, we don't aim for a super realistic tree. The trunk of the tree is made of the cylinder and has a radius of 3 and a height of 40 units.

Because we will be using quite a high number of trees in our scene, we can save memory by giving it only 1 Height Segment and approximately 10 Rotation Segments.

Sphere to the top of your trunk.

Make the tree to look like this one: Picture 27

Let’s head over to creating some fields.

Our two landscape objects are polygonal which allows us to select polygons and to use some very interesting modeling tools like extrude, bevel and others. These tools come in very handy for our project because any landscape will look much better if it isn't just a green plane, but a patchwork of different colors and heights.

Select the landscape object that sits next to our camera and switch to polygon mode. Zoom the selected landscape so it fits our top viewport Picture 28.

You might think that it could be avoided by rotating the landscape along the y-axis, but this is not an appropriate solution, because if we do that we will lose the nice landscape that we have created Picture 30.

Picture 30

Chapter 7 Picture 28

Switch to Rectangle Selection.

Picture 29

Picture 27

Picture 29

Paint a rectangle somewhere in your top view. You will see some visual feedback within the 3-D viewport that doesn't look very good because it gives a straight line for our selection. This would ruin the natural look that we are keen to create.

31

There exists a little trick (actually it is one of the standard tools) that we can use in order to get diagonal polygons: Deselect any polygons and chose the Knife tool. If you are working with another version other than Cinema 4d R9 you can use the tool as is. Users of C4D R9 need to make a setting to the tool before

Landscape Tutorial Part 2

By Georg Niedermeier aka Sad using it: Uncheck the Create N-gons option. Picture 31

Picture 32 Picture 31

And that's what's your 3-D viewport might look like: Picture 33

Tutorial

Now it is time to make some free, but rather diagonal cuts. The knife tool creates new edges to those polygons it touches. It is normal that this method produces triangles, but it will not disturb us.

Once you're finished with the cuts, choose the Polygonal Selection Tool, activate the option Tolerant Selection and make a selection of the newly created area. Activating Tolerant Selection helps to select polygons, because normally polygons are only selected if they are entirely surrounded by the rectangular or polygonal selector.

It is necessary that you make the selection very carefully because we don't want to produce a selection that appears too edgy. Remember that you can add polygons to your selection by pressing the shift key.

If you want to deselect certain polygons just hit the Ctrl key while selecting them. Don't worry if the selection has some edges.

It doesn't matter too much.

A polygonal selection will either be finished by clicking the starting point again or by pressing the right mouse button after you have made at least two left clicks. Your top viewport should look something like this now: Picture 32

Picture 34

In order to be able to texture the field, grow the selection via Selection -> Grow Selection and save it by clicking Set Selection in the Selection menu. The triangle on the right side of your landscape object in the object manager indicates that your selection has been saved.

Now you can see if you have understood what I have shown you:

Picture 33

Please notice that both cuts can be seen.

That the first selection from which we are going to create a field.

Click the Extrude Tool or select it from the Structure menu. Click the mouse button and move the mouse very, very little. Actually we don't want a normal extrusion because every polygon would be moved along its polygon-normal which would create some very flower power fields. You can try if you like, but please make sure to undo it after you have seen what would happen.

What we want is to have a field that grows straight up. So after you have made your very little extrusion click the green arrow in the center of the selection and move it up. Picture 34

32

Repeat that with the second landscape object starting from the very beginning of Chapter 7. Activate the second landscape object by clicking it in the Object Manager. Use the knife tool and make 2 parallel cuts so it appears like a street. Try to make sure that the selection can be seen in the 3-D viewport Picture 35.

Invert the selection Picture 36.

Picture 35

Make a very little extrusion and move it by clicking the green arrow.

Grow the selection 1 time and save

Landscape Tutorial Part 2

By Georg Niedermeier aka Sad

name like pole Picture 40. In order to finish the fence we need a bunch of wooden planks. The easiest way

Picture 36

Picture 38

Tutorial

it again. Now we have created some space for a street crossing the field.

Picture 37

Picture 37

Chapter 7 Adding More Details

Picture 40

Let's create a fence that separates the field from the street.

Switch to top view and move it so that the first landscape that we have created appears. Now select some polygons that will make the poles of our future fence. Try to make the selection as uniform as possible.

Picture 38 Make an inner extrusion. Make it as far as it is needed to look like a realistic pole. Not too thick and not too thin, that is. Orientate on the size of your tree Picture 39.

As we have done earlier with our fields, make a tiny extrusion and

to create it is to use a cube and to give it the shape we need. In top view you can adjust the length, while you have to use the left, right, frontal or back view in order to manipulate the height of the planks Picture 41.

Picture 39

after that move it up along the yaxis. Once you're satisfied with the poles, grow and save the selection because we want to be able to texture the poles differently. Before you save the new selection, make sure that the first selection isn't activated.

If it was it would be overwritten.

Make a single click at the new selection tag and assign a new

33

Picture 41

Landscape Tutorial Part 2

By Georg Niedermeier aka Sad If you switch back to Perspective View you will see how you have to rotate the planks and how you have to use them in order to model a nice fence. If you need more planks just copy the cube.

Because we don't want to create an animation, it will be sufficient to only model the fence where it will be seen by the camera.

Picture 42a

Once you're finished, it should look something like this Picture 42.

The Attributes Manager shows three subfunctions of the duplicate tool.

Activate all three of them via click dragging Picture 42b.

Tutorial

If you're wondering whether the tree that we have made earlier is too big

Picture 42c

Picture 43

function of Cinema4d. Switch to the Edge Tool and select the edges as shown below Picture 44.

Picture 42b

Picture 42

compared to the fence, then you're right. The tree needs to be scaled down a bit. Select the null-object that contains the models of which the tree is built and double-click its name. Rename it to Tree. Scale the tree down to your likes and create several instances of it.

The function is to be found in Functions > Duplicate.

Picture 42a

Enter a number of your choice and activate the Create Instances option.

Instances are copies of an object that take over the settings of the base object automatically. The base object is the object that has been active while executing the duplicate function. The instances can be found in the newly created Tree_copies Null-Object.

Spread the trees over the entire scene Picture 42c.

You will have been noticing that the edges of our fields are not straight and that they look as if they were built of blocks Picture 43. In order to correct that you will have to fiddle around with the Stitch and Sew

34

Picture 44

Now you need to activate the Stitch and Sew function found in the Structure Menu Picture 45.

Now click at a and drag it to b.

Picture 46. The result will look like this: Picture 47. Another example of blocky structure can look similar to this one: Picture 48.

You can change that by stitching

Landscape Tutorial Part 2

By Georg Niedermeier aka Sad

That's how it should look like after you have used the Stitch and Sew

Tutorial

Picture 48

Picture 45

Picture 49

function Picture 50. Don't relay too much on my example pictures because most of the time it won't look exactly the same.

Picture 46

Picture 50

Picture 47

two edges together as you have already done earlier Picture 49.

Play around with Stitch and Sew until you are getting used to this functionality of Cinema 4d. In our next part we will create the sky, some grass, and an agricultural building.

35

Emorpher: The Power of PLA Morphing

By Sebastien Florand aka Fluffy Emorpher, developed by Santiago Ramirez (aka Eaggo), is a wonderful morphing tool whose sole purpose is to deform a mesh. http://www.eggington.net/~eago/

Tutorial

The big advantage of it compared to other plugins and Posemixer, is that it doesn't need a copy of the mesh for each morph, it smartly uses a PLA (Point Level Animation) animated track that will define the different states, and morph these tracks together using sliders. No more heavy meshes to duplicate. No more keeping track of tens of copies. The only thing that Emorpher can't do, is to morph bone hierarchy, but Posemixer does this really well, so no problem.

First, we'll need a model to work with. As it happens, MrBurp here has not left for his Hawaiian vacations yet, so I'll keep using him for this tutorial [pic1].

features will have changed or not be available in previous versions.

1 - Emorpher : How it works >> First of all, you'll need to tell Emorpher which mesh to deform.

To do this, it needs a Null object that you will drop as a child of that mesh.

So track down your object, and drop a Null on it, as a child. Name that Null Object, with a unique name (here, I name it "Emorpher" - and use numbers after it if I have several characters). [pic2]

Picture 2

>> Right-click on the Null object, and you should have the Emorpher function listed at the main level.

Select it and it will create an Emorpher tag on the Null object.

By doing this, the plugin automatically sets up the default state of your morphing, by creating a keyframe in the PLA track of the object (we'll go check that later on in the tutorial), and pops up a window directly in "edit" mode (notice the checked "Edit" radio box). The Edit mode allows you to modify the mesh and record your changes [pic3].

Picture 3

The basic mesh is a simple, low resolution object dropped into a Hypernurb. In this tutorial, I will be using Cinema4D R9, so some of the

PLA keyframe that will define a state in the animation track, and as a result, a morphing. In the popup, you'll notice that a tab has been added, with a blank box and several buttons. In the blank text box, input a name for the morphing you want to create (here, I will name it "mouth closed"), and click on the left arrow.

This creates a Null object in the object manager, that will be used as a slider to drive that specific morphing. That Null object is named exactly as defined in the blank text box. [pic4]

>> Next, you need to create a morph state. Click on the "Add target" button. This creates a second

36

Picture 4

>> You can now start to edit your mesh and create your morphs.

As I named my morph "mouth closed", then I will close the mouth, using point mode or polygone mode.

I won't cover that part in detail, but here is the shape I will use as morph state. Once happy with your modeling, click the "refresh" button on the Emorpher popup.

This will refresh the state of that specific morph, based on how look your current mesh. The "refresh" button will help you redefine the state of the morph whenever you want make changes. It will refresh that specific state with whatever current deformation you have applied to the mesh at the moment you hit the button. [pic5]

Emorpher: The Power of PLA Morphing

By Sebastien Florand aka Fluffy

same number of points on the other side. If not, you'll have to set your mirror poses independently. To make sure that the pose is correctly mirrored, a neat function is available, which is the "Test" button. This function allows you to check the morph directly in edit mode, and see what's inside a morph. [pic7]

axis, on a value between 0 and 100 (of whatever unit you are using).

These Null objects are nice, but not really straightforward to use during the animation stage, so we will setup a simple system via Xpresso to link them to sliders that will appear in the viewport, for easier use. If you move the Null objects, you'll notice that they act as sliders. >> create a Null object, name it "morphings" and drop all your morph Nulls as a child of it [pic8].

Tutorial

Picture 5

>> Next, we'll create another pose.

Click the "Reset" button to reset your mesh at the default shape (the way it was when you applied the Emorpher tag on the Null object), and click the "Add target" button to create another morph state.

Name that morph, and click the left arrow to create a Null object that will be used as slider.

In my example, I will create a "surprised" state (which consist of a simple raised brow) to show you the use of mirroring poses. Once satisfied with the morphing, click the "refresh" button to make sure it is applied to that morph [pic6].

Picture 6

>> Now, we will mirror our "surpriseL" pose by clicking the "Mirror" button next to that state.

This action will create a new mirrored morph on the character. Make sur the character is symmetrical before doing this, or at least has the

Picture 7

>> In addition to the "Mirror" function, you will find the "Form object" function, which allows you to make a copy of the current state to start your morphs from that position if you wish. >> Create as many poses as you need and uncheck the "Edit" button once you are ready to use the slider system. Note that you can come back anytime on "Edit" mode by simply double-clicking the Emorpher tag to open the Emorpher popup and checking the "Edit" radio box once again. Click the "Test" button to come back to a specific state, tweak your morph and hit the "Refresh" button to save the changes on a specific state.

You can also create new ones at will, whenever you want.

Picture 8

2 - Sliders system

>> Next, we will create our own sliders system by creating User Data entries. Select the "Morphings" Null object, and in the attributes manager, go into the menu "User Data > Add User Data". In the User Data window, name the entry as your first morph (here "mouth closed"), set the interface type to "float slider", Unit to "real" and changed the maximum value to 100. This will map the User Data entry to the Null slider movements [pic9].

Emorpher's morphings are driven by Null objects, whose movements are automatically restricted to the X

>> Repeat the process for your other morphing states. You should now have 3 User Data sliders that

We are done with the creation of morph targets. We will now see how to actually use these morphs.

37

Emorpher: The Power of PLA Morphing

By Sebastien Florand aka Fluffy

>> Now, we will link these User Data entries to our different Null objects using Xpresso. Apply an Xpresso tag to the "morphings" Null object by right-clicking on it and selecting "cinema4D tags > Xpresso".

the "coordinates > position" menu. [pic13]

>> In the Xpresso editor, drop the "Morphings" Null and all you morph Null objects [pic11].

Picture 13

Tutorial

>> Link each User Data entry to the matching Null morph node (it is fairly important to name things properly if you want to identify them better). [pic14]

Picture 11

Picture 9

appear in the attribute manager when you click on the Null object "morphings" (if you make a mistake while creating the User Data entry, you can edit them anytime by rightclicking on the name of the entry and choose "Edit Entry" from the drop-down menu) [pic10].

>> In the Xpresso editor, click on the red square at the top right corner of the "Morphings" node, and select all the morphs in the "object properties" menu [pic12].

Picture 12

Picture 10

>> Next, click on the top left blue square of the Morphs Null nodes and select the "Position X" value in

38

Picture 14

>> You can now close the Xpresso editor window and check if the User Data sliders work properly by dragging some of them. You'll notice that the value of the User Data is used to input the value of the X position for each Null, thus moving them properly from 0 to 100 (as we set them up earlier) on the X position and allowing them in turn to drive our different morphs.

Finally, our system is in place and working, allowing us not to go inside and lose ourselves the hierarchy by placing everything together at the same spot. This little time we spent setting that up will save us a lot of time when animating. But we can make the system better yet by putting all these controls directly in the viewports, so as to not go into the object manager at all. Let's check it out.

Emorpher: The Power of PLA Morphing

By Sebastien Florand aka Fluffy >> select the "Morphings" Null objects, and select all your morphs entries (adding to the selection using the Shift key). >> Right-click on one of the entries, and select "Add to the HUD" function [pic15].

the viewport (it doesn't matter if you move the Null morph controls with it, but if you don't want to, press the "Ctrl" key and drag the "Morphings" Null to affect only that object and not its children [pic17].

track, since you shouldn't have begun animating yet. In my example, I have two more tracks animated [pic18].

Picture 18

Tutorial

Picture 15

>> Notice that all the entries we selected now appear in the viewport. Maintain the "Ctrl" key and drag the HUD element on the top left side of the viewport, as to not have it in the way. >> Finally, select the "Morphings" Null object and make it display a selectable shape by going into the Attribute manager and changing its display shape to "diamond" in the "Object" tab. Increase the radius as needed to be conformable. You can also change the color of the displayed diamond if it is easier to identify for you [pic16].

Picture 17

You have now a Null object that you can select in the viewport and that will display the morphs controls directly into the HUD, allowing you to have every needed controls at hand, without losing time by opening the hierarchy and looking for your morphs states.

3 - Protecting your painstaking work Last thing, we will make sure that we won't erase by mistake any of the hard work we've done by creating these morph states.

>> Select the "emorpher" track by clicking on its name, then send it to another layer using the "layer > Color selection > layer 7" menu.

Your track keyframes should turn the color of the layer you send them on (green in my example).

Then, lock the layer by clicking on the little lock icon under that layer's color box.

Every keyframe is now locked into that specific green layer and I won't be able to either select them or erase them by mistake. I also can mask the layer and hide the "emorpher" track if I wish to really keep that track out of my mind. [pic19][pic20]

As I explained at the beginning, Emorpher uses PLA tracks to create the morphings. These tracks contain keyframes that can be selected and erased if you don't pay attention to it. Our last step will then be to lock these keyframes in place and make sure we don't do something foolish.

Picture 16

>> Move the Null Object wherever you will be able to select it easily in

>> open the timeline and select "filter > show animated objects" to display all animated tracks in the timeline. Here, you should only have one

39

Picture 19

This step is really worth the little extra time, when you face what

Emorpher: The Power of PLA Morphing

By Sebastien Florand aka Fluffy would happen if you messed up : I hope you'll enjoy that plugin as much as I do, and I hope you enjoyed this tutorial. As usual, if you encounter any problem, don't hesitate to contact me on the 3D Attack forum, I will gladly help you.

Cheers, Fluffy

Tutorial

Picture 20

That's it, we are finished, you can now animate freely without worrying about anything except your art.

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40

Clothilde Drapes!

By Jamie Hamel-Smith

Ever wanted to have the curtains in your architectural animation billow in the wind? Or have some nicely tied drapes to compliment your interior layout? This month I am going to show you how to make the process simple and painless.

We are going to start with some billowing curtains. Firstly, we need something to hang the curtains from.

Create a Cylinder Primitive, oriented on the X-Axis, with the following settings; (Image 01).

Segments, and 15 Height Segments.

We do not need as many height segments as width segments for this exercise. Rename the plane and call it "curtain." Its width should be about 500, and its height should be about 600. Don't worry that the curtain is longer than the pole, we will fix that later. (Image 02) Position it as you

Now it's time to set up the Cloth, Select your "Pole" and "Curtain" objects, and choose "Make Editable" from the "Functions" menu, or use the default keyboard shortcut "c".

Clothlide will only work with polygon objects, so we have to make them editable before we can start working with the Cloth Tags. Right Click (cmd Click on Macintosh) the Curtain object and select Clothlide Tags > Cloth A "Cloth Tag" icon will appear next to the object, and this is where we will adjust all of our settings for the behavior of the cloth object.

Tutorial

Now, if we create a cloth object and just hit play, the cloth would fall into the endless abyss of Cinema 4D. We have to fix certain points of the cloth so that it hangs from these "Fixed" points. With the "Curtain" object selected, choose the points tool (Image 04) and select some Image 02

like, so that it looks like it is hanging from the "Pole" object. (Image 03) Image 01

Position it in your file as the pole that the curtain will hang from. Also, rename the object and call it "pole" The next step is to create the actual piece of cloth that will hang from the pole. One of the things to remember about using cloth in a 3D program is that the cloth will look better if it has more subdivisions (width and height segments).

Image 04

However, it will also take longer to calculate the simulation. We will try to strike a nice balance between the two. Start by creating a Plane Primitive and setting the orientation to the Z-Axis. We will use 35 Width

Image 03

41

points at the top of the curtain object. Try to select every 3rd point; this will give the look of the curtain being fixed to the pole at certain points along its length. (Image 05) With those points selected, select the Cloth Tag and go to the "Dresser" page. Click the "Set" button next to "Fix Points" (Image 06).

The points that were selected should turn bright pink. They are now "Fixed." Go to the "Animation" menu and select Frame Rate > All frames, if it is not already selected.

Clothilde Drapes!

By Jamie Hamel-Smith

that it fits the length of the Pole.

(Image 07) Hit the play button

Image 05

Image 07

Tutorial

again, the cloth should whip and bounce a bit as it readjusts to its new fixed points positions. Hit the stop button, go to the Cloth Tag and select the Dresser Page, next to the "Relax" button, enter 90 in the steps field.

Image 06

Click the play button and you should see the cloth relax a bit. Stop the playback, and save your file, call it "Curtain Set Up." Then go to the File menu and choose "Save As", we are going to work in a new file from this point on, because we want to come back to this step later on. Save the new file as "Cloth Blowing." In the Title Bar of Cinema 4D it should now say the name of your new file, and your Curtain Setup file should now be saved safely on your hard drive.

Select the Model Tool, and then select the Scale Tool, scale the cloth object on the X-Axis, resizing it so

testing, you may want to go to your project settings and change the duration to something over 10 seconds or 300 frames) Tweaking the settings in this tab will yield some interesting results, especially the "Wind Turbulence" value. Another great tip to increase the realism of the wind blowing is to animate the wind strength.

Making your Curtain Object a child of a "Cloth Nurbs" object can also give you some more options to play with, such as the Subdivision option, which works similarly to the HyperNURBS object and there is also the thickness option. You can find this object under Plugins > Clothlide > Cloth Nurbs. Save and close your "Curtain Blowing" file.

(Image 08)

Hit the Relax button, and watch the cloth as it relaxes into its new state.

If the cloth still seems like it needs to relax a bit more and come to rest, simply hit the relax button again.

Now we have folds in our drapes.

You may notice some sharp creases in the curtain near the top; these are a result of the Phong Tag's angle limit.

To remedy this, simply select the Phong Tag for the Curtain, and deselect the "Angle Limit" check box.

This would be a good time to go back to the cloth tag, and under the dresser page, click the Set button to the right of "Init State". This will set the relaxed curtain, with folds and all, as the initial state of the cloth object.

Now we are going to play around with the "Forces" page of the cloth tag. Simply set the wind strength to 1, and hit play. (For this part of the

42

Image 08

Now we can open the "Curtain Setup" file that we saved earlier and do something a little different with the Curtain Setup.

When you open the file, if you set the time slider all the way back to zero, the curtain object should still look like the plane that it started out as. We are now going to explore another part of the Cloth Tag's settings, the "Belt" option. Belting allows you to attach parts of the cloth to other objects. We will start

Clothilde Drapes!

By Jamie Hamel-Smith

by creating a cube, with the following dimensions, X=600, Y=20, Z=10.

After adjusting the dimensions, set the Segments X to 20. Position the cube so that it is about 他 ways down the curtain. Your scene should now look like the one in the following image; (Image 09)

onto the Tie object. To do this we must select the Curtain's Cloth tag and select the Dresser Page once again, and drag the Tie object from the Object Manager into the space that says "Belt on:" The next step is to select the points on the Curtain object that are the closest to the Tie object (Image 11)

Tutorial

Image 11

Image 09

Make the cube editable, ("c" Key) and rename it "Tie" Create a "Wrap Deformer" Use the "Transfer Function" to send the wrap deformer to the same coordinates as the "Tie." Enter the following values into the Wrap Deformer and make the wrap deformer a child of the Tie object.(Image 10)

Image 10

Everything is now set up. We can now "Belt" the points of the curtain

We can now click the "Set" button next to "Belt Points" and you should see some yellow lines going from the points to the nearest polygons to them. This shows which points are belted to which polygons.

Now would be a nice time to go to File > Save As and save the file as "Curtain Tied" Next step is to hit the play button and see the effects of the belting.

You should see the cloth relax much like in the first part of the tutorial, except that the "belted points" should stay put.

Similarly to the first part of the tutorial, you should press play, then stop, followed by scaling the object (with the Model tool) on the X-Axis until the top of the curtain fits the length of the pole. After the Scaling, press play again, and see it jump and whip around as it readjusts to its new "Fixed Positions." Press stop and use the Relax button in the Cloth Tag on the Dresser Page to allow the curtain to return to a more

43

stable and relaxed state. Your file should now look like this; (Image 12)

Image 12

The next step is to animate the parameters of the Wrap Object so that it "Curls Up" and takes the curtain along for the ride. Turn on Automatic Keyframinig and activate the Parameter Icon (Image 13) then

Image 13

set the time slider to 4 seconds, and adjust the Tension and Width Parameters of the Wrap deformer as shown; (Image 14) Return the time slider to zero and turn off Automatic

Image 14

Clothilde Drapes!

By Jamie Hamel-Smith

Tutorial

Keyframing. When you playback the animation, the wrap deformer should curl the cloth up into a bunch at the center of the "Tie" object. And give you something similar to this; (Image 15) you can now make the

Image 15

"Tie" object a child of a HyperNURBS object to smooth it and also make the "Curtain" object a child of a Cloth Nurbs object and it will look much smoother. You should also delete the Cloth Tag if you are pleased with the result and would like to keep the cloth still. (Image 16)

Image 16

44

Fireworks with Thinking Particles!

By Bjoern Marl aka “Srek�

Tutorial

In this tutorial I will show you how to create a Thinking Particles setup to generate a firework with several rockets and different explosions.

The main thing behind a firework with particles is spawning. Spawning is the process of new particles being created based on an older particle.

In this tutorial it is used for two things. The smoke or fire trail of the rocket. The sparks created by the explosives

matrix which in turn is used to align the trail particle emitter. This way the trail particles move in the opposite direction then the rocket. This has to be done throughout the lifetime of the rocket, so it is not suffident to do this on emission. PPass set to the rocket particle group does the trick here. <Image04>

Both are pretty different. The trail is created continuously throughout the flight of the rocket while the sparks are only created at one point in time, when the rocket explodes.

Also, the trail particles will move in the opposite direction as the rocket while becoming slower, whereas the sparks can move in any direction you want.

Image 01

Since in reality the trail consists of very lightweight particles they are strongly influenced by air friction.

You can use PFriction for this and limit it to the trail by using the Trail particle group for PPass <Image05>

Image 05

In this example we will create all elements of the firework as particles: rockets, trails and sparks.

Additionally, to the main text of this tutorial you will find a good number of remarks within the Xpresso setup.

The scene itself is rather simple and only consists of the visible lights which are used as particle shapes, the particle geometry object to make them visible and some Nullobjects to control things like gravity direction and to host the main Xpresso expression that does all the work. <Image01> To differentiate between the rockets, the trail and the sparks different particle groups are used. <Image02> All particles are subject to gravity influence. By using the parent group "All" for Ppass you can address all particles in all groups at the same time <Image03>.

The rocket emitter is based on

Image 04

The sparks, as well as the trail, are made of visible lights with no illumination. Lens effects can be used too.

The sparks are created at the moment the rocket particle dies.

This can be determined by the PAge node. It allows to detect a number of events related on the particles age or a change of group.

Image 02

Image 03

PStorm and a Nullobject (Launcher) for positioning and alignment. The only thing special on this emitter setup is the inversion of the rocket velocity that is used to create a

45

With Type set to Die the node will give us a boolean True value on the frame the particle dies. This triggers a PStorm node set to Shot which produces the stars. By using the rockets position for the PStorm node the sparks are generated at the position of the rocket. <Image06> Since a real firework usually has several types of rockets it's only logical to build a setup that can create

Fireworks with Thinking Particles!

By Bjoern Marl aka “Srek”

Tutorial

Image 06

more than one type. By using a random value this setup creates two types of sparks. The random node is fed the Random Seed value that comes with every particle. This ensures that the generation of random numbers is repeatable. In the example the nodes related to boolean operations are minimized to save screen realestate. The logic behind this is rather simple. The random node creates either a true or false value. A true value should create a spark of the Spark1 type while a false value should create a Turbulent Spark. It goes like this: IF Rocket dies AND Random is TRUE THEN create Spark1.

IF Rocket dies AND Random is NOT TRUE THEN create Turbulent Spark.

You can vary the way the sparks are emitted with the parameters of the PStorm nodes. In this example the Spark1 sparks are emitted spherically while the Turbulent Sparks are emitted in the direction of flight. This is done by aligning the spark emitter to a matrix calculated from the rockets velocity.

should be created <Image07> <Image08>

Image 07

Image 08

If you have questions or problems regarding this tutorial then please feel free to post on our forum at: http://www.3d attack.net

If you want to create more then two types of sparks the Condition node and a random integer value are a good option to select which shape

See you Bjoern Marl aka “Srek”

46

Prize Fight Round 2 Winners!

By Tavy Ann

PRIZE FIGHT ROUND 2

On November 17, 2004 MAXON and 3D Attack presented Round 2 of "THE PRIZE FIGHT". The "PRIZE FIGHT" is a 3 Round competition where our entrants battle it out in drawing, modeling and animating an Olympic character of their choice.

In December we brought you the results from Round 1 and our 5 winning entries. This month it's time to take a look at our winners from Round 2, the modeling Round.

Each entrant had to model, in CINEMA 4D, the Olympic Character they drew in Round 1. The two top models were to win the CINEMA 4D R9 XL Bundle, but because the models were so well done, MAXON and 3D Attack had a very difficult time picking just two and closed Round 2 with 10 winning entries. All of the winning models were created in MAXON's CINEMA 4D. All 10 of or our winning entries from Round 2 will be advancing to Round 3, the animating Round. They will fully rig and animate their Olympic Character from Round 2 using the tools in CINEMA 4D's MOCCA module for a chance to win the CINEMA 4D R9 Studio Bundle and a trip to SIGGRAPH 2005, in Los Angeles California.

Be sure to keep following our entrants in Round 3 on our forum at www.3d attack.net. Not only will this be an exciting Round, but an educational one as well.

Our Round 2 winners are: Oliver Wuensch, Floris Drupsteen, Rogerio Lima, Mac Andre, Alexander D. Remizov, Sergio Garces, Juergen Jaekel, Mark Gmehling, Antoine Aurety and Sebastien Florand.

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Prize Fight Round 2 Winners!

PRIZE FIGHT ROUND 2

By Tavy Ann

Sebastien Florand (Fluffy)

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Prize Fight Round 2 Winners!

PRIZE FIGHT ROUND 2

By Tavy Ann

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Best of CINEMA 4D

Some of the best artists around the world using CINEMA 4D

Image: Just Do It, Nike Sneaker Artist: Sven Kallinich (nutriman) Country: Germany Website: www.realiez.de Date created: January 21, 2005 Software: CINEMA 4D R8

Artist Comments: What can I say, luv Nike, luv computer graphics... here's the result ;-). People have been asking me if I did the seams by texturing. Nope, they're modeled by having splines projected on to the shoe and a lot of low poly instances of one hole and a piece of thread which are aligned to these splines.Next challenge would be a pic of these kicks the way they look now....worn out, dirty - say hi to the bodypaint manual :-) The Nike Logo is Trademark of Nike, Inc

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Image: Ferrari 250 GTOl Artist: Zoltan Sostai Country: Hungary Website: http://supremacy.zenesznet.com Date created: December 2004 Software: CINEMA 4D R9, Paint Shop Pro 7

Artist Comments: The hardest part was the shader work.

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Image: "Junk" Artist: Jacob Saariaho (Cpt.Jack) Country: USA Website: www.cptjack.net Date created: October 20, 2004 Software: CINEMA 4D

Artist Comments: I started this little guy a while back, but I got bored and moved on. Months later, I was cleaning up my hard drive when I opened his file and saw this unfinished head and torso looking out at me. It was hilarious, he looked so pathetic and forgotten. I knew I had to finish him.

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Image: Milan Condominium Artist: J.Carlos Pérez Ponce Country: México Website: www.infograficagdl.com Date created: September 04 Software: CINEMA 4D

Artist Comments: Interior view of the living and dining spaces of a condominium located in Milan street, Monterrey México.

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Image: Pussy Gatto Artist: Ben Jerrems Country: Australia Website: http://www.renderosity.com/gallery.ez?ByArtist=Y&Artist =Beanzvision Date created: September 2004 Software: CINEMA 4D XL7

Artist Comments: I found a great use for lights....don't use them! This image was created by using the Luminance channel on all the textures. Giving it that flat 2d "toon look". Image inspired by the late "great" Eyvind Earl, an amazing Disney artist.

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Editor’s Notes Hello there Readers and Attackers!

We just wanted to take the time to thank all of our forum members and readers for all of your wonderful support. With out your participation on the forum and the feedback you give on the magazine, we wouldn’t be able to bring you every thing we do each month.

Once again, thanks for the support and dedication.

or article, or have your software or plug-in reviewed by 3D Attack, please click on the following link for instructions: http://3d attack.net/3d Attack/viewtopic.php?t=1405 All submissions must be e-mailed to Attention: Tank at 3d attack@3d attack.net CINEMA 4D R9 For Sale

The 3D Attack Team

If you are interested in purchasing a never used, unopened copy of CINEMA 4D R9 Studio Bundle for a very reasonable price, contact Georg Niedermeier at sad@3d attack.net.

Only serious inquiries need apply.

RSS Feed on the Forum

Advertising with 3D Attack

Our new forum also has a nice new feature: RSS - Really Simple Syndication. This actually means that you can get the latest posts without even visiting our forum. You can simply get it via mail or a RSS news reader, so you will always be up to date on things. RSS is actually still pretty new on the web, but it’s growing rapidly and more and more sites are using it. We wanted to jump on the train and bring you this great feature. To find out how to enable RSS check here: http://3d attack.net/forum/showthread.php?t= 1326

If you would like to advertise with 3D Attack send us an e-mail requesting our media kit and rate card. 3d attack@3d attack.net

Best Regards,

Friends of 3D Attack™ www.doschdesign.com www.maxon.net www.3duser.com.tw www.3dtotal.com www.cgtalk.com www.c4dcafe.com www.cinema4duser.com www.cactus3d.com www.3dfluff.com www.spot4d.co.uk www.3darena.de www.frenchcinema4d.com www.sadbatu.de www.C4dHotline.it www.peXel.de www.cgchannel.com

www.c4dmodelshop.com

Attack of the HORRIFIC BLOB Be looking for the Attack of the HORRIFIC BLOB Part 2 in the April issue of 3D Attack - The CINEMA 4D Magazine.

Dosch Design Be sure to visit our friends at Dosch Design www.doschdesign.com.

Check out their wide selection of innovative and easy to use computer graphics products.

THE MAGAZINE ON CD

Tutorial and Article Submissions

www.ambientlight.co.uk www.bubbles4d.com www.mediaworks.fr www.3dlinks.com www.cgchina.com www.c4dzone.com www.c4d-pl.org *3D Attack the CINEMA4D Magazine and all material contained therein are copyright protected. You may not disassemble or distribute any

Tutorials Be sure to visit the 3D Attack shop and check out our new Magazine Collection on CD. 8 complete issues and extra Goodies on one CD! http://www.3d attack.net/shop/

www.black-graphics.de www.tarabella.it/C4d/ www.sharbor.com www.planit3d.com www.cartesiuscreations.com www.c4d.allplanforum.com www.renderosity.com www.designerinaction.de www.3dweave.com www.scifi-meshes.com

part of this publication without prior written consent from 3D Attack directly. Any attempts to do

If you have questions concerning a specific tutorial or want to show us a tutorial you have completed, feel free to post your questions and work on our C4D discussion forums at www.3d attack.net.

so will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law as it applies in Michigan, USA. This applies for both 3D Attack material as well as any named artist contained in its publications.

Although we read through all the tutorials and proof-read them for errors we cannot guarantee that they are 100% error-free and therefore can-

If you would like to submit a tutorial

not issue refunds based on those errors.

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Keep on attacking...

By Sir Gong

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