Archive notice: This article was originally published on August 5, 2014. Links and embedded videos are preserved as part of the historical record.
The first change is the new start screen – but do not be alarmed, although there are new features behind it, you will still be able to use C4D.
The Content Browser
A lot of new material can be found in the Content Browser – for example, the new Reflection Channel, many high-resolution materials and models, and professional Motion Graphics setups can be added with a few clicks and changed to your heart’s content. Here, for example, there is a parametric spiral staircase that can be adapted to a building with just a few steps. Similar scenes offer parametric windows and doors or a paved floor. Entire storeys can be created with the House Builder by simply cutting a floor area where walls are to be created. Windows and doors can be added through splines, and materials can be dragged onto already prepared selections.
Motion Tracker
One of the completely new features is a Motion Tracker 0, so it is now possible to do without third-party programs or plug-ins and calculate and integrate 3D camera moves directly in C4D. What is interesting is that although everything can be set and adapted to your heart’s content, the one-click solution, as is sometimes needed for small tasks, nevertheless works perfectly well.
Material System
The material system forms another focus of the new features. The shading models and, above all, the handling of gloss and reflections have been fundamentally changed – reflections and gloss can now be arranged in separate layers one above the other, each with numerous settings for roughness, relief or normal, anisotropy, Fresnel and similar. This reorientation of the material system enables a physically correct material structure for the first time, as is required for metallic paint finishes, for example.
Modelling and Sculpting
Cinema 4D is certainly well positioned in the field of modelling. The available functions leave hardly anything to be desired. Nevertheless, the necessary evil remains that it is often necessary to switch between different tools and functions. First the knife cuts a surface, then it is selected, extruded and scaled. Hotkeys and keyboard shortcuts naturally shorten the switch between such functions for experienced users, but why not simply invent a combined tool that brings together all common modelling functions?
This is exactly what happened with the new Polygon Pen. With this tool, you can create new points, edges and points, as well as cut and extrude edges and polygons or use the Bridge function. New elements snap directly onto existing structures when dragged, so after a short time you wonder how you ever managed without these functions. A special mode enables interactive subdivision and curved rounding of edges, as well as the simple painting of entire polygon strips. A collision calculation with stored geometry can also be taken into account. A dream when retopologising sculpting meshes.
Also not to be underestimated for modelling is the new Bevel Deformer. It offers the same options as the Bevel function, which was greatly expanded with Release 15, but remains completely parametric. This means that you can edit or even animate the rounding of a point, an edge or polygons at any time. The deformer can be limited to selections or specific Phong angles. Several of these Bevel Deformers can act on the same object. It fits with this that the Boole Generator is now also able to create an invisible selection at the collision edges between cut objects, which can be read directly by the Bevel Deformer.
Rendering
New is a Reflectance Channel that allows reflections and mirror reflections within a single material channel, as well as multiple layers for precisely controlling complex surfaces. A "Bi-Render Engine" is also involved: the new raytracing engine for hair and Sketch&Toon effects within one render pass allows styles to be mixed, and the Team Render Server is now also on board – the additional client-server architecture for Team Render to control render jobs via a web interface.
And here is the video with examples….
In the upcoming issue of Digital Production – issue 2014:06, you will then see in detail what new features there are.
