Maxon Cinema 4D 2023: A Detailed Guide to MoGraph

Maxon Cinema 4D 2023:

A Detailed Guide to MoGraph

Discover the MoGraph module and unleash

your capabilities as a Cinema 4D artist

Pradeep Mamgain

Maxon Cinema 4D 2023: A Detailed Guide to MoGraph

© 2023 Neurons Factory. All rights reserved.

Except for brief excerpts used in critical articles or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the publisher’s prior written permission.

NOTICE TO THE READER

Electronic Files

This textbook’s electronic file in whatever form is licensed only to the original user and may not be transmitted to any other party.

Disclaimer

There is no patent liability assumed in connection with the use of the material included herein. Despite the fact that every precaution was taken in the preparation of this book, neither the author nor Neurons Factory, or its dealers or distributors, will be held accountable for any damages caused or alleged to be caused by this book, directly or indirectly. All terms recognized to be trademarks or service marks in this book have been written correctly. Neurons Factory cannot guarantee the accuracy of this information. The use of a term in this book does not affect the validity of any trademark or service mark.

Book Code: NFB004TD03

Acknowledgments

My gratitude goes out to all those who supported me during the writing of this book. This includes those who provided guidance, shared their comments, and assisted with editing, proofreading, and design.

Thanks to:

Parents, family, and close friends.

I extend my appreciation to my mentors and teachers for their valuable insights and guidance, which have been of great advantage to me.

I express my gratitude to all the students I have taught in the different institutions. Their participation has enabled me to learn new things about computer graphics that were previously unknown to me.

Everyone at Maxon [https://www.maxon.net]

Finally, thank you for picking up the book.

About the Author

I’ll keep it short: I am a digital artist, instructor, and consultant, and the founder of Neurons Factory. My expertise in computer graphics is self-taught, and the Internet, where remarkable artists generously share their knowledge on YouTube, has been my primary learning resource. I enjoy guiding young aspiring 3D artists in their journey towards becoming professionals in the 3D animation and visual effects field. I have assisted my students in securing satisfying careers in these industries.

For nearly fifteen years, I have been involved in CGI. My primary software tools are Maya, 3ds Max, Cinema 4D, Photoshop, Nuke, After Effects, Filmora, and Fusion. In addition to computer graphics, I have an interest in web design/development, digital marketing, and search engine optimization.

You can contact me by sending an e-mail to [email protected].

Preface

The book "Maxon Cinema 4D 2023: A Detailed Guide to MoGraph" offers a step-by-step explanation of the entire process of creating MoGraph animations in Cinema 4D, providing comprehensive coverage of each stage. For beginners and intermediate users of the software, this book serves as a valuable resource, offering valuable insights into essential concepts and techniques for developing MoGraph animations. Prior to commencing the core MoGraph module, the book acquaints readers with animation tools that aid in the creation of MoGraph projects. Additionally, the book provides guidance on creating light presets using the XPresso module, allowing for efficient illumination of MoGraph scenes.

With a practical and methodical approach, this guide instructs readers on the fundamental principles of MoGraph, complemented by real-world examples to enhance their proficiency. The chapters are structured in a progressive manner, with each subsequent chapter expanding upon the previous one, comprehensively covering all essential aspects of MoGraph, such as fields, effectors, and a diverse range of MoGraph generators and deformers. By following the tutorials, readers can acquire a broad skill set that can be combined to produce high-quality MoGraph animations.

This book provides an abundance of helpful tips, tricks, notes, and cautions, making it a valuable resource for individuals seeking to enhance their Cinema 4D MoGraph skills and streamline their workflow. It offers a comprehensive guide that teaches the essentials of the MoGraph module in Cinema 4D, presented in an easily understandable manner without the use of technical jargon. The included tutorials provide clear, step-by-step instructions on how to accomplish various tasks using Cinema 4D. Upon completion of the book, readers will possess the knowledge and skills necessary to produce visually appealing animations.

What are the key features of the book?

• A comprehensive explanation of animation tools

• Guidance on setting up lighting to efficiently illuminate scenes

• In-depth coverage of MoGraph effectors, deformers, and generators

• Bonus tutorials to further enhance understanding and skills

• More than 30 tutorials are included, along with before and after files.

• Additional guidance is provided in the form of tips, notes, and cautions.

• Important terms are in bold face so that you never miss them.

• The material presented under the heading "What just happened?" provides an explanation of how the instructions are functioning.

• Under the "What next?" heading, the content outlines the steps that should be taken after completing a particular step or set of steps.

• The resources for this textbook include an ePub file that contains color images of the screenshots and illustrations featured in the book. These images are provided to enhance the learning experience and are included as part of the resources.

• Access to the starting and ending states of each tutorial, as well as the resources used in the tutorials, is available to you.

Who this book is for?

• Beginners and intermediate users of Cinema 4D

• Digital artists

• Motion graphics artists

• Indie game developers

• And anyone who wants to learn Cinema 4D

Prerequisites

• No prior experience is required, beginners friendly

• Cinema 4D software installed on a computer or laptop

• Eagerness to learn and grow

• Willingness to be awesome

How this book is structured?

This book is divided into the following chapters:

• Chapter 1 - Understanding Keyframes and Animation: In this chapter, you will be introduced to the animation tools available in Cinema 4D. The content will cover the creation and editing of animations.

• Chapter 2 - Introduction to MoGraph: In this chapter, the fundamentals of MoGraph are covered. Prior to delving into the basics, readers will learn how to create a light setup to efficiently illuminate scenes in Cinema 4D.

• Chapter 3 - Effectors: The primary focus of this chapter is on effectors, detailing how to use them to modify various aspects of clones, objects, object points, and object polygons such as location, size, angle, and more.

• Chapter 4 - Fields: In this chapter, readers will be introduced to the concept of fields, which can be utilized to control the spatial strength of their effect.

• Chapter 5 - Other MoGraph Objects: This chapter provides an explanation of various MoGraph generators and deformers.

• Chapter 6 - Bonus Tutorials: This chapter offers additional bonus tutorials that provide readers with the opportunity to further enhance their skills.

Conventions

Icons Used in This Book

Important Words

Important words such as the name of menu items, tool names, dialog box or window names, button names, and others are emphasized in boldface for better visibility and to highlight their importance. For example:

Select Options from the left pane. In the Options area, change Ray Depth to 6, Reflection Depth to 3, and Shadow Depth to 3. Clear the Automatic Size checkbox and then expand the Automatic Size area. Then, change Bucket Width and Bucket Height to 32 each.

Figure Numbers

Figure numbers are assigned in the following order: Figure 1, Figure 2, and so on. In tutorials, the sequence is reset at the beginning of each tutorial.

Naming Terminology

LMB, MMB, and RMB

These abbreviations stand for the left, middle, and right mouse buttons, respectively.

MEV Menu

This abbreviation stands for menu in editor view. It depicts the menubar in each Cinema 4D viewport.

Tool

When you click an item in a palette, toolbar, manager, or browser, a command is executed to create/edit an object or do some activity, that item is referred to as a tool. For instance, the Move tool, Rotate tool, Loop Selection tool, and so on.

Right-click Context Menus

Right-click menus (see Figure 1) are contextual menus in Cinema 4D that allow rapid access to commands/functions/tools linked to the presently selected entities.

Hidden Menus

Cinema 4D includes a number of hidden menus. These menus allow you to easily select tools, commands, and functions. The M menu, for example, provides easy access to modeling tools. For example, if you wish to launch the Extrude tool, hit MT (see Figure 2).

Check Box

A small box (labeled 1 in Figure 3) that, when selected by the user, indicates that a certain feature has been enabled or a specific option has been selected.

Drop-down

A drop-down (abbreviated drop-down list; also known as a drop-down menu, drop menu, pull-down list, or picklist) is a graphical control element (labeled as 2 in Figure 3) similar to a list box that allows the user to select one value from a list.

Button

The term button (also known as a command button or push button) refers to any graphical control element (labeled as 3 in Figure 3) that allows the user to easily start an event, such as searching for a query, or interact with dialog boxes, such as confirming an action.

Window

A window (labeled 4 in Figure 3) is a discrete viewing area on a computer display screen in a system that supports numerous viewing areas as part of a graphical user interface (GUI).

Dialog Box or Dialog

An area on screen (see Figure 4) in which the user is prompted to provide information or select commands.

Trademarks

Windows is the registered trademarks of Microsoft Inc. Cinema 4D is the registered trademarks of Maxon Computer.

Access to Resources

This book is available through a variety of distribution platforms. If you do not have access to the resources used in this book, you can request them by visiting the following link: https://neuronsfactory.com/contact.

Tech Support

Neurons Factory’s technical staff is always accessible to address your technical questions. If you encounter any technical difficulties while using the textbook, please contact the author at the following address: [email protected].

Errata

We have made every effort to assure the accuracy of this book and its accompanying content. Please contact us if you see a problem so that we may improve the book’s quality. If you find any errors, please report them at https://neuronsfactory.com/errata.

This will alleviate the annoyance of other readers. Your errata will appear in the errata section of the book’s web page once confirmed.

Chapter 1: Understanding

Keyframes and Animation

Animating a 3D object or character involves bringing it to life. Cinema 4D’s "4D" refers to the fourth dimension, time. To create an animation, you have to modify and document the object’s properties over time. This process results in the creation of an animation. By playing the animation, each frame is presented in rapid succession, giving the impression of movement. This chapter will teach you about the fourth dimension.

Animation Palette

Located beneath the viewport, you will find the Animation palette, which is made up of three primary components: the Timeline Ruler (identified as "A" in Figure 1), the Powerslider (identified as "B" in Figure 1), and the Animation Toolbar (identified as C in Figure 1).

Timeline Ruler

The Timeline Ruler is comprised of two sections. Clicking on the top portion allows you to see the present image in the view, while the lower half displays the keys of the active objects and selections. By using the 1 and 2 hotkeys, you can adjust the size or location of the ruler.

Powerslider

Positioned in the lower-left corner of the Animation palette, the Powerslider enables you to swiftly move throughout the timeline. Adjusting the length of the Powerslider is possible by dragging the corrugated lines located at the left or right end, as shown in Figure 2.

By double-clicking on the grayed-out frame numbers located at each end of the Powerslider, you have the option to establish a preview range. In Figure 2, the grayed-out frame numbers are indicated as 10 and 50. In order to stretch the Powerslider to encompass the entire duration of the project, you can press Ctrl A while clicking on the timeline.

Double-clicking on the Powerslider allows you to alternate between its previous and current states. Holding down the Alt key while dragging one end of the slider will proportionally scale both ends. To skip to a particular moment in the animation, you can select a spot on the top portion of the Timeline Ruler. To view the animation, click and drag across the top half of the Timeline Ruler. In the event that you don’t want the animation to play in the viewport, drag while holding down the Alt key.

Animation Toolbar

Included in the Animation palette, the Animation Toolbar contains a collection of navigation and mode icons. These icons can be utilized for a variety of tasks such as playing an animation and specifying the recording mode.

Setting Animation Preferences

Before we delve into the methods of recording animation, let’s discuss animation settings. To access these settings, press Ctrl D; the animation settings will appear in both the Project Settings and Animation tabs of the Attribute Manager. In the following section, we will examine these tabs in further detail.

Project Settings Tab

The FPS (frames per second) parameter regulates the rate at which frames are displayed in the active document. This setting is uniformly applied to all animations produced within the scene.

Frame rate in the Render Settings window

The Frame Rate parameter in the Output section of the Render Settings window can also be used to set the frame rate. However, modifying this value will not recalculate the animation. It is important to note that in some cases, this may lead to a degradation in image quality, with frames potentially being skipped or duplicated during rendering.

The Project Time parameter indicates the current frame that the Timeslider is positioned at. The Minimum Time parameter determines the starting point of the animation tracks and can also be assigned a negative value. The Maximum Time parameter sets the concluding point for the animation. The Preview Min Time and Preview Max Time parameters specify the beginning and ending time of the preview range that appears in the Powerslider, respectively.

Animation Tab

The Animation tab contains settings that are utilized to establish the interpolation between the current key and the subsequent key. Cinema 4D features three interpolation options that you can define using the Type parameter:

• Spline: This is the default and most frequently employed interpolation type (illustrated in the first image in Figure 3) in Cinema 4D. It is utilized to develop animations wherein objects accelerate and decelerate.

• Linear: This interpolation type (illustrated in the middle image in Figure 3) maintains a constant value without any change.

• Step: When this interpolation type is selected (as shown in the last image in Figure 3), no interpolation occurs. The key value remains unaltered until the next value is attained.

If you have enabled the Overdub checkbox and a keyframe already exists, the interpolation type of the existing keyframe will be preserved when you record a new keyframe (only the value key will be replaced).

You can the Quaternion Interpolation parameter to temporally affect the Quaternion interpolation (the rotational values saved in the keyframes will remain unchanged).

What is Quaternion rotation?

You may be familiar with the term Gimbal Lock in the context of character animation. Gimbal lock happens when the rotation value reaches P +/- 90°, causing the heading H and banking B to have identical effects. This causes one of these dimensions to disappear entirely, leading to significant jumps in rotation, even for small rotations. To prevent Gimbal Lock, Quaternion ensures there is no unnecessary motion.

The Linear (SLERP) option animates temporally in a linear fashion (i.e., with identical velocity) whereas as the Cubic option casus the velocity near a keyframe to decelerate.

Recording keyframes in CINEMA 4D

There are various methods to create keys and tracks, as well as animation, in Cinema 4D. The following are the steps to do so:

1. Open animation-start.c4d and then invoke the Scale tool. Select Aeroplane in the Object Manager and then switch to the Attribute Manager > Coordinates tab. Scale the object; notice that scale values are not changing in the Coordinates tab.

2. Choose the Object tool from the Standard palette (see Figure 4). Next, scale the object; notice now the scale values are changing in Coordinates tab.

3. Undo to changes you made or reopen animation-start.c4d.

What just happened?

By enabling the Object mode, the scaling of an object also scales its axis system, unlike the Model mode where only the surfaces are scaled. This mode is ideal for animation work. When using the Scale tool in Object mode, the object axes are scaled instead of the surfaces themselves. Non-uniform scaling of an object in the Model mode can cause stretching or squashing of child objects during rotation, but this issue can be avoided by working in Object mode. It is recommended to use Model mode for modeling and Object mode for animation.

4. In the Animation toolbar, click on the Scale, Rotation, and Parameter icons to disable them (see Figure 5).

What just happened?

I have kept the Position icon enabled while disabling the other icons. This means that only the object’s position will be captured during animation recording. The Position, Scale, and Rotate modes are used to capture the object’s position, size, and orientation values respectively. The Parameter mode, along with key selections, allows you to capture only the selected parameters during keyframe recording. However, this does not apply to Position, Scale, and Rotation settings.

What next?

Now, we will animate the position of the Aeroplane from red cube to green cube.

5. Make sure the timeslider is at frame 0 (see Figure 6) and then click on the Record Active Objects icon in the Animation Toolbar to create a keyframe.

6. Move the timeslider to frame 30 (see Figure 7). Invoke the Move tool, select Aeroplane, and then move it along the x-axis to the green cube (see Figure 8).

7. Click on the Record Active Objects icon