December2005

ISSUE - DECEMBER 2005

Editors Notes

Page 4 3D Attack and Vital Disclosure Present “Story Time”

Page 6-11 Interview: Jana Rot by Tavy Ann

Page 13-19 JENNA Step by Step by Gary Zullo

PAGE 20 WIN Unity!

PAGE 21-23 zBlur - Working On A Project by Thomas Pasieka

PAGE 24-25 Modeling A Book by Bram van Gerwen

PAGE 26-27 Review: Discovering BodyPaint 2 & 2.5 by Mark Gmehling

PAGE 28-32 Interview: Dennis Miller by Tavy Ann

PAGE 33-35 Layered Shaders by Rui Batista

PAGE 36 Gnomon Workshop by Aaron Biscombe

PAGE 37-39 Artist Spotlight on Cornel Swoboda

PAGE 40-42 Best of C4D Gallery

Page 43 Attack Team

Page 44 Holiday Rendering by Sebastien Florand (Fluffy)

03

Editor’Editor’s Notess Notes

Contact Information

3D Attack

158 S. Saginaw St.

Chesaning, Michigan 48616 - USA

E-mail: [email protected]

Tutorials

If you have any questions or com-

ments regarding the tutorials within

the magazine, please feel free to

express them on or CINEMA 4D dis-

cussion forum at www.3dattack.net

Harvey Reitano 1924 - 2005

The December 2005 issue of 3D

Attack is dedicated to the memory of

Harvey Reitano. He will be remem-

bered with great admiration and

much love.

Attack the CINEMA4D Magazine and all material con-

tained therein are copyright protected. You may not dis-

assemble or distribute any part of this publication with-

out prior written consent from 3D Attack directly. Any

attempts to do 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 can-

not guarantee that they are 100% error-free and there-

fore cannot issue refunds based on those errors.

Happy Holidays Attackers!

The Holiday Season is upon us. A

time for giving, receiving, sharing,

caring, reflection and love.

In the United States the first holiday

of the winter season is

Thanksgiving. Although

Thanksgiving’s roots can be found in

our rich American history, many fam-

ilies find it to be a time to reflection

of all they are thankful for. 3D

Attack would like to take this time to

thank you, our readers. Thank you

for all of your support this past year.

You make our work worth doing.

May you and your families be richly

blessed throughout the holiday sea-

son and into the New Year.

Seasons Greetings,

The 3D Attack Team

***GOODIES FOLDER***

http://www.3dattack.net/goodies/

As most of our readers know, your

goodies folder usually comes zipped

with your magazine. We have

decided to do the Goodies a bit dif-

ferent. You will now find your

Goodies folder at http://www.3dat-

tack.net/goodies/ for download.

This allows us to make changes to

the Goodies folder easily, (if need-

ed) and provide you with the access

to the Goodies at all times.

Remember, the Goodies are copy-

right protected, as is the magazine.

These Goodies are for paying read-

ers only. DO NOT redistribute your

download link or your Goodies fold-

er.

BODYPAINT TRAINING DVD

Nigel Doyle (3DKiwi) of

C4dcafe.com has released his new

BodyPaint training DVD.

Discovering BodyPaint 3D 2 & 2.5

with 3DKiwi is now available for

purchase at:

http://www.c4dcafe.com/3dkiwi/bpsh

op/index.html

3D ATTACK RADIO

Yep, 3D Attack is now doing a radio

type broadcast. Our goal with the

radio show is to have fun and bring

our listeners CINEMA 4D related

information. While we are not pro-

fessionals in this area, we hope you

will enjoy the show. Be sure to

check it out on

www.3dattack.ne/radio, or subscribe

to our podcasts within ITunes.

Simply go to the "Advanced" menu

in iTunes and choose "Subscribe to

Podcast...". Enter this link:

http://www.3dattack.net/radio/3DAT-

TACK-CINEMA4DNEWS.xml

Advertising with 3D Attack

If you would like to advertise with 3D

Attack send us an e-mail requesting

our media kit and rate card.

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Reviews

If you would like 3D Attack to evalu-

ate and review your product, or if

you are a member of the press and

would like to evaluate and review

the 3D Attack line of plug-ins for

CINEMA 4D, feel free to contact

Thomas Pasieka at:

[email protected]

http://www.3dattack.net/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=70

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http://www.doschdesign.com

Tavy: Jana, it’s a true pleasure to

speak with you today. We are look-

ing forward to learning more about

you and your work. Would you mind

introducing yourself to our readers?

Where do you live…how old are

you…etc…?

Jana: First, hello to all the readers

of 3D Attack. It's a pleasure to do an

interview for such a good 3D maga-

zine, especially because it's dedicat-

ed to Cinema 4D. I was born about

26 years ago in Kranj Slovenia and I

still live there. I've been interested in

clothes since I was a little girl. When

I was still in kindergarten I was very

stubborn about what kind of clothes

I should wear, so my mother had a

real problem with me sometimes.

When I was a bit older I started

drawing my own clothes and I still

have some of my first sketches, and

they look...hmm really funny. After I

finished classical gymnasium in

Kranj, I went on to study Fashion

and Textile design, where I found

out more about design, fashion, tex-

tiles and other things linked to this

area. I graduated this year in June.

For my diploma I decided to do a

collection of dresses made in 3D

using CINEMA 4D, known for it's

user friendly interface and I can say

now, it was a smart decision. With

CINEMA 4D you can easily come to

a wanted result.

Tavy: Can you tell us a little about

your education? What are you cur-

rently doing to earn your living?

Jana: After I finished classical gym-

nasium Kranj I continued on with my

education at the University of

Ljubljana, Faculty of Natural

Sciences and Engineering,

Department for Textile and fashion

design, where I graduated this year

in June under the mentoring of

Marjeta Godler, and co mentoring of

AndraÏ Logar. My diploma with the

title “3D Computer Technology for

Development of Clothes Collection”,

was nominated for the Student

Preseren award which is the highest

government given award for stu-

dents here in Slovenia, the awards

will be given in December. In

October I had the first “real life”

exhibition of my 3D collection called

“Rot_Rhoeas”, which I think was

pretty successful.

I'm currently working on some proj-

ects for a small company here in

Slovenia called Thirdframestudios;

they specialize in 3D animation for

mobile phones. I'm modeling and

texturing at the moment. Some

other companies here in Slovenia

have invited me to do some lectures

on modeling and texturing, so I'll be

also doing that in the next months or

so. I am also looking for worldwide

offers :) .

Interview with Jana Rot - Fashion DesignerBy Tavy Ann

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Jana Rot - Fashion Designer

Tavy: What inspired you to com-

bine 3D/CG and fashion design?

Jana: My boyfriend AndraÏ Logar

was very interested in 3D animation.

He went on to study 3D animation at

the Media Design School in New

Zealand three years ago. During

that time I was finishing my educa-

tion as a Textile and Fashion

designer here in Slovenia and I had

to think of what will I do for my

diploma.

So, as I stayed in touch with him all

through his learning process of 3D

animation, we heard from each

other almost everyday, and seeing

what he was doing, he infected me

with 3D. I started thinking of how, as

a Fashion designer, I could imple-

ment 3D in my designs. At first I was

aiming really high.

I wanted to do a catwalk animation

of my own designed dresses, but

when I started to learn CINEMA 4D,

and I actually started to work on my

clothes, I realized that all areas such

as modeling, texturing, lighting and

animation are so extensive and take

so much time to really get to know

and use them, that I wouldn't be

able to finish my project on time.

Although C4D is very easy to use, I

left out animation and some other

things. As no one at my faculty was

doing something like this in 3D, (as

far as I knew, and only a few in the

world according to my knowledge),

this was also another challenge for

me. I was doing something new and

that kept me going through the

rough times. This is quite often the

case with 3d graphics.

Tavy: What software applications

are you currently using and why?

Jana: I use CINEMA 4D 9.0 for

modeling, texturing, lighting and ren-

dering of my 3D models of clothes,

accessories and other 3D objects

that I create for clients. I'm currently

using Corel Painter together with my

Wacom tablet for doing my sketches

of clothes and accessories or just

for drawing.

I also use Adobe Photoshop mainly

for correcting images, and Adobe

Illustrator for arranging images for

printing. And for writing things down

I use OpenOffice2. And I should not

forget BodyPaint as an essential


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tool for texturing. But being a part of

the CINEMA package, I often forget

to mention this great piece of soft-

ware.

Tavy: CINEMA 4D is known for

being an “easy to learn” 3D applica-

tion. When did you start using CIN-

EMA 4D, and how long did it take

you to learn its tools and begin

designing your creations?

Jana: I have been using CINEMA

4D for about a year and a half and, I

have to say, that you can fast and

easily get your wanted result with it.

In my first 6 months with C4D I went

through numerous tutorials I found

on the web, books, and of course

the CINEMA 4D Manual. First. My

boyfriend, AndraÏ Logar, also helped

me a lot. In that time I learned the

tools, the basics of modeling, textur-

ing, lighting and rendering. Then

after first six months of learning the

program I started to work on my cre-

ations. First, I did sketches of my

designs - They've been a sort of sto-

ryboard for my 3D designs, and then

I started to work on real 3D. One

dress, together with the accessories,

took more than a month to finish. To

complete all four, it took me, togeth-

er with lighting and rendering, more

than six months.

Tavy: When starting a new design,

where do you start? Where do you

end?

Jana: I always start with some kind

of inspiration for my clothes or col-

lections and end with a finished real

life sewn dress or finished 3D dress.

The inspiration could be something

from nature, something not so real,

something from the past, or just

something from my imagination.

Than I draw these inspirations on

piece of paper, sometimes at the

right moment when I get the inspira-

tion! Then I gather all of my ideas or

information’s and I draw down

details, for which I think could be

useful for the collection and then I

do figure sketches. This, I think, is

also a classical approach for design-

ing clothes. I do the same when

designing clothes in 3D. For this

particular collection, I took some

photos of the “poppy”. I took these

pictures a long time ago when my

mother brought a bunch of poppy's

home from a field near our home.

So, the photos of the poppy in differ-

ent stages of its blossom were my

inspiration. I would look at them

when drawing details that I thought

would be useful for my collection.


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Then I started to do sketches on a

computer with Painter and my

Wacom tablet. I drew like thirty

sketches, chose four of them, and

started working on materials. I had

to choose from which fabrics or

materials the clothes and the acces-

sories would be made of. I tried to

find “real life” fabrics and used them,

later on, when I was texturing and

making 3D materials.

I also decided where the stitches,

darts, zippers and other details of

the clothes will go, and where, or

how, these kinds of clothes should

be sewn in real life, and how the

fabrics should behave. After all the

preparations, or when I did the sto-

ryboard, I started working in CINE-

MA 4D. First I started with modeling.

I modeled all four dresses together

with accessories, continued with

UV's for all the objects. After that I

started working on materials and I

had to figure out how to imitate the

real live fabrics in 3D so they would

look in 3D, like they do in real life.

When I was working on materials I

had the fabrics and other materials,

like leather, always by my side. I

was always checking their parame-

ters out and looking at what kind of

reflection they have. Do they have

Fresnel or not? What is their diffu-

sion like? And so on…. I was look-

ing for irregularities and how certain

fabrics behave. This wasn't an easy

thing to do in 3D, and sometimes I

did more than a hundred variations

of the fabric. This is how I got the

one that I was satisfied with. When I

had the materials that I wanted, I

started texturing and sometimes I've

combined or used more than three

different materials on one part of a

dress in order to get the look that I

wanted. So I had, in average, more

than fifteen materials on one dress.

Sometimes even twenty or more.

The basic lighting was set before I

started working on materials. This

enabled me to do test renders to

see how the materials behaved and

if they were looking as real to life as

possible, according to the fabrics I

had for reference. When all the

materials were finished, the render-

ing started, which took approximate-

ly eleven hours for one dress with-

out the separate details and single

parts of the dress. When everything

was rendered I did some corrections

in Photoshop, and that is how I

ended the 3D dress or collection.

Tavy: To date, what is your greatest

achievement?

Jana: My greatest achievement to

date would have to be my 3D diplo-


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ma. I have put so much of my life

into it. There were times or days

when I thought that I would never

reach my goal, but with a lot of help

and love from Andraz and my moth-

er Vojka, I made it through the hard

times of a intensive one year of

work. I would like to thank them

both again.

Tavy: Are you currently working on

any projects you can tell us little

about?

Jana: I'm currently working on some

projects for company here in

Slovenia called Thirdframestudios.

Soon I will start to work on a tutorial

on how to make a bag. I have been

getting some other offers as well.

The future seems bright.

Tavy: Do you see a future for

3D/CINEMA 4D in fashion design?

Jana: Yes, I think CINEMA 4D has a

real perspective in fashion design,

especially with features like

Clothilde and Dress-o-Matic.

And especially if in the future we

see specific plug-ins just for fashion

design, like, for example, plugins or

softwares for architects, this would

be really nice. When I was doing my

schooling I did some research on

what kind of 3D programs exist for

fashion design, and I didn't find any

real 3D programs.

I mean all the programs for fashion

and textile design aren't made in a

way that a fashion designer would

be able to model, texture, set light-

ing and render in a certain way for

his own clothes. They are mainly

library based, and there you can

only use the already made parts of

clothes, patterns and fabrics, put

them together or change them in a

certain way. But these kinds of pro-

grams don't leave much room for a

designer to be creative, but being

creative is a fundamental of being a

designer. On the other hand, CINE-

MA 4D offers all that.

You can model, texture and every-

thing else in every way that you like.

I was very surprised when I've dis-

covered how many new ideas you

can get when working in a 3D pro-

gram and how many new possibili-

ties open with such tools that this

kind of program offers.

I also think, that you start to think in

a way that you have not thought

before. Though we must never for-

get that 3D programs are just a tool

to help us come to fresh, liberating

ideas, and not just a tool that we are

fascinated and limited with.

A real innovation in the fashion

world would be a 3D plug-in or a

program in which you could model

clothes in a way that you can do in

CINEMA 4D, and the end result

would be patterns for your clothes.

Current fashion programs offer just

3D simulation of clothes from

already made patterns, but this real-

ly isn't a very innovative way for a

designer. So if there is anyone pre-

pared to develop something like

this, maybe even MAXON itself,

please, let me know!

Tavy: Do you have any words of

wisdom/advice for the thousands of

aspiring fashion and graphic design-

ers throughout the world?

Jana: Hahaha words of wisdom,

well if I would have something to

say it would be this: Don't ever stop

doing what you think is worth of giv-

ing up some of your free time for,

but never forget that love and health

should be the first things on your

mind. And of course, keep using

Internet communities like 3D Attack

or CG Talk and don't forget to return

a favor!

Tavy: Jana, thank you so much for

taking time from you busy schedule


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to enlighten us with a little deeper

look at you and your work. We are

looking forward to what the future

holds for you and 3D in fashion. Do

you have any last words you would

like to leave our readers with?

Jana: Thank you for this interview.

I'm very honored that you contacted

me to do an interview for your won-

derful magazine. I hope that the

readers will, or have, enjoyed it. I

would also like to thank all CINEMA

4D communities for all the help they

gave to me during the realization of

my project.

And I wish to the 3D Attack team, to

all the readers and to the magazine,

an inspiring, creative, challenge

filled new New Year (2006), with a

lot of great 3D Stuff.

Have fun and keep the creativity

going!

Jana Rot


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http://www.unity3d.com

Hello my fellow Attackers! In this

issue I am going to take you through

an overview of JENNA and show

you its power in simplicity. As you

know 3D Attack and Core Arsenal

have found a way to keep JENNA

alive. CoreArsenal’s dedication to

the CINEMA 4D community and 3D

Attack’s desire to bring this fantastic

plugin back, has blown life back into

JENNA (!!). 3D Attack dug deep and

pulled out the resources needed to

obtain this “must have” plugin for

distribution to the CINEMA 4D com-

munity. So, what do we want to

accomplish in this tutorial? Well, I

want to show you how each object

works and how you can quickly cre-

ate some crazy things by using

them in different combinations. If

feedback is positive I would like to

then do another project-based tutori-

al in the future where you and I

could explore JENNA in an actual

project. So, if you would be interest-

ed in that please email us at:

[email protected] and voice

your opinions ?

Ok, so some of you may be asking

what the heck is JENNA anyway?

Well, allow me to answer that!

Simply put, JENNA is a real-time

procedural geometry engine for

objects and animated hierarchies in

Cinema4D (R9.1+). The plugin

objects include:

ITERATOR (transform-based multi-

ple source object generator)

TWEENER (object hierarchy

blender)

GRIDARRAY (volumetric object

hierarchy distributor)

MESHARRAY (material aware

object hierarchy distributor)

ALLIE (geometric material inter-

preter).

NICKL (loopable function-based

deformer)

displaceVIEW (material displace-

ment preview)

In addition to these objects, JENNA

has some additional, and very use-

ful, objects as part of the suite:

Multiple Source (allows multiple

source objects and hierarchies to be

used in JENNA objects)

uberNULL (pure null object)

jTAG (Jenna data container tag)

jSHADER (Jenna object data shad-

er)

If you’re new to JENNA then you’re

in for a treat. If you are familiar with

JENNA then you can attest to the

fact that it is most likely a “must-

have” plugin in your toolbox. JENNA

can best be summed up as being

CINEMA 4D’s Duplicate command

on steroids! Certain things still can-

not be done without it without a lot

of work and effort, so you can

understand what all of the buzz was

about when it looked as though

JENNA was gone forever…

Now, let’s discuss each object, what

it does and how to use them.

ITERATOR

ITERATOR is a generator that

allows you to create repetitive

objects in a non-destructive editable

way (e.g. Think of things such as

fence posts along a field, techy-

nurnies on a spaceship, people in a

line, chains, ropes, lights, etc, etc.).

Under normal circumstances even

JENNA - STEP BY STEPGary Zullo aka Mr. Pixar

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Tuto

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CINEMA’s duplicate function would

leave you with a lot of post-work to

do in order to place these items,

and that work would be destructive;

meaning you’re stuck with what you

did unless you remembered to save

a file before going at it ? ITERATOR

allows you to define symmetry and

placement all from a comfy control

panel and it’s completely non-

destructive. Don’t like what you end

up with? Reset your parameters, or

remove the ITERATOR object and

that’s that – back to “normal”!

Making it do something (basic):

This is a basic example of how you

can setup and use the ITERATOR

object generator.

Create a primitive object (I used a

cube)- Create the ITERATOR gener-

ator object (Plugins > CaJENNA >

ITERATOR)

Since ITERATOR is an object gen-

erator we will need to drag the prim-

itive object under the ITERATOR so

that the primitive is a child of the

ITERATOR.

As soon as the primitive is placed

as a child of the ITERATOR you

should immediately see an array of

transformed primitives

Now you can tweak the various val-

ues to describe each object’s place-

ment, rotation, variation from the

other objects, size, etc.

Making it do something

(advanced):

This is a more advanced example of

how one can use the ITERATOR

object generator.

Create a text spline primitive

Create a cone primitive and change

its “Bottom Radius” to 5, “Height” to

15, “Height Segments” to 1 and

“Rotation Segments” to 15

Create a new ITERATOR generator

(Plugins > CaJENNA > ITERATOR)

Change the ITERATOR’s “Count” to

50

Go to the ITERATOR’s “Transform”

tab and change the “Translate

Vector” Y value to 10 and change

the “Rotation Vector” Y value to 0.

Move the cone so that it is a child of

the ITERATOR.

Move the text spline primitive so that

it is a child of the ITERATOR (until

we add the cone as a child the text

spline primitive will be iterate)

In the “Path” tab make sure that the

“Use Path” and “Tangential” are both

checked.

Make sure that animation time slider

is at frame 0. Then CTRL-Click

(CMD-Click on the MAC, I believe)

the grey circle next to the “Origin

Offset “parameter. This will create a

key frame at our current frame (0)

and at “Origin Offset” 0. Move the

animation time slider to frame 90

and then adjust the “Origin Offset”

value to the position where the

cones have made it through the

entire text spline primitive. CTRL-

Click (CMD-Click on the MAC, I

believe) again to create a key frame

at frame 90. Rewind the animation

time slider and press play. Pretty

cool, eh?

TWEENER

TWEENER is a generator that

allows you to create objects by

“blending” two object hierarchies.

Ultimately, TWEENER is a powerful

interpolation generator. To function,

it requires two source object hierar-

chies which are identical in their

makeup (object types and vertex

counts) but different in their parame-

ters and/or vertex placement. For

instance, by dropping a sphere into


14

Tuto

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TWEENER, duplicating it to make a

second sphere inside the TWEEN-

ER object, changing the radius of

either sphere, and transforming

either sphere (position is the most

obvious ), a series of spheres is

generated by mixing the two source

spheres.

Making it do something:


can setup and use the TWEENER

object generator.

Create two separate (but similar)

primitive objects. I used cubes.

Place some space between each

object so that you can easily see the

effect.

Create a new TWEENER generator.

Move both primitive objects so that

they are children of the TWEENER

Immediately after moving the primi-

tives you should see the space

between the primitives disappear

and tweened objects fill the space

Experiment with each parameter of

the TWEENER as well as each

primitive and see what cool effects

you can come up with.

This not only works with primitive

object but with splines, object hierar-

chies, etc. Feel free to try this same

technique using splines instead of

primitives. The only thing to remem-

ber is to make the splines editable

(‘c’ key by default).

GRIDARRAY

GRIDARRAY is an object generator

that allows for the regular and

arranged distribution of objects and

hierarchies within a cubic volume.

The distribution of objects can be

constrained to any combination of

specific topological regions of the

volume (corners, edges, faces, and

volume). GRIDARRAY is ideal for

the quick and efficient creation of

crystalline, repeating structures as

well as irregular, organic structures

composed from a specific object

(stars, dust, clouds, etc).

With a bit of experimentation and

creativity you can realize a huge

range of forms. It is well worth tak-

ing some time to explore the wealth

of GRIDARRAY’s possibilities.


(See next picture)


can setup and use the GRIDARRAY

object generator.

Create a cylinder primitive and use

the following settings: radius=32,

height=100, height segments=8 and

rotation segments=18

Create a tube primitive and use the

following settings: inner radius=34,

outer radius=70, rotation seg-

ments=18, cap segments=1,

height=19, height segments=1

Drag the tube primitive so that it is a

child of the cylinder. Create a new

GRIDARRAY generator. Move the

cylinder/tube hierarchy to that it is a

child of the GRIDARRAY. You

should immediately see the genera-

tor doing its job as our cylinder/tube

object is duplicated several times

Tweaking values such as variation,

scale etc can yield some pretty

ingenious results.

MESHARRAY

MESHARRAY is an object generator

that allows you to create instanced

hierarchies based on the geometry


15

Tuto

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of a source hierarchy that can be

further influenced by material prop-

erties. Creation, source hierarchy

selection, translation, scale, orienta-

tion, visible light color, and even

final shading properties can be influ-

enced by these material channels.

MESHARRAY’s support for animat-

ed deformed bodies offers a wealth

of design opportunities.



can setup and use the MESHAR-

RAY object generator.

Create four cube primitives

Create a new MESHARRAY object

generator (Plugins > CaJENNA >

MESHARRAY). Either set “Auto-

Update” to “Always, or you will have

to click “Force update” to see

changes. Move the 4 cubes so that

they are children of the MESHAR-

RAY object. Immediately after mov-

ing the cubes you should see the

effects of MESHARRAY on the

cubes. Resize the cubes as follows:

cube1=no changes, cube2=all size

parameters set to 25, cubes 3 and

4=all size parameters set to 10

Since we are creating a noise-driven

animation we need to create the

material noise that will be the driver.

So create a new material. Add noise

to the color channel. I used “Ober”

at global scale=1000% and anima-

tion speed=1. This will give us a

large enough scale to see the true

pattern of the function as well as

seeing it animate over time.

In order to use the new material in

the MESHARRAY object it first has

to be applied to an object in the

hierarchy. To avoid having the mate-

rial being rendered on our

MESHARRAY-created objects we

can simply use an uberNULL (more

on that in a bit) that will be ignored

by MESHARRAY when it evaluates

the objects.

Create an uberNULL object (Plugins

> CaJENNA > uberNULL) and move

it so that it is the first child of the

MESHARRAY object then click the

green check (which will turn to a red

X) to make MESHARRAY ignore it.

To use the material to influence the

attributes of the instanced objects

we must first place the texture tag in

one the texture evaluation channels

of the MESHARRAY object. Select

the MESHARRAY object and locate

the “Texture” tab in the Attribute

Manager. Drag the texture tag from

the uberNULL object to the first tex-

ture channel.

With the MESHARRAY object

selected to go the “Parameter” tab.

Make sure “Density” is checked and

set channel=1. Now play the time-

line and change the “Density”

“Tolerance”. In order to animate this

one from the timeline you’ll have to

set key frames, but you should see

what can be done by simply playing

with the tolerance value ?

ALLIE

(See next picture)

ALLIE is an object generator that

allows you to utilize a grid of

instanced hierarchies that can be

further influenced by material prop-

erties. Creation, source hierarchy

selection, translation, scale, orienta-

tion, visible light color, and even

final shading properties can be influ-

enced by these material channels.

ALLIE is ideal for the quick and effi-

cient creation of stylized, repeating

structures as well as irregular,

organic structures composed from a

specific object (droplets on a sur-

face, cloud structures, etc...). This

particular generator is a lot like

another plugin called

“PlaceOnPoints” if you are familiar

with its functionality


(See picture on next page)


can setup and use the ALLIE object

generator. Create a cube primitive


16

Tuto

rial

and set each of the size compo-

nents to 50.Create a new ALLIE

object generator. Move the cube

primitive so that it is a child to the

ALLIE object. Immediately after

moving the cube you should see the

effects of ALLIE (a cube instance

will be placed on each point inter-

section). With the ALLIE object

selected go to its “Transform” tab

and change each of the “Count” val-

ues to 5

Since we are creating a noise-driven

animation we need to create the

material noise that will be the driver.

So create a new material. Add noise

to the color channel. I used “Ober”

at global scale=1000% and anima-

tion speed=1. This will give us a

large enough scale to see the true

pattern of the function as well as

seeing it animate over time.

In order to use the new material in

the ALLIE object it first has to be

applied to an object in the hierarchy.

To avoid having the material being

rendered on our ALLIE-created

objects we can simply use an

uberNULL (more on that in a bit)

that will be ignored by ALLIE when it

evaluates the objects.

Create an uberNULL object (Plugins

> CaJENNA > uberNULL) and move

it so that it is the first child of the

ALLIE object then click the green

check (which will turn to a red X) to

make ALLIE ignore it.

To use the material to influence the

attributes of the instanced objects

we must first place the texture tag in

one the texture evaluation channels

of the ALLIE object. Select the

ALLIE object and locate the

“Texture” tab in the Attribute

Manager. Drag the texture tag from

the uberNULL object to the first tex-

ture channel. With the ALLIE object

selected to go the “Parameter” tab.

Make sure “Density” is checked and

set channel=1. Now play the time-

line and change the “Density”

“Tolerance”. We have a noise driven

animation my friends!

NICKL

NICKL is an object deformer that

allows you to easily define looping

deformations for animation, but also

allows you to easily deform just

about anything. NICKL gives you

unparallel power related to deforma-

tions by giving you: numerous

tweakable function defaults, real-

time feedback and tons of falloff

options. NICKL is still just as appli-

cable now (NICKL2) as it was when

it debuted.

Making it do something (basic):


can setup and use the NICKL object

deformer.

Create a primitive object (I used a

plane). Create a new NICKL

deformer (Plugins > CaJENNA >

NICKL). Since NICKL is an object

deformer and works just as native

C4D deformers do you will need to

drag it so that NICKL is a child of

your primitive, or other object

The NICKL deformation should be

immediately visible to you in the edi-

tor viewport(s). Tweak the settings

to your liking. Try the different

falloffs and functions for some really

cool effects – easily! Press play and

see what you’ve done ?

Making it do something

(advanced):

(See image on next page)

This is a more advanced example of

how one can use the NICKL object

deformer.


17

Tuto

rial

Create a text spline primitive

We need to add sufficient detail to

the points in the splines for the

deformation to show well on the

splines. So, first change the

“Intermediate Points” value to

“Uniform” and set the number to

something like 30. Alter the different

strength values until you have

something that looks good ?

Alter the global scale value until

golden brown. Now, press the play

button. Since NICKL was created for

loopable deformations; you just cre-

ated an animation! As long as you

haven’t changed any of the parame-

ters in the functions tab the anima-

tion should loop seamlessly

displaceVIEW

displaceVIEW is a new addition to

JENNA that allows you to preview

material displacement in the editor

without any restrictions (or having to

render). To my knowledge this is the

only displacement previewer for

CINEMA 4D currently. displaceVIEW

can be converted to a polygon

object from the deformed (pre-

viewed) geometry (for this you

would use the “Current State To

Object” function).



can setup and use displaceVIEW.

Create a new primitive object (plane

for example). Create a new

displaceVIEW object (Plugins >

CaJENNA > displaceVIEW). Since

displaceVIEW is a deformer and it

works just like native C4D deform-

ers it must be placed as a child to

the object.

Now we need to create a material

that uses displacement, which is

pretty easy to do. Create a new

material, and go to the material edi-

tor. Check the box to enable the dis-

placement channel and add a noise

of your choice (I used Stupl @

100% strength / 200m height).

Once you have a suitable material

apply it to the plane primitive.

If displaceVIEW is enabled you

should immediately see the flat

plane become displaced according

to the noise you applied to the

material. If you want to change the

way it looks then all you need to do

is change your material accordingly

and refresh the displaceVIEW object

by clicking the “force update” button

in the attributes manager.

Alternately, you can also set the

“Auto Update” value to “Always” ?

and any change you make to the

material will immediately appear in

the editor window

Some other invaluable JENNA items

Multiple Source. This object is used

mainly by ITERATOR and ALLIE to

allow for multiple source object hier-

archies. I know you’re probably

thinking, “Wow! You don’t say?” LOL

Let me explain…ITERATOR, by

default, can only use a single object

hierarchy instance. The same goes

for ALLIE. This removes that limita-

tion. GRIDARRAY also can make

use of Multiple Source…think of

using separate object hierarchies for

the edges, surface and volume. This

allows for limitless possibilities; and

easily to boot.

uberNULL

uberNULL exists to eliminate an

issue with virtual hierarchy baking in

Cinema4D. If you use a NULL

object without children objects in a

virtual hierarchy (created by an

array object for instance) the NULL

objects will be deleted when the

array object is converted to a real

object hierarchy by using the

“Current State To Object” command.

The uberNULL does convert and

preserves the parental axis function-

ality. It can also be used (when dis-


18

Tuto

rial

abled) for texturing evaluation pur-

poses in MESHARRAY or ALLIE

objects.

jTag and jSHADER

jTAG is a data tag applied to objects

instanced by JENNA object genera-

tors like ITERATOR, TWEENER,

GRIDARRAY, MESHARRAY, and

ALLIE. It stores data including UVW,

Position, Texture 1 - 5 (these are the

evaluated texture results of the tex-

ture channels associated with a

generator object). These data chan-

nels can be used by jSHADER,

XPresso, or even other plugins that

add properties based on jTAG data

jSHADER is a shader whose pur-

pose is using the jTAG data created

for JENNA object instances for

shading during rendering. This adds

an incredible amount of power to

JENNA by allowing instances to

become unique.

Summary:

Well, first of all I’d like to thank you

for making it this far. I realize that

this tutorial may have been a bit

long but I wanted to go over JENNA

and all its functionality in great

detail. I’ve personally never really

seen any tutorials or much of any-

thing JENNA-related on the web

which is somewhat depressing.

So, I was more than excited to write

this and share this invaluable tool

with everyone. If you liked this

month’s JENNA tutorial please let us

know and if there is enough

response I’d love to do a project-

based tutorial that moves away from

how each parameter works and

actually make something! You

decide ?

You can find each of the scene files

created in the tutorial in this month’s

goodies (see the editor’s notes at

the beginning of the magazine for

more information).

Until next time -- Gary


19

Tuto

rial

http://3dattack.net/shop/index.php?plugin=7

Unity is valued at $999.00. For a chance to win Unity e-mail your answer to the question above to [email protected], (hint: The answer

can be found at www.unity3d.com under “Company”). UNITY should be your subject line and your answer and your real name must be

included in the e-mail body. Your e-maill address with then be pooled with the other entries and we will pick one random winner on January 1,

2006. The winner will be notified via e-mail and on our forum at www.3dattack.net.

*3D Attack staff and their immediate families are not eligible to enter and/or win 3D Attack prize giveaways.

**Unity is currently only available for OS X.

http://www.unity3d.com

Hello there ATTACKERS!

Well this is not really a tutorial, but

surely an interesting piece of work

by Pierre Magnol. Pierre is a free-

lance artist is using zBlur and CINE-

MA 4D to create professional com-

mercials. One example can be

found on our 3D Attack page at:

http://3dattack.net/shop/index.php?pl

ugin=5

This commercial was completely

produced by him using various 2D

and movie layers.

A while ago Pierre and I made con-

tact and he asked me to give his

some assistance on a new commer-

cial for ROSSIGNOL. He showed

me some example shots of his cur-

rent work and I noticed some arti-

facts in almost every scene. I took

the time and explained why he was

getting these artifacts and showed

him some tips and tricks on how to

avoid these while using zBlur.

For those of you that are not familiar

with z-Blur, let me give you a quick

description: zBlur is a post effect for

Cinema 4D, which can be used as

an alternative to C4D’s, own DOF.

zBlur does not cancel out other post

effects, it does not require the

Advanced Render module, and it

supports reflections and bleed con-

trol. zBlur also has a preview win-

dow and a reference object that can

make changes right in the editor.

The first screenshot (see big pic-

ture) will show you the setup for this

shot. You will notice a lot of planes

and cubes plus some extruded

objects. A lot of the planes use 2D

motion graphics (Picture in Picture)

with alpha channels. Actually an

easy task for zBlur, but the setup

can be a bit tricky at times and one

would need a little experience with

zBlur. The scene itself is very basic,

but the combination of 2D motion

graphics and animated 3D Objects

makes this an interesting project.

Here is a shot of the scene com-

pletely without any blur effects. The

different layers are placed all over

the place in different levels. (See

picture below) A nice little setup

which gives the expression of a high

tech product. Most of the graphics

you see are done with Adobe

Photoshop and the animation of

these files, on the other hand, was

then done in Adobe After Effects.

The very next picture will show you

the result of Pierre's settings. I

marked the various render artifacts

right in the picture (1-6) and you can

clearly see that the blur ends

abruptly on several objects that use

alpha channels and such. (See pic-

ture on next page). It seems like the

transition is not smooth and you

would most likely blame zBlur for

this. Well, zBlur is not the problem,

but as mentioned in the beginning, it

requires a little training and knowl-

edge with zBlur to avoid these

"errors". Now let's have a look at

zBlur - zBlur - WWororking On king On A PrA ProjectojectBy By TThomas Phomas Pasiekaasieka

21

Tuto

rial

Pierre's zBlur Render Settings

shown in the next picture (See pic-

ture below - zBlur settings). Pierre

chose to use the "spline" blur type

with a Sample Radius of 1 and 2

Iterations for a not so heavy blurring

of his scene (The higher the

Iteration the more blur). The Blur

profiles almost shows a nice curve

and Pierre is also using "Bleed

Control" to get rid of the bleeding

(blurring of edges around objects

that should not be affected). There

seems to be nothing wrong with his

settings, but have a look at the set-

tings I've made in the next picture

(See my settings in the pic below).

I chose to go with a medium blur

type and 2 Iterations in order to get

pretty much the same result Pierre

was after. I also chose to use the

bleed control option, and as you can

see, it goes from low to high (nice

transition). Now here is a little trick.

As you can see the first point of this

curve (bottom left) is not totally on

the lowest setting, and the last point

of the curve (top right) is not all at

the top. This makes for a smooth

transition. Here is a preview of the

zbuffer (zBlurPreview), which is very

helpful and allows for easy and fast

setups of your desired blur range.

The dark areas represent the

"sharp" areas while the white areas

represent the blurred areas, and in

between (grey) is the transition. The

preview window will allow you to set

start and length of the zbuffer (Start

at 0 and ends at 6400 - scene

depended). The preview window will

also allow you to "set keys" in order

to create a camera animation with

blur.

The following picture (on the next

page) will show the end result of my

settings. You can clearly see that

there are no artifacts and we have a

nice smooth transition. That's what

we wanted! The scene is ready to

be rendered in high resolution!

A little side note: zBlur requires a lit-

tle knowledge. It is best to play

around with zBlur on easy scenes to

get a feel for it. Learn how to use

the different blur types and learn

how to use the preview window.

zBlur is an amazing tool, but like

with any other plug-in/software, it

requires a bit of effort and time. But

once you become a pro with zBlur, it


22

Tuto

rial

will be as easy as eating breakfast!

If you have problems using zBlur in

your project, please don’t hesitate to

ask us on the forum or directly write

me e-mail, and we will check your

scene or give you some tips and

tricks!

Happy rendering!

Thomas

Check out some example render-

ings and videos on our shop page

at:

http://3dattack.net/shop/index.php?pl

ugin=5

zBlur has been updated to version

1.5 and is now also able to create

“bokeh” effects (see video on the

bottom of the shop page for more

information).


23

Tuto

rial

http://3dattack.net/shop/index.php?plugin=5

Basic Modeling - Basic Book using

Splines

In this basic modeling tutorial we'll

learn how to create a realistic look-

ing hard cover book using some

simple spline techniques. The

splines are easily adjustable so that

you can use your resulting docu-

ment as a template to quickly create

other books that differ in size and

form.

Let's begin by drawing the rough

form of the cover. Go to Top View

(F2), look at Picture 1 and draw a

similar spline using the Draw Bezier

Spline Tool (selected also shown for

reference). When setting down

points with this tool you can hold the

mouse down to drag out the tan-

gents and aim the spline. Make sure

you start drawing the bottom points

at the 0 position of the axis so that

we'll be able to mirror this spline

properly in the next step. To check if

both points are at the 0 position

select them and go to the Structure

Manager (under the Window menu).

The structure manager let's you edit

the position and tangent positions of

individual points. You can see the

rows of the two selected points high-

lighted in the structure manager.

Make sure both of their Z values are

set to 0. The other values with the

arrows next to them are the position

values for the tangents of that point.

Rename the spline to 'Cover Spline'

when done.

When satisfied with the cover spline

create a Symmetry object and drop

the spline into it. You'll notice that it

mirrors on the wrong plane, so set

the Mirror Plane of the symmetry

object to XY to get the proper result.

The spline for the cover is finished

now and we are ready to extrude it.

Go back to the main view (F1), cre-

ate an Extrude NURBS object and

drop the symmetry object into it.

We need to change a couple of set-

tings before it looks correct. First

click the spline and enable 'Close

Spline', this will close the gap in the

spline and enable the extrude object

to utilize caps. Next we have to

change the extrude direction. Click

the extrude object and change its

rightmost value, which is set to 20

by default, to 0 and the middle value

of 0 to 160. Now the book spline will

be extrude along the Y axis. You

might want to use a different value

than 160 depending on what scale

you drew the spline, as long as the

dimension of the book look like in

Picture 2.

We notice a little oddity in the mid-

dle of the cover where it closes the

spline. The book appears to be one

object but is in fact two. We want it

to be one object. The procedure is

quite simple but you have to pay

attention to the points you are going

to connect here. Duplicate the spline

object for the cover and rotate it 180

degrees over the X axis (P 180).

Now the duplicate object is like the

symmetry. drag the first spline out of

the symmetry and delete the sym-

metry object, it looked fancy but this

method is not convincing. After this

select both splines and use the

'Connect' Function. A new spline will

be created from the two loose ones.

The two loose ones can now be

deleted.

Now comes the part where to pay

attention. Go to top view and zoom

in on the middle points of the cover

that are on the X axis. Because of

the loose splines combined those

points are actually double and are

on top of each other, they need to

be welded together to work correct-

ly. select one of the points and drag

the just a tiny bit along the z axis so

that you can see the other point

underneath it. Now select both

Basic Modeling: A BookBy Bram van Gerwen

24

Tuto

rial

Picture 1

Picture 2

points, use the Weld function and

click on the bright yellow point that

appears between them. Those

points will now be connected. To fin-

ish the spline you can now delete

the other double point which isn't

welded yet and enable the 'close

spline' option.

The extrusion won't display the loop

error in the middle anymore now.

Let's continue, to smooth the current

flat caps go the the Caps tab of the

extrude object and set both Start

and End to Fillet Cap, the Steps to 4

and the radius to 1. This should give

nice rounded edges. Lastly we need

to get the subdivisions down a bit, a

lot of them are generated along the

back of the book. To remedy this

select the spline, set its Intermediate

points to Natural and its Number to

3. This will change how the spline

extrapolates its extra points and

build up the polygons accordingly.

Also a good way to keep polycount

down if you are using a lot of spline

objects in your scene.

Next we'll make the pages, this is

not for animating so its just going to

be a static object. Use the Draw

Bezier Spline tool to draw a spline

like in Picture 3 (selected also

shown for reference). Don't drag out

tangents for the points except for

the one indicated. This will give

points with linear interpolation and

will simply become sharp corners

instead of rounded off. When the

points are drawn select 'Close

Spline' in the spline options and the

gap will be closed.

Now create another Extrude Nurbs

object and drop the spline into it.

The pages section is of course a bit

smaller than the cover itself. Set the

Y position of the extrude nurbs

object to 2.5 and change the Y

movement to 156 in the object prop-

erties. This will give the pages a bit

of room under the book and above.

To tweak out the form set the

Intermediate Points of the spline to

Natural and its number to 3. Result

in Picture 4 (Left).

The last detail is the piece of materi-

al (to which the pages are

bound/glued) that sticks out with

most bound books. Draw a spline

like in Picture 4 (inset). Then create

a Sweep NURBS object and a

Circle Spline. Set the Circle spline to

0,5 and drop it into the Sweep

object along with the drawn spline.

The circle spline must be above the

other spline for the sweep to work.

You'll notice the spline being 'swept'

with the small circle, but the ends

are still flat. To round them of we'll

simply enable the Fillet Caps in the

Cap tab of the sweep nurbs object.

To prevent the sweep from getting

thicker due to the fillet caps enable

'constrain'. When Start and End are

set to Fillet Cap set their steps to 3

to get roundings and the radius to

0,5 to match the sweep. This part is

now complete finishing off our basic

book. Result in Picture 4 (Right), I

colored the cover simple green to

show the different objects better.

The book is now finished. But

because of the splines it is still high-

ly adjustable. You can tweak the

form of them very easily by dragging

a couple of points. For instance you

can make the back cover rounded

by dragging the middle points out-

ward, you can make the cover thick-

ness thinner by dragging its outer

points inward. A couple of examples

shown in Picture 5.

Texturing is also easy, If you only

want to see the front take your jpeg

of the book cover you need and

apply it to the model with flat projec-

tion, then click the tag and select 'Fit

to Object' from the texture menu.

If you also want a text on the spine

it is better to make the cover

editable and create a vertex selec-

tion for the front and the spine. That

way you have more control over

how you align the different textures.

Have fun making some books. If you

have any more questions on making

books please ask them on the 3D

Attack Forum.

Bram

Basic Modeling: A BookBy Bram van Gerwen

25

Tuto

rial

Picture 3

Picture 4Picture 5

REVIEW:

DISCOVERING BODYPAINT 3D

R.2 & 2.5 WITH 3D KIWI

On October 11. Nigel Doyle a.k.a.

3D Kiwi launched shipping of his

“DISCOVERING BODYPAINT 3D

R.2 & 2.5 WITH 3D KIWI”-DVD.

It’s available in the C4DCafe shop

for $59.99 (including postage):

HYPERLINK

"http://www.c4dcafe.com/3dkiwi/bps

hop/index.html"

http://www.c4dcafe.com/3dkiwi/bpsh

op/index.html

The DVD (Rom) comes along in a

slim case containing Flash Format

video tutorials at 1024x768 px with

32bit depth color that ensures sharp

and clear video on a computer mon-

itor. Shipping is prompt as you can

see by the buyers-reactions CGTalk

(Nigel himself takes care handwrit-

ing, even Asian addresses are suc-

cessful!

http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthre

ad.php?t=283264&highlight=Bodypa

int+DVD"

http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthre

ad.php?t=283264&highlight=Bodypa

int+DVD

All of the included scene files are

saved with the BodyPaint stand-

alone CINEMA 4D Rel.8.2 format.

The videos are recorded from

BodyPaint version 2 (CINEMA 4D

Rel.9). During the making of this

DVD MAXON announced BodyPaint

2.5. Due to this announcement,

Nigel took the time to include an

extra chapter where he shows the

new features of BodyPaint 2.5

So now lets talk about the content:

First of all I was really impressed by

the announced playtime of his DVD

that is about 16 hours. My first

thought was, “How the hell will he

entertain the BodyPaint community

for 16 hours?” Well, he does it and

he does it well.

Chapter 1: In the first chapter Nigel

gives a shortcut describing where

the 16-hour journey is going to take

us. This gives a nice impression of

the senseful learning curve he has

prepared (16min).

Chapter 2: Nigel then moves on to

talk about what UV’s are and how to

work with them. This gives the new

user a general understanding of

what BodyPaint is, and the possibili-

ties it offers (44min).

Chapter 3: Then he takes 64 min-

utes to introduce the common BP-

commands and tools, mixing of

shaders and BP painted textures

before he goes into detail with the

bigger DVD projects (64min).

Chapter 4: Here Nigel shows how

to work with BodyPaint’s time saving

Paint Setup Wizard (41min).

Chapter 5: UV Editing Tools are

fully explained in this chapter,

except the interactive mapping that

is given an extra chapter.

Furthermore, Nigel shows optimiz-

ing/adding of a customized com-

mand palette (38min).

Chapter 6: Projection Tab Tools - A

walk through of all BodyPaint

Projection tools and their usage

(34min).

Chapter 7: In Interactive Mapping I,

Nigel introduces one of the most

important mapping methods and

demonstrates some problem solu-

tions (28min).

Chapter 8: Interactive Mapping II is

about mapping a complicated object

(a Spitfire plane) (60min).

26

DV

D R

evie

w

http://www.c4dcafe.com/3dkiwi/bpshop/index.html



Chapter 9: Preparing the Spitfire for

UV Mapping (36min).

Chapter 10: UV Mapping the

Spitfire - divided in 8 parts (226min).

Chapter 11: Painting the Spitfire is

divided in 10 parts and is the

biggest project on Nigel’s DVD

(299min).

Chapter 12: The last chapter is

dedicated to the new features

BodyPaint Rel.2.5 offers (39min).

Chapter13: Contains an alphabeti-

cal and chronological index about

the DVD’s content (PDF -format) - a

nice troubleshooting helper next to

the manual.

I really enjoyed watching Nigel in

(real time) paint his MkV Spitfire

project-unrehearsed. He included

all trials and errors. This really helps

the viewer understand BodyPaint’s

workflow and walks them through

how to easily solve the little prob-

lems that are sure to arise.

The chronological and alphabetical

index the DVD provides (PDF for-

mat), and the Introduction of

Chapters are very useful. They will

quickly guide you where you need to

go.

Bonus Tutorials and Files: Nigel

also includes bonus tutorials and

files. Here he shows some of

BodyPaint’s tools in action.

You will also find files (Me109f by

John Logan – Ready to Get

Unwrapped and Painted) on the

DVD.

Although you will not find an in

depth organic character

painting/unwrapping tutorial on this

DVD, everything that is needed to

complete a project of this caliber is

explained. Nigel explains

BodyPaint’s possibilities with only

technical meshes, but all the tool

and mapping methods that need to

paint a character a very well

explained the give the general

understanding you need to paint an

organic mesh.

All in all, I think Nigel lifts the

“Training DVD” to a new standard

when it comes playtime and price,

16 hours for $59.99 (incl. Shipping).

Furthermore, his explanations are

easy to follow and clear, even for

non-native English speakers.

Nigel doesn’t leave one function or

command unexplained. Every knob

is analyzed and shown in action.

All explanations are well taught, as

you can expect, if you are familiar

with Nigel’s free tutorials on:

"http://www.c4dcafe.com"

On a side note: I enjoyed not having

trouble with Alt-Tab while

following/doing his tutorials. When

comparing playtime, price and quali-

ty, I think this DVD is the best intro-

duction to BodyPaint on the market.

It’s a must have for the newbie and

pro alike.

Without any doubt, 5 of 5 ATTACK

POINTS!

27

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Tavy: Hello Dennis, and thank you

for taking time to speak with 3D

Attack. Would you please share

with our readers a little about your-

self? Where you live....your

career...etc?

Dennis: Hi Tavy. Thanks for asking!

I live in the suburbs of Boston with

my wife, dog and cat. I work at

Northeastern University in Boston,

where I teach courses in electronic

music composition and multimedia

studies. I’ve been there many years

(my only real job!) and plan to stay

until they throw me out. It’s a great

place to work - they love the idea of

combining arts and technology - and

my students force me to keep up on

new developments. I also write

about technology for Electronic

Musician Magazine, where I am an

Associate Editor.

Tavy: Can you tell us a little about

your education? Where did you go

to school...your major(s)...etc?

Dennis: I grew up in New Orleans

(very sad...), where I graduated with

a Bachelor’s of Music Composition

from Loyola University. I then went

to grad school first in Hartford (CT),

then later in New York City. I fin-

ished up at Columbia University,

which was one of the pioneering

institutions in electronic music, but I

didn’t really focus on that while I

was there (that came later).

It wasn’t until a few years after I left

Columbia that I got interested in

computer music. I convinced

Northeastern to let me take some

classes at MIT so I could get on the

fast track with the subject. After

another few years, I saw how similar

some of the graphics languages

(POVray, to be specific) were to the

music programming language I was

using (Csound), so I taught myself

POVray (a work in progress..) and

started to create images that had

some of the characteristics of my

music (repetition with variation, etc.).

I gradually migrated to moving

images, where I was really able to

apply techniques from music com-

position - both are time-based, after

all - and along the way, I took cours-

es in art history, art fundamentals

and the like to begin my “new

career.”

Tavy: When I took a first look at

some of your work I thought, ok this

guy is an abstract artist and a good

one at that. As I looked a little

deeper and played a few of your

animations I realized you have gone

far beyond 3D abstract imagery.

You have found a way to success-

fully blend music, 3D and animation

to produce some of the most stun-

ning modern art I’ve ever seen. I

guess my question to you would be,

where did this all start?

Dennis: Well it just seemed so nat-

ural to try and organize the images

in my animations along the same

lines that I had been using in my

music, which is also “abstract.” Take

a sequence of images, “transpose”

it, “invert” it, reverse it, lengthen or

shorten its duration, flip it upside

down... all of those things are very

common ways to develop musical

themes, and they all work well in

abstract moving art.

But coming up with a lot of “raw

material” - oftentimes, many varia-

tions on a few basic themes - is only

Interview with Dennis MillerBy Tavy Ann

28

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Dennis Miller

Ammonite I.

One of my earliest POVray images.

the start. The hard part is arranging

all this material into a cohesive and

integrated composition. And of

course, the music and the images

also have to “play well together,” so

that becomes another part of the

challenge (and the fun) of compos-

ing these pieces. Throw in the ren-

dering time, and you can see why

each of my “Concert” works took

one year to complete!

But really, it all just comes down to

intuition - what goes where and

what comes next, how long to focus

on one basic idea before moving on

to another. That’s the approach I

used in writing modern concert

music for 20 years and it’s the exact

approach I use in my mixed media

works.

Tavy: What operating system are

you using? Mac/Windows?

Dennis: I’m on the PC - just started

out that way and stayed with it. But

except for some rare exceptions, it’s

all the same to me.

Tavy: What software applications

have you used, and are currently

using, to create your beautiful work?

Why?

Dennis: I started out with POVray

and ran with it for about 6 years,

during which time, I created six of

my Concert Animations. It’s incredi-

bly open-ended - you can write pure

math equations to generate images,

or use any of hundreds of primitive

objects, including many contributed

by users. And of course, it is entirely

free. But in Spring of 2004, I decid-

ed I wanted to try a “more tradition-

al” 3D program so I could do some

of the things (camera movement,

real-time previews) that POVray just

couldn’t do (it’s a scripting language,

after all). Also, my last POVray work,

Faktura, really seemed like it went

about as far as I could go with that

software.

Fortunately, I came across some

images created with DiTools (big

round of applause!), and immediate-

ly bought CINEMA 4D. I’ve been

totally immersed in it ever since (I

own every book and have read most

all of the tutorials) and feel as if I am

just getting competent. I owe a lot to

the great gang of users who hang

out at Remotion’s site (thanks to

Gunter, et al!) and at the other

forums, and I’ve been amazed with

the help and generosity of the entire

C4D community. Except for POVray

and Csound, which both had great

support communities, I’ve never

seen anything like it.

So now I am strictly using CINEMA,

and I look forward to all the new


29

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Ammonite II

A frame from a High Def animation that uses Jenna

and Cinema 4D.

developments from both Maxon and

the plug-in community. There are

just an abundance of riches (includ-

ing your own, Tavy!).

Tavy: Often when I ask an artist,

“Where do you find your inspira-

tion?” they will tell me in the shower,

while driving in my car, by looking at

the world around me etc..where do

you find yours?

Dennis: That’s a tough one. I have

a great need to immerse myself in

art, what with all the horrible things

that are happening around the

world. For me, working is one part

escape and for the other part, an

attempt to put something positive

back into the world.

Personally, I think of my work as a

way to explore creative challenges -

it’s not really so much “about” any-

thing as it is an on-going effort to

create an abstract work that can be

as compelling and involving to an

audience as any representational

work. But since there is no story line

per se, I have to give the different

musical and visual elements their

own meaning, and try to keep every-

thing unified and moving along, and

I hope some of that is clear to the

viewer.

Tavy: Your work has been seen at

exhibits and presentations the world

over. If you could pick one of your

works as a favorite, what would it be

and why?

Dennis: Tough question - like ask-

ing, which of your kids do you like

the best?? I think the visual ele-

ments in Faktura are about as

advanced as I will ever do, but the

combination of color and movement,


30

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Introspection

This image is one of my all-time favorites -

DiTools and Cinema 4D.

not to mention the shape of the

basic objects, in Cross Contours,

will be hard to beat. But hopefully,

every new work will get better in

some way, so my final answer is: My

favorite work is the next one I cre-

ate!

Tavy: Could you tell us a little

about your workflow? Where do

you start and end? How do you

know when a piece is finished, or is

it ever?

Dennis: My work habits are much

the same as they have been when I

was writing concert music - con-

stantly sketching, trying to stay

focused, always looking for the line

or thread that will hold a piece

together. The toughest part is

always just committing to a begin-

ning - getting started! Then things

often seem to take on a life of their

own, and in most cases, the work

gets easier.

I don’t always work in a linear way -

sometimes I have an ending before

a middle section. I also like to keep

the music and the images moving

along somewhat in sync - often, I

will work on the music for a few

days and it will get ahead of the ani-

mation; sometimes, it is the other

way around. What I don’t want to do

is finish an animation and then go

figure out what the music will be (or

vice versa, which I often did in my

earliest works). So there’s a lot to

juggle - and simply finding files on

my hard drives is no small task -

but I’m not complaining...

Tavy: Are you currently working on

any projects that you could share a

bit about with us?

Dennis: I guess you could say

“Always working on a project....” (My

wife wishes I would take a vacation

some time, but she’s a cancer

researcher, so she should talk!).

With all the resources available

today - and CINEMA provides so

many - I constantly find news ways

to produce interesting images,

though only a small fraction of them

will end up in a piece. Right now I

am exploring Katachi’s DPiT 3 and


31

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Julia

After seeing a contemporary glass show at a muse-

um in Boston, I gave it my best shot.

getting some great “results,” plus

DiTools is always on hand. I have

four or five short “movements,” each

with some similarities in the basic

type of images, that might end up in

a suite. That’s the plan, anyway. But

if I can find some other way to con-

nect them and bring them together

into a unified composition, I could go

a different route.

Tavy: If you could give one piece of

advice to the millions of aspiring

artists in the world, what would it

be?

Dennis: Hang in there! Get advice

from people you respect. Send your

work out to festivals and confer-

ences - they’re everywhere. But

remember that you are the only one

that needs to be satisfied.

Tavy: Once again, thank you for

sharing with 3D Attack and our read-

ers a little about you and your art.

Any last words?

Dennis: Thanks for the opportunity!

It was a true pleasure interviewingDennis Miller, his work in innovativeand inspiring. Available on Mr.Miller’s website is a DVD collectionof all 7 of his Concert Animations.Although his still images are stun-ning, there is nothing like seeingthem flying and morphing across thescreen. Visit Dennis Millers websiteat www.dennismiller.neu.edu.


32

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Frame from Release

Release was a short animation created for the Voom

High Def network.

Layers! Almost every graphic appli-

cation has them and, lets face it,

they are tremendously useful, if not

completely indispensable.

They are also, luckily, present in

CINEMA 4D. You can find them in

the BodyPaint module, and you use

them just like you do in Photoshop.

The other place you have layers is

on the Material Editor, in the form of

a shader, and this is exactly what

I'm going to talk about.

Using the Layers shader is almost

like having a small compositing

application inside any channel of

your materials. In fact, the Layers

shader is like a Fusion shader on

steroids!

You can add to the Layers shader

whatever you would be able to use

in any channel and you can com-

bine all you want in whatever way

you wanted. You can even add

masks, to create more complex

combinations.

Anything you add to the Layers

shader is stacked on top of whatev-

er is already there - you can change

the position whenever you want, by

dragging - and it will influence

everything that is bellow it, just like

the Layers floater, in Photoshop.

So, if you add a Colorize effect to

the Layers shader, it will not just col-

orize the image that is directly bel-

low it, but it will colorize the result of

everything that is bellow it. There is

a way to change that rule, as we will

see later. But first, let us explore the

Layer shader dialog:

The leftmost button, labeled

"Image..." allows us to load a bitmap

into the Layer shader. The following

button, labeled "Shader...", when

clicked, shows a menu with all the

procedural shaders available in

Cinema4D. The third button, labeled

"Effect...", when clicked, shows a

menu with a set of effects specific to

the Layer shader. We will talk about

them right away. The "Folder" but-

ton, when clicked, generates a fold-

er inside which we can place what-

ever we want: bitmaps, shaders,

effects, other folders... We will talk a

bit more about folders later because

they are not there just for

cleanup/organizational purposes.

Finally, the "Remove" button deletes

whatever is selected in the bottom

of the Layers shader dialog.

The effects that are specific to the

Layers shader are the following:

The Brightness / Contrast / Gamma

effect is, I believe, obvious enough.

Everyone has a TV set at home and

knows how to control the brightness

and contrast of the image. The

Gamma parameter is not so obvious

for non-professionals.

I will try to explain in a very simple

and quick way: not all devices dis-

play/reproduce color the same way.

For example, if we feed a printer

with a value of 75% of cyan, the end

result may be a shade of 79% on

the paper (due to uncontrollable rea-

sons, like ink quality, paper quality,

etc). The same can happen with

monitors: the video board sends out

an RGB value of 15,120,34 and the

monitor displays a value of

13,117,30 (again, due to uncontrol-

lable reasons, like phosphor quality,

backlight lumen power, etc). The

Gamma curve is used to correct

those discrepancies.

For example, an image viewed on a

Mac computer will always look

brighter than when seen on a

Windows PC computer, because

those OSs use different gammas to

display images. Actually, the gamma

on Windows will almost always oblit-

erate the darker shades and that is

why Windows is so crappy for

design work, but that is another sub-

ject ;-) So, Gamma is used mainly

for correction. If you don't know how

to use it, leave it. Stick to Brightness

and Contrast.

The Hue / Saturation / Lightness

effect allows to individually control

the color (the hue means just that,

color. If something is red, no matter

what type of red, if it is yellow, no

matter what type of yellow, etc), the

saturation (is it a vivid color, a dull

color or no color at all, as in... grey)

and the brightness of the color (is it

dark? is it light?).

The Posterize effect will reduce the

number of colors of the image. For

example, if you set the number of

colors to 5, the image will only show

5 different colors, sampled from the

most common colors of the original

image.

The Clamp Color and Clip Color

effects look similar, at first sight, but

they do different things. Both have a

Low and a High limit. The Low limit

is 0% and the High limit is 10000%.

Layered ShadersBy Rui Batista

33

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Yes, you read it right, ten thousand

percent!! Don't forget that CINEMA

4D can deal with HDRI images too

and those images can have pretty

high luminance values. Now, for the

difference between the Clamp and

Clip color effects. Since the manual

in not very clear about what they do,

I will provide my explanation, based

on my observation and interpretation

of the outcome.

When you set a Low value in Color

Clamp, all values below that bright-

ness will become that value.

Meaning that, if you set a Low value

of 23%, all brightness values bellow

23% will be, from now on, treated as

23%. The same for a High value, as

in, if you set, for example, a high

value of 77%, all brightness values

above 77% will be, from now on,

treated as 77%.

Setting a Low value for the Clip

Color effect will set a NEW low

value for the image bellow it.

Meaning, if you set a Low value of

23%, everything bellow 25% will be

treated as 0% and the place where

the 23% value was, is now treated

as the new 0%, scaling all the

brightness values above.

If you set, for example, a High value

of 77%, the values of the brightness

are adjust in a way that the old 77%

brightness value is now treated as

100% brightness.

In this case, we can't say that every-

thing above 77% is treated as 100%

because, as we learned, these val-

ues can go as high as 10000%.

So, all the values are simply scaled.

Since this is all very abstract, I

believe it can be better understood

with a graphical representation:

The Transform effect will "physically"

transform the image bellow it. You

can rotate, flip vertical and horizon-

tally, move and scale the image.

Actually, the Layers shader could be

used just for transforming a bitmap,

using the Transform effect because

there is no other easier way to do

these kind of manipulations.

When the image is

moved/scaled/rotated, the missing

content that should appear at the

edges is filled in with a wrapped mir-

rored image. Having a hard time

understanding the last sentence?

Just check out the sample pictures:

This is done to minimize the evident

seam that appears at the limits of

the images when they are tiled. But,

some images are already prepared

for seamless tiling and, for those,

there should be an option to turn off

this mirror/wrap behavior.

Unfortunately, there isn't. I already

asked Maxon to include this but I'm

only one voice shouting in the

crowd. Please, go to

http://maxon.net/pages/support/sug-

gestions_e.html and ask for this

addition (and any more you may

want). Finally, there is the Distort

effect. The pixels of the underlying

image are shifted, depending on the

brightness value of the noise type

chosen from the Noise list. This is,

by default, a 2D (X and Y) displace-

ment. But, if you are creating volu-

metric textures, turn on the 3D

option and the Z axis will also be

evaluated. The Strength value

defines how strong the displacement

will be. The Noise Scale defines

how big or small will be the noise

pattern. Actually, the scale parame-

ter should be called Frequency

because higher values generate

smaller noises, but this is not a per-

fect world! Some noises can have

variable detail generation. The

amount of detail is set by the

Octaves parameter. The higher the

value, the more detail you get, but

also longer calculation times.

The Time Scale parameter defines

how fast/slow the noise animates.

What? The noise animates? Yes, it

does. But you will only see it when

you render the final movie (if it is a

movie) or if you press the left-mouse

button (Command+click on the Mac)

on the thumbnail preview of the

material and choose Animate. My

personal opinion is that the Time

Scale parameter should default to

0%, because, usually, people don't

want the noise to change over time.

What the user usually wants is sim-

ply a "distress" effect on the image.

But, if you are rendering a still, you

will not see any animation, so, lets

leave it this way. Finally, the Wrap

options allows you to decide how

the missing pixels from the edges of

the image will be filled. HINT FOR

MAXON!!! This is what we also

need in the Transform effect!! Now

that we saw what we can add to the

Layers shader, let us see HOW we

can add those things.

Usually, like stated before, whatever


34

Tuto

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you add to the Layers shader,

appears on the top of the list and

affects everything bellow.

How it affects, depends on the

transfer Mode and the intensity at

which it is applied. The intensity is

how much the above image is

blended with everything that is bel-

low it. Its like the Opacity slider in

Photoshop. This can be changed by

dragging the slider or adjusting the

value numerically. The transfer

modes are quite a few:

Normal

Multiply

Screen

Overlay

Hard Light

Soft Light

Dodge

Burn

Darken

Lighten

Add

Subtract

Difference

Exclusion

Hue

Saturation

Color

Luminance

Levr

Layer Mask

You probably know all the transfer

modes from Photoshop (that is why

I will not explain each and every

one, individually), except for the last

two.

The Levr mode acts as a Threshold

filter. If the brightness value of the

pixel of the image bellow is darker

than the brightness value of the cor-

respondent pixel of the image

whose transfer mode is set to Levr,

the result will be black. If it is lighter,

the result will be white.

The Layer Mask mode affects the

way the layer above is displayed.

This is better understood with an

image, as usual.

The top layer is a simple gradient

(1). The layer right beneath it is also

a Gradient, set to Circular (2). Its

transfer mode is set to Layer Mask

so, it will serve as the layer mask of

the layer above it. That is why, we

can see a “hole” in the top gradient

and, through it, see the bottom

layer, a Tiles shader (3).

White pixels in the layer set to Layer

Mask will make the top layer

opaque. Black pixels in the layer set

to Layer Mask will make the top

layer transparent. Grey values will

produce correspondent translucent

results.

Clicking on the eye icon, on the left

of each layer, will turn its visibility on

and off. This will also affect the

results of the final image, since each

layer influences everything that is

beneath it. So, turning a single layer

off can produce drastic changes.

Double clicking the name of the

layer allows us to change its name.

Why? Well, having a dozen layers

named Gradient is not as clear as

having layers with names like

Green-Red, Contrast, Sky gradient,

etc.

Clicking the little thumbnail at the

right of the layer name enters edit

mode for that shader/image. It

resulting dialog depends on the type

of shader/image, of course.

When the editing of that particular

shader/image is finished, go back to

the Layer shader dialog by clicking

the left facing arrow at the top of the

Material Editor window (the up

arrow can also be used).

You can re-arrange the order of the

layers by simply clicking and drag-

ging them up and down. A little grey

bar appears, showing where the

layer will be placed, when the

mouse button is released.

If you drag the little thumbnail,

instead of the name, you will get a

copy of the layer that you can place

wherever you want.

Until now, I said, repeatedly, that

each layer usually affects everything

bellow it. But, what if we want to

restrict a certain effect to a group of

layers? Easy! We use a folder.

Consider a folder as an independent

“universe”. Everything you place

inside a folder (by dragging layers

into it – the cursor chances to show

that it will be placed INSIDE the

folder) is evaluated first and then,

the final result of the folder is com-

bined with whatever is bellow it. Of

course, the final result of the folder

calculation can also be applied with

variable intensity (opacity) and with

different transfer modes.

Double clicking the folder name also

allows changing its name. This is

specially important because the

name “Folder” is not particularly

informative.

And this is it. The only thing you

need now is to use your imagination

and combine shaders and effects in

the best way possible.

Rui Batista


35

Tuto

rial

Hey Attackers, long time no see.

I’ve been busy this past few months

with school, but of course I’m never

to busy to bring our loyal readers an

article or two. This month, I’m here

to report on a event I recently

attended here in LA on behalf of 3D

Attack. Our friends at The Gnomon

School of Visual Effects were kind

enough to let me sneak in and

observe some master digital artists

at work during the first ever Gnomon

Workshop: Live! I’m sure by now,

most of our readers are familiar with

the good people at Gnomon, espe-

cially their Gnomon Workshop divi-

sion, which provides a plethora of

training material in the forum of

dvds. While its truly a godsend that

Gnomon offers this kind of material

so that boring folks like me can

learn about ZBrush in the corner of

my room while all the cool kids go

out partying and engaging in gener-

al acts of debauchery, I think most

would agree with me in that there’s

nothing quite like learning from the

source. That’s what this 2-day

event was all about. The people at

Gnomon seem to be pulling out all

the stops when it comes to providing

great educational resources for 3D

Artists, and this was no exception.

While there were a few rough edges

throughout the day I was there (I

was only able to attend on the sec-

ond day, which focused on digital

painting techniques), overall the

event went smoothly. The event

seemed to feature most of the big

names that spring to mind when

thinking about the cutting edge of

visual effects, from organic modeling

to matte painting. On day one,

which focused on 3D techniques

and technologies, the instructors

included: Eric Hanson, Kevin

Hudson, Zack Petroc, Mayan

Escalante, and the infamous Meats

Meier. I’ll discuss the second day a

bit, as that was when I was there.

Scott Robertson discussed creating

reflective surfaces in Adobe

Photoshop, Dylan Cole discussed

his approach to designing matte

paintings, Neville Page explored

rendering illustrations in Adobe

Photoshop, Ryan Church of course

discussed concept painting in Corel

Painter, while Christian Lorenz

Scheurer discussed conceptual art

direction. My two favorite lectures

were given by Dylan Cole and

Neville Page. For an hour and a

half, I sat in awe as Cole was able

to render what to me looked like an

excellent matte painting of a city in

the time it takes for me to roll out of

bed in the morning. He literally

started with a blank canvas in

Photoshop, and we watched every

stroke that he put down, and it was

fascinating to discover the different

aspects of his painting as he was

painting it. Of course along the way

he explained what he was doing,

what keyboard shortcuts he was

attempting to use (he was having

trouble transferring the mac com-

mands to pc), and seemed com-

pletely fine with sharing all the little

tricks he uses on a daily basis to

make his work easier and faster. I

really appreciated it, and I’m pretty

sure I shan’t be painting 4K resolu-

tion matte paintings anytime soon.

But even though I probably won’t be

making photorealistic film quality

images, the techniques he showed

were applicable to quickly mocking

up concepts for your personal or

professional projects. What was

even better, is that Dylan encour-

aged people in the audience to

shout out questions, which he would

repeat for everyone- and then

answer. Neville Page, as I stated

above, was also another favorite.

Mr. Page is definitely an amazing

artist, but what I found most appeal-

ing about the techniques he demon-

strated to us, was that I actually had

a chance of doing them. I’m not

sure if this was merely because I

was watching him do it in front of

me on a rather large screen, I was

nevertheless impressed with the

clarity by which he explained his

methods. For his session, he

walked us through the creation of an

illustration he had made prior to that

weekend- that of some sort of shiny

beetle. He demonstrated the use of

different Photoshop tools in the

approximation and simulation of dif-

ferent surfaces and the interaction

of light with them. It was highly

informative. Overall, I was pretty

impressed with Gnomon Workshop:

Live, in its first iteration. Its definite-

ly strange to sit in a huge space with

hundreds of other people that want

to do the same things that you want

to do, but at the same time it’s a

great feeling, and anyone who can

facilitate that kind of atmosphere

among artists should be applauded.

And on top of the great instruction

that was being provided, Gnomon

had also wrangled top art directors

and representatives from studios

such as Dreamworks Animation,

Sony Pictures Imageworks, Ubisoft,

and Fheng Zhu design among oth-

ers. I’m sure that guests were

thrilled to have the opportunity to

show their portfolios to these indus-

try professionals, and I’m sure some

careers were made in the process.

The pure networking potential of the

event is kind of mind boggling when

one thinks about it. We all lurk or

participate in online forums in some

aspect or another, but the opportuni-

ty to meet a real person that has

your interests and who could possi-

bly be your future collaborator on a

short film, or your contact at that

dream job, well- you get the idea.

36

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PO

RT

- G

NO

MO

N S

CH

OO

L

http://www.gnomon3d.com/title.html

http://www.gnomon3d.com/title.html

3

I was born in Silesia, Poland in the

middle of April 1981. For more than

20 years now I’ve lived in Cologne,

Germany. During my mercantile

education I started getting interested

in CG-graphics, so I switched from

classic pen & paper to the first 3D-

app demos. This if when CINEMA

4D became my weapon of choice. I

really don’t consider myself a pro-

fessional 3D Artist, but more of a

simple Graphics Designer like thou-

sands of others. Maybe this is the

reason I enjoy spending time in the

different communities. It keeps the

dialog open.

During this time, Thomas (Tank)

Pasieka, introduced me to his plan

to launch a new e-portal called 3D

Attack. I’ve really enjoyed watching

how successful 3D Attack has

Artist SpotlightCornel Swoboda aka “Cornel”

Spotl

ight

Name: Cornel Swoboda

Age: 24

Country: Germany

Software: CINEMA 4D 9.1, ZBrush2,

Photoshop CS

Website: http://www.nutshells.de

Favorite resources on the web:

3dattack, c4dtreff, CGTalk, ZBrush

Central

become, and am really happy to be

one of 3D Attack’s Spotlighted

Artists.

As you can see from some of my

images, I never understood the prin-

ciples of XPresso, Thinking Particles

and other node-based stuff. I didn’t

find my interest in it till recently.

Don’t even ask for C.O.F.F.E.E. at

this point! One good thing about

being a C4D user is the great sup-

port that comes from the plug-in

developers. I’ll let those talented

people do that job!

I especially like to work with lights

and shaders, experimenting, and

just starting CINEMA 4D to see

where the journey takes me. This is

my way of “Zen Meditation”. While

working for an advertising agency I

did a lot of product visualization. It’s

a very interesting aspect when work-

ing in 3D, but it’s definitely not

something I can see myself doing

for the rest of my life. I always try to

keep a good balance between 3D

work and 3D the hobby. The hobby

side can really eat up a lot of time.

But then again, why do we have fall

and winter?

Not too long ago I was asked by the

European Space Agency (ESA) in

Munich, Germany to join their team

and work on an 80-minute docu-

mentation about space. CINEMA

4D was already integrated into their

pipeline and the deadline was close

(as always – what a surprise). With

two graphicians and two scientists

we spent 6 months faking, cheating,

working and rendering with CINEMA

37

3


Spotl

ight

38

4D to solve this difficult task. For

example... ask yourself how would

you visualize a detailed flythrough of

the galaxy with its billions of stars

when you work on a regular work-

station with 1GB of RAM? This was

probably the most stressing, yet

interesting time of my life. I would

be more than happy to do it all over

again.

Things are now moving a bit slower

for me. I am currently busy with

studying communication design and

will work as a trainer for CINEMA 4D

beginner courses in January of 2006

for 3dpowerstore.de.

I really try to keep as busy as I can.

PUH! That’s why most of my ren-

dered pictures are months, or even,

years old. Well, I also try to

squeeze in 6 hours of sleep daily

(minimum)! However, I have 2 pri-

vate projects currently frozen, so

keep visiting the 3D Attack Forums.

Maybe I’ll have some updates soon.

A few last words: Always do what

you love and many doors will magi-

cally open.

KEEP ON ATTACKING!

- Cornel

3


Spotl

ight

39

Best of CINEMA 4DSome of the best artists around the world using CINEMA 4D

40

Image: Furniture on the Run

Artist: Wes Ware

Country: USA

Date Created: 9/10/05

Website: www.wesart.com

Software: CINEMA 4D and Photoshop

Client: Guardian SPF Glass

Agency: Gish, Sherwood & Friends

Creative Director: Roland Gibbons

Artist Comments: This piece really challenged the way I

approach a project. Many different elements had to work

together to tell the story. I absolutely love working in 3d, down

to the smallest details. I find myself getting lost in the simplest

things. I actually spent 2 days working on a procedural wood

texture when I hadn't even built the entire scene yet. Not that

it's a bad thing to achieve a realistic wood texture, but when

the timeline for the project suffers for it then it's an issue.

I stepped back from the project for awhile and realized that I

need to approach this in the same way I would a painting... work

in broad, general strokes and refine the image as a whole as you

go along so that at any point in the process, you have a "fin-

ished" piece. My workflow changed. As a Sole proprietor, I have

to do it all myself (I do farm out a little but not much, I'm too much

of a control freak).

There's no one working on the textures for me in the corner while

I build the models. If I get ahead of myself then the timeline is

doomed.

41

Image: Radio GAGA

Artist: Dejan Andric

Country: Germany

Website: www.pixel-guerilla.com

Date created: 10-14-05

Software: CINEMA 4D 8, Gamma Correction

Artist Comments: Well... hmm ...had some spare time while digi-

tizing 5 hours of Footage for an Edit on the next Day...so i

grabbed a free G4..added Radiosity and Realism.. What a Night!

42

Image: Gothic

Artist: Matthew S. M. King

Country: USA

Website: http://matthias-art.tripod.com

Date created: November 2005

Software: CINEMA 4D 7

Artist Comments: I modeled my cathedral

after the Royal Abbey Church of St.-

Denis, where the Gothic style was invent-

ed. I used the number 7 as a base for all

amounts and measurements, such as tan-

gent values, surface subdivisions, and

light intensity values. I chose not to tex-

ture it so to purely emphasize the model-

ing.

December2005

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