Turbocharge your motion graphics
Find out how to use the Redshift Object tools to enhance viewport performance for motion graphics in Cinema 4D
How to use the powerful Redshift Object tools in Cinema 4D
Cinema 4D from Maxon has had a long-deserved reputation as a leader in creating advanced motion graphics. With the acquisition and integration of the GPU rendering powerhouse Redshift into the Maxon family, motion graphics solutions have received a speed and efficiency boost.
This is because Redshift has tools that can create fast proxy geometry, which can drastically speed up responsiveness in Cinema 4D, both in the viewport and at render time.
In this tutorial, we will look at how powerful the Redshift Object tag can be for creating particle and spline geometry on the fly with X-particles and the Matrix Mograph object. All of this can be done without developing actual geometry in Cinema 4D, which can really slow a scene down.
We will also see how efficient the Redshift Proxy can be at speeding up the Cinema 4D viewport. A Redshift Proxy is a file, still or animated, which bakes out the selected geometry of a scene into separate files. These are both fast-loading and easy to use across a range of C4D scenes.
At the end of this tutorial, you will have learned skills that are transferrable into all elements of a Cinema 4D pipeline. Redshift Proxies are an incredibly powerful way to leverage large datasets easily in Cinema 4D.
01 CREATE A CENTRAL OBJECT
Make a new Cinema 4D file for every element created, as this allows greater control when compiling the scene later. In the new file for the Central Element, create a sphere. Cinema 4D spheres have a range of geometry options. Choosing an octahedron at this stage gives a distinct pattern to work with. Keeping this as a live 'object' rather than a polygon throughout will mean that it is easy to change throughout the creative process, which will enable more straightforward iteration.
02 EXTRUDE THE SPHERE
As well as the standard Mograph objects, Cinema 4D also has the Moextrude, which can work on geometry within an object. Add a new Moextrude object and place it under the sphere in the Object Manager. This means that any changes applied to the Moextrude object are only applied to the sphere. In the attributes of the Moextrude object, set the Extrusion Steps to 1.
03 ANIMATE THE EXTRUSIONS
Add a Random Effector, then set the Position parameter in Y to the desired amount. This creates a randomised pattern. In the Effector tab of the Random Effector attributes, set the Random Mode to Noise. Adjust both the Moextrude length and the Position parameter to create a subtle bump effect on the surface of the sphere.
04 USE A FIELD FALLOFF
Add a Linear Falloff Field to the Random Effector so that only some of the polygons are affected. The linear field can then be animated without any keyframes by adding the Vibrate tag and setting the rotation to 360º for all three values for the Amplitude. Reduce the frequency to 2 to create a smoother animation which gradually extrudes random faces on the sphere’s surface.
05 ADD AN HDR TO LIGHT THE SCENE
Cinema 4D comes with HDRS to use, but for this scene I am using the Greyscalegorilla Pro Metals suite of HDRS, which work with their HDRI Link plugin. This provides a quick way of accessing a range of HDRS and can be dragged and dropped. To hide the background, uncheck Enable Background in the Environment setting in the Dome Light attributes.
06 BEVEL THE EDGES USING A REDSHIFT MATERIAL
Create a new Redshift material, and use the Copper preset. To soften the hard edges, add an RS Round Corners node to the Bump Input channel. The Round Corners radius can be adjusted as desired to create a small bevelled edge. Add a Bevel object to the scene and group it with the sphere object with a new null object. Set the Bevel level to the desired radius to create an object that looks more organic, and loses the CGI effect. Again, both of these elements can be adjusted throughout the creative process.
07 CREATE BASIC WEATHERING WITH AN RS NOISE NODE
Add an RS Noise node to the material and connect it to the Refl Roughness to create some basic weathering. To check what the Noise is doing without having to see ‘through’ the material, the RS Noise can be connected directly to the Surface node, which shows it in the Redshift Renderview. This works with most nodes within Redshift and is a great way to troubleshoot and refine nodes directly. When the Noise is to a scale and contrast that suits, connect it to the Refl Roughness channel.
08 USE A MATRIX OBJECT
The Matrix object is similar to the Mograph Cloner object, apart from the fact it produces points rather than clones of objects. For new Cinema 4D artists this can be confusing as the Matrix object does not create anything to ‘see’. Add a Matrix object, set the Mode to Object, then drop the Sphere object in the Object dialog. Points can now be seen across the sphere in the viewport.
09 ADD GEOMETRY
Add a Redshift Object tag to the Matrix object by right-clicking on it in the Object Manager. Once added a Particles tab will appear in the attributes for the Redshift Object tag. Set the mode to Sphere Instances, and in the Redshift Renderview a small sphere should appear for every point of the Matrix object. Adjust the Scale of the Matrix points in its Transform tab, and the Scale Multiplier of the Redshift Object tag to create an equivalent size in both the Renderview and the Cinema 4D viewport.
10 MOGRAPH
The Matrix object works just like a cloner and therefore, so do all the Mograph effectors. Adding a Plain Effector can push the Matrix points away from the surface, and the same Linear Field Falloff object that animates the Moextrude object can be used to control this effect. If the effect is to be inverted, it is best to just create a duplicate of the Linear Falloff Field.
11 ADD MATERIALS TO THE MATRIX OBJECT
Now that the Matrix object can be seen in the Redshift Renderview, it can have Redshift Materials applied to it just as if it were a regular object. The Redshift Sphere objects are much quicker to render than a ‘traditional’ combination of a cloner object and a sphere object, and as such viewport and Redshift Renderview performance is faster as well. Create a new Redshift Incandescent Material and apply it to the Matrix object, so that the sphere instances appear as small glowing spheres.
12 CREATE A REDSHIFT PROXY OF THE SCENE
Gather all the elements, bar the HDR dome, into a new group Null. Select the Null and from the Object Manager Edit menu choose Select Visible. Go to the main Cinema 4D menu, and select File>export>redshift Proxy(.rs) and a palette will pop up. Make sure the Export dropdown is set to Selected Objects, and Add Proxy to Scene is ticked. That animation is set to all frames.
13 SAVE IT
If the Proxy is to be used among multiple files, it might be a good idea to keep it in a separate folder within the Cinema 4D 'tex' folder. When the Redshift Proxy is saved, an individual file is created for each frame, so it is a good idea to save to as fast a drive as possible. When the Proxy creation process has finished, a new Redshift Proxy object will appear in the Object Manager.
14 WORK WITH THE REDSHIFT PROXY
If the Proxy files are being kept in the local 'tex' folder, reduce the path to just the file name. Set the Preview to Mesh and hide the original object group. A grey version of the shape without the matrix dots should appear in the Cinema 4D viewport. In the Redshift Renderview, the Proxy object should look identical to the original object. The most significant noticeable difference is in playback speed in the Cinema 4D viewport, which can actually be up to ten times faster.
15 USE THE PROXY IN THE SCENE FILE
The Redshift Proxy object can be added to the scene file that will be used for the main render, either by adding it from the Redshift menu or by copying and pasting the Redshift Proxy from the Sphere Cinema 4D file. A Redshift Proxy can also have different materials added to it just like any object as long as the Materials option in the Attributes palette is set to Object.
16 MAKE TRAILS OBJECT USING X-PARTICLES
In a new Cinema 4D file, created at the same level as the other files, we will make the Trails object. Create a Null Group and within it, place a Platonic object and an Arch spline. Add an X-particles system and set the Emitter Shape to Object and drag the Platonic object to the Object dialog box. Apply an Align to Spline tag to the Platonic and choose the Arch as the spline. Set two keyframes for the Position in the Align to Spline at 0 and 100% at 0 and 100 frames to create an animated movement with particles.
17 USE THE XPCONSTRAINTS TO ‘CLUMP’ THE PARTICLES
Reduce the number of particles to around 1,000 from 100 and reduce the speed to a couple of the centimetres. The xpconstraints modifier, which is added in the Dynamics part of the X-particles system, can be used to make the particles move as if they were trapped in liquid and also attract themselves to each other. Play with the settings in the Connections, Forces and Viscosity tabs in the xpconstraints tag to get a feeling of movement for the particles.
18 UTILISE THE XPSPEED MODIFIER
Even with the xpconstraints modifier, particles can still drift away from the spline. To get this under control, use an xpspeed modifier with a Spherical Field Falloff. Activate the Clamp Maximum speed in the xpspeed attributes to a very low value. This will not stop the particles, but prevents them from drifting off while still giving them enough momentum for the attraction settings from the xpconstraint tag to work. Adjusting the size of the Spherical Field Falloff can be a good way to bring more life to the particle system.
19 ADD GEOMETRY TO X-PARTICLES SYSTEM
This would be an excellent point to create an xpcache object, and save the cache to the 'tex' folder in its own cache folder to keep everything local. To ensure the Redshift Proxy will work properly, and because the article count is relatively small, create a duplicate of the Platonic object, create a xpgenerator object and make the duplicate Platonic a child of it.
20 THE LINKING ELEMENTS
To create the web of the trail, use an xptrail object to create spline elements between the particle points. Experiment with the settings in the xptrail object, as there are a lot of different ways to connect the particles using the Algorithm dropdown. Try and find a balance between creating obvious connections and something that still feels delicate like webbing. The particle movement from the xpconstraint will still apply to the movement of the threads.
21 VISUALISE THE XPTRAIL MODIFIER
Add a Redshift Object tag to the xptrail object. There is now a Curves tab. Choose Strips from the Mode dropdown, which will create basic polygon strips in the Redshift Renderview. As Redshift is making this geometry rather than Cinema 4D, it provides quicker feedback for the Cinema 4D viewport and the Redshift Renderview, than using the traditional C4D Sweep object method.
22 ADD ILLUMINATED TEXTURES
Create two RS Incandescent materials of opposing colours and add one to the xptrail object and the other to the xpgenerator object. Create a new RS material for the original Platonic object, and using the Redshift Shader Graph, copy the RS material nodes from each of the two RS Incandescent materials into the Shader Graph of the Platonic material. Use a Material Blender node to combine the two materials, using the Wireframe node as a matte between them.
23 CREATE THE RS PROXY OF THE TRAILS
Collect all of the relevant objects into a parent Null and go to File>export>redshift Proxy(.rs). Again create a folder within the master 'tex' folder for the Proxy files and allow Cinema 4D to create a file for each frame. When finished, a new Redshift Proxy object should be in the Object Manager. Clear the Path to just the file name and copy this Proxy object into the Scene file.
24 CLONE THE X-PARTICLES REDSHIFT PROXY
As far as Cinema 4D is concerned the Redshift Proxy is just another object, so using it as the driver for a Radial Cloner object is a great way to make the most of it. As everything in this Cinema 4D file is a proxy, the playback is rapid and is not reliant on X-particles or Mograph caching, allowing the scene to be quick, and this allows the artist to concentrate on composition. Play a sequence through in the viewport, and it should be faster on the second play as the RS Proxy files will have been loaded into the viewport.
25 CLONE THE REDSHIFT PROXY CLONES
The Redshift Proxy system is so robust that an Instance can be created of the main elements, dropped into another cloner and used as a background object. If different materials or more advanced animation are required, just duplicate the original group and drop that into the cloner. These methods will be quicker with Redshift Proxies than with normal Cinema 4D objects.
26 LIGHT THE SCENE
Add a Redshift Environment object to create both volumetrics and bokeh. Add a Redshift Area Light in the background to create volumetric effects. In the Volume tab set the Contribution Scale to 1, which will blow out the image, and use the Area Light Intensity Multiplier in the General tab to control the amount of volume effect. This method tends to give a cleaner result at render time.
27 SET BOKEH WITH THE CAMERA TAG
To create a realistic bokeh, add a Redshift Camera. When it is in the Object list, first of all, enable Bokeh in the Redshift Camera tag. In the Bokeh tab, click on the Override and Enabled checkboxes. Use the COC Radius to control the amount of bokeh, and keep the Power at 1 or higher. Using this method will keep realistic highlights and should prevent grains.
28 ADJUST REDSHIFT RENDER SETTINGS
To render with Redshift, first of all, make sure that Redshift is selected in the Renderer settings dropdown. In the General tab, go to the Unified Sampling settings and adjust the Samples Max to 512 and the Samples Min to 64. If that causes a slow render time, change those settings downwards – as ever it’s a compromise between you and the time needed to get the right combination. Activating the sampling overrides for Light, Volume and Reflections to around 1,024 samples also helps with the quality of the render.