Firstly we had to have some artwork, which we made in Illustrator. I used a vector form of my personal branding. It features an M with two concentric circles, with the outer circle being broken into 3 arcs. For this to be compatible with Cinema 4D we had to convert any text to paths by creating outlines. It was recommended that any longer bits of text should be avoided as text can be added in C4D. Mine was fine because it was just an initial.This was placed on a document that had been altered to work using C4D's 3D space. The default setting for Illustrator is to have the origins set to the top left hand corner, because Illustrator is used to create flat vectors it only needs to have two axis' (X and Y), but given that C4D uses 3, where the origins all meet in the middle. We needed to move the origin points from the corner to the middle of the page, we did this by turning on the rulers, and then moving from the top left corner of the document window and dragging this to the center point of the document, and this reset the origins to 0,0 in the middle of the page.
We then set the artwork to sit centered around this center point. When saving the work, we had to save it as a legacy version as the last compatible version of Illustrator was Illustrator 8.
Next we set up a more professional and organised workflow on the desktop, by creating a folder on the desktop for the project and then creating 3 new folders within this new folder. One each for the artwork, output, and Cinema 4D. This is because in industry where a project may be compartmentalized this is the most efficient way of working.
The next step was entering C4D. W started by editing the render settings. Firstly, changing the output to a print output with A4 Landscape settings, and changing the frame range to current range. We also editing the name that the file would be saved as, changed the file type to JPEG, with the quality at 95%, but we were advised anything above 80% would be fine.
We then saved these settings as a template, before saving an empty file with a proper name to begin the project. There is an option in C4D that allows the file to be saved incrementally to chart progress.
Next we changed some of the view settings, so that there was an darker tint to the edge of the work space window, as well as adding an action safe border at 95% of the full size of the window.
The following step was importing the artwork that we had made in illustrator. C4D does not label this as import or place like Adobe Creative suite instead it is 'merge'. When merging there is an options window and with a scale setting, In this case we just left it at 1.
C4D can read that the imported file is made up of paths, in the window we selected the paths that was under the shape layer and used a right click menu to connect objects and delete. The next step was to drag out all the paths from the shape and delete the null shape.
We then went about extruding the paths that made up our design. We again selected the paths and used the subdivision surface tool and selected extrude. Then we dragged the path into the extrude layer, before altering with the settings of the extrusion. We changed the caps to fillet caps, on both the start and end, as well as changing the bevelled edges to 3 stepped edges with 0.5cm radius'.
Once we were happy with this, we started to add the environment. We added a floor and a background. Because the floor is inserted at 0, 0, 0 we had to adjust the Y-position of our logo. The best way to move it is by using the arrows that appear when a layer/object is selected. The green arrow moves it in the Y, the red moves it in the X, and the blue moves it in the Z-axis. I shifted mine up enough that it looked as if the logo was hovering above the floor.
The next stage was to start sprucing up the work. This was started by adding a new material. This is achieved by creating a new material in the bottom tray by double clicking. You can duplicate this new material by selecting the original and dragging it to the right whilst holding the cmd button. I added three colors; orange and white, (these are the primary and secondary colors in my branding) and a dark grey, as I think this would offset the other colors nicely. The materials/colors can then be applied by dragging them onto the face of the shape, or onto the layer for it to be applied to all of the shape.
This was followed by us selecting the floor and the going to the tags menu. we selected the Cinema 4D tags sub-menu and compositing. We then turned on the compositing background, and compositing background for HDR Maps options.
We then added some text, by selecting MoText from the MoGraph menu. In the text options we changed the justification so that it was aligned center. I added the supporting copy, to sit next to my logo.
Once this was done, we added a camera by selecting add camera from the top tool bar. This is initially added to where the current viewpoint is, this can be seen by scrolling/zooming out immediately after adding the camera. Clicking on the crosshairs in the camera layer in the window in the top left allows you to see it the render from that particular angle.
Next, we added some lighting. We were advised again that when adding lighting you should follow the same principles as photography, using key, and fill lighting. The key lighting was placed over the left shoulder of the camera. We then enabled shadows, by simply going into the general menu in the light, going to shadow, and turning on soft shadow maps. Using a low shadow resolution (around 250 x 250) keeps the shading soft, whereas using a higher res can create a more defined edge. A second light can be added to fill in some of the shadows.
The position of the lights can be changed without leaving the camera view, by altering lights coord settings.
Another one of the settings can be altered to add colored tints. We added a slight yellow tint to the key, using a yellow with a 5% hue, and a blue tint to the fill.
The final step was to add a lighting effect that would add a bit more depth to the work. It was made by changing one of the visible light settings on the key light, turning the visible light on and making the radius bigger so that it extended beyond the artwork.
Overall I am quite pleased with how my first attempt at working in C4D went. I found the process to be quite simple, even if there was a few times where I got a little lost whilst working with some of the camera/viewpoint controls. This is certainly something I would like to do again, and perhaps refine the use of the lighting, to give a more desirable outcome, as I feel that I may have implemented the last step incorrectly as it doesn't really add anything to the composition. I am really happy with the rest of the styling however as it fits well into existing branding I have produced, however I would like to perhaps tweak the colours a little bit to be an exact match what already exists.
I look forward to using and progressing my skills in Cinema 4D.
