Cinema 4D potential

[Anonymous]

There seems to be a lot of negative feelings about Graphisoft's decision to discontinue MaxonForm, especially from those who have spent a lot of time and money purchasing and training the product. However, in the wake of this we have the new Cinema 4D plug-in. This product is extremely powerful how ever you look at it, whether it be as a modeling tool, a rendering engine or even as an animation program. With this in our arsenal ArchiCAD stands to become very strong in its field. However, without the correct knowledge and proper use it will fall by the way side as a tool used seldomly and never reach its potential.
With this in mind I am proposing that we use this topic to discuss how each of us use, have used or intend to use the software. This can then become an impetus for others to learn and eventually invest in the software, strengthening its user base and therefore its support by Graphisoft.
If you own MaxonForm or C4D; what do you use it for? What is your work process? Have you found any work-arounds in MaxonForm or C4D that save time compared to their AC counterpart method?
I invite others to raise questions about any aspect of the software and its potential to AC users.

*I understand that numerous other Cinema 4D forums exist and provide excellent advice, however I am yet to find one that specifically focuses on its use with AC.

[stefan]

Dwight wrote:
You don't sound like you do much building, either. [...]

I don't, be some others do.

e.g. ETH Zürich's Architecture & Fabrication laboratories
http://www.digitales-bauen.de
http://www.dfab.arch.ethz.ch/?loc=DFAB&lang=e&this_page=home&this_type=&this_year=&this_id=

MIT Digital Design Fabrication Group:
http://ddf.mit.edu

These are academic institutes, but they are not only creating digital models.

Other examples are at the SmartGeometry group:
http://www.smartgeometry.org

ArchiCAD and Cinema4D don't figure in these sites, but they all try to combine digital form making with actual fabrication.

When a script can provide a laser cutter with all required information about some n-thousand different unique pieces, the machine will happily start cutting along.

There is indeed an issue when all these automatically fabricated pieces need to be assembled on site. In these academic circles, there are many examples of complete digital production projects, where in the end the students spend the best part of a week mounting and connecting complex pieces, only helped with some printed "tag" onto the side and the digital mockup on the laptop next to them.

[Anonymous]

I can see that this is a divided subject.

With all due respect Dwight I am still a lowly student, sitting in the gutter gazing at the stars. But can you blame me? I believe that there are two key ways to revolutionize the way something is built; you can either push the boundaries of what you have or look for something new that does the job better. I am hoping to that C4D could enable both avenues to be explored. Existing parts can be pushed to their limit to get the best out of them, while at the same time new geometries and building methods can be tested.

I would love an all singing, all dancing AC that allowed free form modelling for the masses, yet what would be lacking within that is the scope that C4D provides. It has a new way of working that can allow people to tackle problems in a different manner. This alone could provide many innovations.

I feel that you may have misinterpreted my comments regarding people's use of the software. My "Field of Dreams" notion is in no way doubting the creativity of the community or the design briefs that they may tackle. I simply wished to imply that the software would allow for a greater level of investigation at the conceptual level whilst maintaining a competent level of construction detail. As in my opinion, it is the hassle of experimenting with amorphous shapes in 3D software, only to have to recreate any designs again in useful architectural software that turns some people away.

With regard to the Smart Geometry post, I find it to be an inspiring prospect. My aim in posting that was to show what is possible, I understand that not many architects could ever dream of a budget that would allow it, although with the logic of AC and the freedom of C4D it provides a good starting point to find an acceptable mid-point.

I see the industry moving forward into an increasingly digital age, an age that many industries have been part of for some time now. Many industries have streamlined their manufacturing processes via computers or found ways to use new materials which increase their products quality. We are in an industry that requires all of these, from materials, to advanced design, complex manufacturing etc. I don't see why we should not grasp at any advances (Whether in software, design or manufacture) with both hands.

[Dwight]

I'm totally in favor of all the things you both advocate and am a Cinmea 4D lover. Computer control and freeform modeling are great things that i use whenever i can - but i only see the relevance in manufactured components where the overhead of figuring out a precise object is warranted. I replied to you initial post with the sentiment that organic form is expensive to build but beautifully iconic - it has a definite application. But:

it's just really expensive and without a sufficient mandate from the sponsor it is professionally irresponsible.

This method of work is expensive not because it is computerized but because of pragmatism - part of a sub-thesis i undertook in architectural grad school in the seventies. It is a different issue from how computers are used by the intellectuals [us] but originates from understanding human behavior [them] and the conflict between the comfort of repetition and the strangeness of the unique. Other problems:

- lack of implied details: no more kiting "similars" to contractors. You know this: You detail the most obvious things and hope that the lunk can interpret the rest of them. Universal and complex detailing for all connections will now be required. I suppose that if you are making expensive buildings the corresponding percentage fees are adequate compensation for this extra work. It is one thing to be a student [youse] or artist [me], making these things up and not really caring about the time and another being an architect with a staff [our Archicad colleagues] burning through a fee designing a complex building.

-uniqueness of parts can't cope with jobsite mishaps: there was this roof insulation product back in the seventies where they cut a matrix of foam at the factory to slope to drain. It came carefully packaged with layout instructions. God help you if the lads decide to put the insulation down on a windy day, all those uniquely-tapered lightweight wind frizbees. Lose one off the roof and then go down into the gators [polar bears in Canada] to retrieve it. Perhaps others had success with this but contractors where i lived hated it, partly because the lads hated following the instructions.

- radical increase in management time: With increasing uniqueness comes increased precision and lack of error tolerance, something construction has plenty of right now. Trying to make design more accurate and sculptural means more information prior to construction and less ability to address jobsite variations.

- bid inflation: the advantages of collision detection and BIM aside, when a contractor sees organic shapes he rightfully gets scared. When he sees a three hundred sheet set of details with a promise that your unique parts will all fit together just like in the model, he doesn't believe you because of his real-life experience working with guys who do not own coveralls.

Of course things will change once these issues get resolved, but it will not be in your generation that organic forms dominate the orthographic.

[Anonymous]

Dwight wrote:
Of course things will change once these issues get resolved, but it will not be in your generation that organic forms dominate the orthographic.

Not to mention that orthagonal spaces are generally more efficient for stacking, storing, etc. There is not unlimited space and material for exploring all the wonders of zoominess in most urban projects. Freeform shapes in buildings will remain the exception. Occurring only in buildings where there is justification and budget for a more sculptural presence.

[Dwight]

Orthagons.
Little Orthagons.
Fabricated from the modern, universal material "ticki taki"
And they are of uniform appearance.

[Anonymous]

I sense that you see my opinions as slightly mis-informed. My lack of experience certainly "gifts" you that one. However, I also think that you may be placing too much emphasis on this word "amorphous". I do not wish for the world to become a mess of globular buildings, nor do I see this as a practical solution to "urban sprawl" (or any of the other issues faced by modern architects). I simply see a world that does not embrace technology in a manner that is always suitable or beneficial. I understand the need for a balance between form and function, and that simple geometries are often easier to construct and afford. My point is that experimentation is necessary to advance the medium. If we stick to what we know and trust then we will stagnate. The assumption that the current solution to a problem is the best we have is wrong. It is the best that we have "right now". Eventually someone will find a better way.

To return to what I had hoped would be the purpose of this post, I was urging the community to embrace a new medium. One that allows new solutions to be found, or to re-evaluate your existing ones. I do not want everybody to suddenly drop their current ways and begin building extra-terrestrial architecture, but maybe see that it has become easier to investigate these paths should they require it. This is why I urged others to say what they use the software for, so that people could see its possibilities and decide if it could improve their way of working. It they have no use for such software then so be it.

[Dwight]

You want me to be the old cranky guy and you want to be the young adventurous guy who will change the world.

But you are wrong: I am the guy who has thirty years of design and construction experience who retired to play with modeling and rendering software and now builds unique things using hand craft, computer technology and all of these fancy machines. I am the guy who is tremendously excited by all of this technology and is always looking to use it profitably. I am in the middle of this revolution and actually doing things with it.

My argument is that it is expensive for the reasons i listed previously and has limited application since most of these free form modelers can't make building information without being re-interpreted through an application like Archicad.

So I've been agreeing with you all along about the wonder of technology. It is in human nature that we disagree, me being overly cynical for the clarity of my argument and you being idealistic.

But i am done now. Let us talk again in five years once fabrication catches up to concept and the trades are filled with educated adventurous souls who want to build post-post-modern things.

[Anonymous]

At no point do I wish to portray you as an "old cranky guy". I am familiar with a small amount of your work and respect the time that you take to help others on this forum. That is the reason that I joined, to learn from those who have more experience. It is always better to learn from primary sources.

I do not see your view point as incorrect, I simply see it as different from mine. We must both stand by these to hold together our own personal ideological values regrding architecture. Your experience, however, gives you far more to draw upon and so I will again state my ideas as ideological as you rightly point out. If the way that I may have written this has caused you to feel differently then maybe I should apologise.

I have not disregarded your points, they are highly valid and the majority of practising architects would probably agree with you I am sure. Personally, I will try and use them to improve my own methods of working. Yet I am very passionate about my work (and have no doubt in my mind that you are) so you will understand my occasionaly stubborn manner.

I do intend to find a suitable translation path that would allow C4D parts to be fully BIM compatable and so any help on this subject would be highly appreciated (from any sources). My current method of saving parts in the .DXF format and then converting them via GDL has several issues. Has anybody found anything that works better (Inside or outside of AC?)

[Bricklyne Clarence]

Chris wrote:
........
To return to what I had hoped would be the purpose of this post, I was urging the community to embrace a new medium. One that allows new solutions to be found, or to re-evaluate your existing ones. I do not want everybody to suddenly drop their current ways and begin building extra-terrestrial architecture, but maybe see that it has become easier to investigate these paths should they require it. This is why I urged others to say what they use the software for, so that people could see its possibilities and decide if it could improve their way of working. It they have no use for such software then so be it.

Personally, I don't think C4D is a good solution for architects (even those wanting to design freeform/organic designs) nor should it ever be in the conversation for alternate solutions for ArchiCAD users needing to redress this deficiency, or rather this raft of deficiencies in ArchiCAD's toolset. I'll explain why.

For one thing as we've painfully been forced to observe and admit through 3 versions of AC and Maxonform now, they don't speak the same language from the point of perspective of allowing sufficient documentation and manipulability of objects between the 2 softwares especially coming back to AC. Once you create a freeform object or geometry, shouldn't it exist in the same universe as your walls, windows, doors, slabs in the sense of allowing one to extract all the necessary geometric, quantitative and possibly even cost information from them as you would all those other elements, and as is the primary function of a Building INFORMATION model? So far Graphisoft has been unable to make that connection work for ArchiCAD users making Maxonform and MF objects created for use in an AC environment nothing more than cosmetic and superficial solutions or band-aids at best, ultimately crippling and limiting the designer's creativity.

Secondly, when Maxonform was first introduced, there was a lot of complaints regarding GS resorting to yet ANOTHER third-party solution to address a glaring deficiency in AC's toolset. And given their track record with the clunky integration of third-party solutions and plugins, which either didn't speak the same language as ArchiCAD, don't have a similar work-flow or interface and perhaps worst of all simply never kept pace with all the latest releases of AC as they had to be updated with each new version, there was no reason to be optimistic about this one changing the trend neither. Despite the fact that at the time there was even a GS tech guy who come on $ he forums and tried to re-assure users that Maxonform was not a long-term solution to GS's plans for the improvement of ArchiCAD's modeling capabilities.
At the end of the day, the presence of tools like Maxonform and C4D by extension are just a needlessly extended reason to justify Graphisoft's reluctance to improve and upgrade the modeling capabilities of ArchiCAD in a manner that is consistent with their entire BIM philosophy and approach. As long as they exist, Graphisoft have no impetus nor incentive to improve their own product.; and look just how great that has worked out for the whole Stairmaker fiasco in AC.

And don't even get me started on the extra cost of having to spend on an additional application to get to do what the Complex profile manager can't handle in ArchiCAD ( e.g. sloping profiles in the Z-axis, and variable extrusions/lofts and sweeps).

The other point is the fact that you're forcing users to have to learn a whole new interface and workflow ( and one that's not even logical nor intuitive to the architectural/CAD/virtual modeling way of thinking or working - simply because C4D was never intended to be an architectural design tool to begin with, as opposed to the animation and character creation and rendering tool that it is) simply to be able to do what they should have had available to them by now in their native software. Even AutoCAD has some level of limited NURBS/freeform surface modeling with rudimentary sweep and extrusion tools. It's mind-boggling and only a little more than laughable that a software that claims to be far more advanced as ArchiCAD claims to be has never really made an honest effort to do this.
In other news, their direct competitors, Revit, just announced the implementation of a Sweptblend tool into their upcoming version which places a serious mode of freeform modeling directly into the hands of their users. This despite the fact that Autodesk already have far more powerful and mature Freeform modeling software solutions in their stable (such as MAX, Maya, Studiotools, et al) which they could easily have redirected their users to, the way that GS has been shepherding AC users to C4D/MaxonForm.

C4D and Maxonform are formidable applications for what they are intended to do. That just doesn't happen to be Architectural design and documentation, and more specifically BIM and if you even prefer free-form architecture. At the end of the day they are object/character modeling tools with more developed rendering and animation toolsets, which GS is using to buy time. That's all.

I'm hopeful ( though highly skeptical given the history) that the decision to withdraw support and development for Maxonform from now on, means that GS are now going to try an put a far more honest and concerted effort into improving those glaring weaknesses in their program rather than depending on third-party developers to bail them out. I guess we'll find out with the upcoming version or rather upcoming versions;
.......... but they're running out of time.

In the meantime my personal verdict is, leave C4D and the Maxonform-types for those object modelers that don't have to worry about parametrics, integrated design and documentation, and improve ArchiCAD's own capabilities.

[Anonymous]

One thing that has certainly been a constant point throughout this topic is the need for GS to work towards new attributes within ArchiCAD that allow various freeform modelling. On that subject I could not agree more.

I have raised in previous topics my concern with AC and C4D not communicating properly in harmony with the BIM philosophy, it did seem to be a conflict of interests. Although there are "work arounds" (if you could call them that). They produce primitive and sometimes limited outcome, which may appear redundant to some, however I have tried to work on it (with my extremely limited ability). I mention in an earlier post that saving a file as .DXF and then converting them using GDL (there is a fantastic tutorial on how to do this in DNC's GDL cookbook). With a little time this can produce parametric objects that will produce as much information as any other (providing that you program it with GDL). I must stress that I have had limited success with rather basic tests, hence my request for any other methods that may have been found. I could easily understand why people with tight deadlines would see this process as wasted time. Especially as it requires learning both C4D and GDL (however both could be beneficial if the time could be found).

Both yourself and Dwight make very informed points with regard to a practical use for the software in the working environment. I admit that I have little to no experience of this and therefore realise that my answers may have been ill-informed. The documentation issue is something that I have encountered when using C4D manipulated objects, it did make the process seem a little redundant, which is why I began looking for ways to make the objects useful within a BIM.