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.

[Dwight]

On the other hand, I use C4D to make discrete elements imported via 3Ds to Archicad. Since they become objects, they contribute to the BIM. They can, to some, extent be re-scaled and distorted, but aren't truly parametric as one expects form GDL scripted elements.

Where I am coming from is that when you employ a freeform modeler in a building environment, you are asking for trouble, since that object is going to be hard to make from sticks and sheets, and expensive to make if other methods like machining or casting are employed. You can make any irregular lozenge in Archicad as long as you accept the fact that it will be a series of flat ribs - easily modeled in Archicad - with interstitial panels - easily modeled in Archicad - approximating the curves of that lozenge. What you can't do in Archicad is willy nilly poke at the thing to form it as you might in modo or Cinema.

The reality is that doubly-curved elements are rare in architecture since they are so difficult to manage, computer-assisted or not.

There is great compatibility in importing some thin-skinned lozenge into Archicad from whatever modeler and filling that form with geometrically rational ribs and skins that make Archicad sense: the best of both worlds.

[Anonymous]

Dwight, Can I ask how well your objects translate from 3D Studio? You mention that they classify as objects, yet are you able to assign the attributes of a regular object? My example being a wall with a different texture on each side. This is something out of the realms of the current C4D translator and another reason behind my use of GDL script to make an object "smart" once again.

[Dwight]

Once you have the 3Ds import Add-on installed, ANY 3Ds imorted is automatically made into a Library Object. You can't logically mess with the script, but there she be: something placeable and scalable and countable in Archicad.

I would never attempt anything as complex as extracting different surfaces. Trying to identify discrete surfaces on anything imported is a frustrating mug's game. All those frigging nodes that make no sense. If I needed a panel with different materials on each face, I'd duplicate the thing and move it over a little and change the copied one's material. That's a workaround. Or set it up in Cinema the way you want.

Things that twist and bulge irregularly - that is for C4D. Weird columns, say. I am researching fabric-formed concrete and Cinema is good at sculpting asymmetric columns...

http://www.umanitoba.ca/faculties/architecture/cast/pdf_downloads/1_pr.pdf

Good luck with your efforts.

[Anonymous]

Thank you for the .pdf, I had been considering a steel mesh with sprayed concrete for a current project, although this will definitely be worth following up (especially due to the low cost). A combination of both could provide interesting results.

I have been looking for a way to create an exterior wall in C4D that could be translated into AC with assigned wall properties. A potentially tall order, but worth a try. So far my knowledge of GDL is limiting my progression (not to menton the errors with unknown characters when opening a .DXF file to be edited). I will explore your method and see if it provides any new options. Many thanks

[Bricklyne Clarence]

Chris wrote:
..........

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.

.......well, once you do begin getting the experience, you'll realize that the documentation aspect of it, is a really big BIG deal, and an issue that one cannot just simply wish away. And managing that documentation in the context of a sensible (read parametric and coordinated) updates and revisions workflow is what makes or breaks the entire logic of using BIM in the first place as opposed to the traditional Flatland (2D CAD) cobbled and disparate approach.

And the fact that you yourself are having to find, or search for, ways ( through GDL scripting or otherwise) to facilitate this workflow and make it work in a BIM context; whereas the cold harsh implication is that, the software is the one that is supposed to be doing all this for you, for speaks volumes to the underlying weakness of the whole approach.

A weakness that Graphisoft can no longer run away from ( by relying on others such as C4D to plug in the holes in their software) without risking ceding more ground to their competitors, both downstream (Vectorworks and other semi-BIM applications) as well as abreast of them, or as they would argue, upstream from them (Revit and Microstation).

And as for Dwight's comments regarding the rarity of doubly curved elements in architecture, that may have been true fifteen or even 10 or 5 years ago. But given how parts manufacturers, civil/structural engineering and the construction fields have not only caught up with the available technology and methods, but are in a certain sense even driving it nowadays, it would, obviously, be foolhardy to believe that the same still holds true today. Perhaps at a smaller scale (residential architecture etc) where conservative tastes and stylistic approaches will always hold sway over the type of architecture that gets designed and build, but larger scale markets and client-bases are demanding or tending towards more iconoclastic and captivating styles and language.

It should be no surprise, given the correlation between the recent number of high profile commissions, competitions and projects won by the likes of Zaha Hadid, - who perpetually seems to be at the top of another award winning roster every time you look at another journal - , or the Snohettas, Fuskas and the likes who employ tools making use of such geometry, on the one hand, and the recent and very concerted push by the likes of Autodesk and Bentley to improve the versatility of their respective softwares' modeling tool-sets on the other hand. Obviously the clients and juries selecting them are not intimidated by the prospect of
having to realize such forms (or pay for them); nor are the engineers and contractors who would have to actually build them and make them work. So why should we be to conceive them?

I'm not advocating that this is evidence of the position that all architecture seeking to be great or noteworthy should be designed this way or employ these types of double-curved geometries and languages.

But at the same time why, in the name of all that's progressive and innovative, would you as an architect limit your creative capacity by some unfounded perception that clients wouldn't want it or because the tools you use (or choose to use) simply wouldn't allow you to do more? In the same way, why would you as a software developer be reluctant to develop the tools and functions in your design software that would enable your clients to not only push the envelop but also, to indirectly, facilitate and promote your own cause by showcasing the vast potential of your own product in producing those would-be striking works of architecture?

Gehry nudged the door open in the nineties with his high profile projects and approach, and now the Hadid's and even SOM's are kicking it and busting it right open.

But if GS are to open their minds and chose to expand the capacities of their software and the capabilities of their clients, then they should do it the right way in an integrated approach that makes sense the the context of a philosophy that they themselves are pioneers in; BIM or Virtual Building. Or they can consign themselves to being a niche product that once held great promise and potential but ultimately was surpassed by the ennui of their own complacency.

[Anonymous]

Firstly, I must stress that I agree with you when you say that GS risk being outdone. Although I do understand their predicament as a developer, being faced with the task of combining two very different mediums. One which is very logical and based within a real world perspective and the other which is relatively free of boundaries in its modelling technique. My attempt to work around this is troublesome and sometimes fruitless, yet potentially a solution. Something that could be used while GS figure out the reprogramming of AC (If this is deemed necessary). Other software that can create such forms are lacking in BIM capabilities, suggesting that pairing the two is not easy. I personally would rather have the BIM ability, as it is more productive.

I would not say that my need to use GDL points out an issue with the software, it simply cannot create what I want within the current version. On a much larger scale, Frank Gehry encountered this with his designs, hence his experimentation with Catia. A software designed for a totally different industry. He used several sofware applications to produce one outcome. The British Museum's great court roof designed by Norman Foster was designed within several software applications to calculate its structural integrity and construction method. Yet it formed one outcome. On a much, much smaller level I am attempting a similar process (obviously I cannot compare to their designs in scale and complexity, but I chose notable examples).

Your opinion on the future of the software is definitely correct, things are moving very fast and GS will need to produce or risk a loss in the market. In the mean time we will have to make do, although we are lucky enough to have migration between a lot of very good software (although sometimes it may involve a game or two of "pass the parcel" between applications).

[Anonymous]

@dwight
Can you please say something more about your workflow with 3d max? I have been intersted in that, but never menaged to do it right

[Dwight]

Like, what kind of problems do you have with it?

[Anonymous]

Dwight wrote:
Once you have the 3Ds import Add-on installed, ANY 3Ds imorted is automatically made into a Library Object. You can't logically mess with the script, but there she be: something placeable and scalable and countable in Archicad...

Dwight,

I never managed using the 3Ds import Add-on properly.
Basic geometry is translated fine. Though, complex elements like furniture from the Dosch Design collection or manifacturers objects seem to pull AC to it's limits to end with a crash / bug report.

Is there any restriction on the amount of polygons / faces that AC can handle? I need most of the objects in one AC scene / design before exporting to a renderer...

[Anonymous]

In addition :


I did the test with a basic chair : import to ".gsm" is about 11 MB ! and counts 42.850 polygons. Every move, change or whatever in AC takes at least 5 minutes... What's the use of 3Ds import in AC then?