Quovadis..LW,Cinema4D, Artlantis? Hello Dwight!

[Anonymous]

I think for AC-users, 4aternatives:
LW with AC9 and AC10
Cinema4D with Maxonform
or Artlantis R.

To have everything is gut, but expensive.

Dear Dwight, with your knowledge, will you buy Cinema 4D or ArtlantisR?

[Anonymous]

cameronm wrote:

Have you checked out the price of C4D?
The basic is half the price of Artlantis and with the Advanced Render plugin it is still less than AtrlantisR.

This is certainly worth looking into. Thanks Cameronm

[Karl Ottenstein]

Krippahl wrote:

cameronm wrote:

Have you checked out the price of C4D?
The basic is half the price of Artlantis and with the Advanced Render plugin it is still less than AtrlantisR.

This is certainly worth looking into. Thanks Cameronm

Not sure where Cameronm got his numbers.

In the US, Artlantis R is $595 for a new license ($375 upgrade from 4.5).

C4D on the other hand is $695 (not half Artlantis - but $100 more) and it does not do the rendering without the Advanced Render module which adds $495 ... for a total of $1,190. So... it is Artlantis R that is half of C4D, not the other way around, at least in the US.

(Maxon also offers miserly discounts - as a percentage of purchase price- for upgrades from prior versions, compared to Abvent and Graphisoft.)

C4D is a superior product - both an impressive modeler and (with module) impressive rendering engine - giving professional results. But, I would estimate it takes several weeks to master compared to a couple of hours for Artlantis R and so think that R is a more productive tool for the majority of architects/designers.

My 2 cents. 😉

Karl

[Anonymous]

Minor correction... C4D does render without Advanced render, which adds Radiosity and other features...

[Karl Ottenstein]

Rashid wrote:
Minor correction... C4D does render without Advanced render, which adds Radiosity and other features...

Thanks for catching that, Rashid! Of course, since Artlantis R includes radiosity (its claim to fame), the C4D advanced render module price must be added to compare apples to apples (even if C4D then ends up being a bigger, fresher apple because of even more features).

Cheers,
Karl

[Anonymous]

Karl wrote:
So... it is Artlantis R that is half of C4D, not the other way around, at least in the US.
Karl

Thanks Karl.
That little piece of information was very usefull.

I was not thinking of migrating (Artlantis works ok for me, so if it aint broken...) but as I teach CAD and multimrdi at an University, I am supposed to know this kind of stuff.

C4D seems to me to be a major competitor of Max (multiplatform AND much cheaper), but for those who do architecture, and model witha BIM/VR software, Artlantis is the right choice for an externall rendering engine.
After all, there seems to be no reason to model on a rendering software, if all your modeling is done beforehand on a BIM basis: modeling done on C4D would not integrate the BIM database (not considering Maxonform, which has a very clear and specific objective).

[Anonymous]

It must be handled very carefully.
C4D is now right rendering programm for Allplan from Nemetschek (the both one is froam Germany.)
http://www.nemetschek.com/

But now AC has also something from C4D, namely Maxonform.

It must be discussed what kind of Rendering programm is now for AC...
And than also the information about price
Graphisoft must contact also with C4D to handle the package for AC-Rendering

In my opinion C4D has more possibility than Artlantis.
I am very angry with concept of Artlantis (no update for Artlantis 4.5!!)

[stefan]

Apples have to be compared with Apples (and I'm not talking about the hardware).

ArchiCAD + LightWorks is fine: it's integrated, it's "free" and it does it's work for most of the common required output.

ArchiCAD + Art*lantis is one step up: you gain fast previews and radiosity in an easy-to-use package. But... no animation at the moment.
(I plan to introduce our students to Artlantis, if our local dealer will follow the offer I got from Abvent...)

ArchiCAD + Maxonform = this is only improving on modelling, not on rendering. I would love to test it, but there is no demo-version AFAIK and my dealer just forwards me to Maxon for more info

ArchiCAD + Cinema4D (or Lightwave or 3ds max or ...)
You have the most expensive deal, but with the most potential: advanced modelling (freeform, subdivision surfaces, NURBS, boolean operations and the lot), advanced rendering (radiosity, caustics, soft shadows), advanced materials & lighting etc...
This beats any other combination, but comes at a cost: the price and the learning time. Because of that, some of the other combinations might work better for your particular goal.

By the way, the Lightworks engine supports Radiosity and soft shadows, but it's a modular beast, which I assume is only partly licensed by Graphisoft. It is the rendering engine of VectorWorks, Truespace, FormZ and many others. I personally think it lacks the edge of engines as VRay, Brazil, FinalRender, Maxwell, but it compensates that with integration into CAD-software, for which is almost the only one in the world.

And you can always export ArchiCAD models into 3ds, obj or VRML files for use in almost any other rendering application out there. Wait a minute, I believe someone actually made some website doing this... Oh, I did 😉

[Anonymous]

Karl wrote:
In the US, Artlantis R is $595 for a new license ($375 upgrade from 4.5).

C4D on the other hand is $695 (not half Artlantis - but $100 more) and it does not do the rendering without the Advanced Render module which adds $495 ... for a total of $1,190. So... it is Artlantis R that is half of C4D, not the other way around, at least in the US.
Karl

I believe C4D also requires the ArchiCad exhange plugin so you can export to C4D from ArchiCad. Maxon sells this for US$95.
This means its pretty much imposible to demo rendering in C4D without spending money. I would love to try it out to see how much harder it would be to use than Artlantis.

[Anonymous]

Hallo neil.
I am looking forward to seeing your experiance with C4D.
Graphisoft cann support this C4D officially like Artlantis.
Than AC-user can get as bundle Maxonform and C4D.
I think, it is good future.

[stefan]

neil wrote:
I believe C4D also requires the ArchiCad exhange plugin so you can export to C4D from ArchiCad. Maxon sells this for US$95.
This means its pretty much imposible to demo rendering in C4D without spending money. I would love to try it out to see how much harder it would be to use than Artlantis.

You don't necessarily need the Exchange plugin or Maxonform. You can export models to and from Cinema4D with standard ArchiCAD (using the 3ds file format).

Maxonform does make it more convenient to put the models into the main ArchiCAD scene, but Maxonform would not do anything for rendering! You need the full Cinema4D for that!

And the Exchange plugin won't do anything additional for adding freeform models in to ArchiCAD.

In fact, you'd be better of with a combination of both: MaxonForm & the Exchange plugin 😉