New Features

Technology • License Server • Service Agreement • Ease of Use • Content Browser • Workflow and Interface •

File Formats • Modeling • 3D Painting • Projection man • Material System • UV Editing • Lighting • Rendering •

Multipass Rendering • Animation • XPresso • Custom Scripts & Plugins

CINEMA 4D - State-of-the-Art Technology for 3D Graphics

From the very beginning, MAXON has always been one of the first developers of 3D software to integrate important new technologies into its applications. MAXON demonstrated its ability to create fast, stable and easy to learn applications with its very first product. Multiprocessor support, multithreading, hyperthreading and DualCore support are just a few of the technologies MAXON has integrated into its applications over the years.

2008 - CINEMA 4D for 64-Bit Macintosh
CINEMA 4D is the first professional graphics software that completely supports the Mac OS X Leopard's 64-bit capabilities for Intel and PowerPC processors.

2006 - CINEMA 4D for Intel-Macs
MAXON is the first developer worldwide to make a Universal Binary version available.

2005 - CINEMA 4D for 64-Bit Windows
MAXON released a 64-bit version of CINEMA 4D immediately following the availability of the Windows 64-Bit Edition. Professional users in particular were able to quickly benefit from up to 1 TeraByte of available RAM on systems running with Windows Server technology.

2005 - Multicore Processors
CINEMA 4D users benefited from an average increase in performance of 80% in 2005 as the first DualCore systems were introduced. This only served to underscore and reinforce CINEMA 4D's position as one of fastest renderers on the market.

2003 - Hyperthreading
This technology was quickly integrated into CINEMA 4D after Intel introduced it and provided the render engine with even more power.

2002 - 95% System-Independent Code
2002 marked the release of CINEMA 4D R8, whose code was 95% OS-autonomous. This made developing the software easier, decidedly faster and more error-free.

2001 - Mac OS X Native Version
In the same year that Apple introduced MAc OS X, MAXON introduced a Mac OS X native version of CINEMA 4D and thus became the first developer worldwide to release a professional graphics application of this kind.

2000 - 3D-Painting in the Rendered Image
The groundbreaking BodyPaint 3D lets users paint on rendered images using MAXON's own Raybrush technology. This unique feature still lets BodyPaint 3D stand in a league of its own. BodyPaint 3D has become a standard tool in every major CG production studio.

2000 - Completely Customizable Interface and Unicode Support
Also in 2000, CINEMA 4D Release 6 was made available. One of its preeminent improvements was the completely customizable GUI - unmatched in its flexibility. Even today, CINEMA 4D remains one of the few applications with such a high degree of flexibility in the configuration of its GUI.

2000 - CINEBENCH
MAXON is setting the de facto standard for real-world speed tests with CINEBENCH. Many hardware reviewers have since made CINEBENCH their standard benchmarking tool for testing.

1998 TCP/IP-Based Network Rendering
NET Render stirred up the market with such one-of-a-kind features as browser administration, automatic load balancing and safe recovery.

1997 - Multithreading
MAXON implements the basics for multiprocessor support. The achieved speed gain still sets standards today.

1996 - Multiplatform
The Windows and Macintosh versions of CINEMA 4D V4 share already 70% program code. This makes developing the application easier and less error-prone.

License Server

License Server

For educational institutions and production facilities managing multiple licenses of CINEMA 4D, Release 11 introduces robust license server technology that makes the management of numerous licenses and groups of licenses with various module configurations a breeze.

Network administratorscan define groups, assign individual licenses, modules and extension kits, and define a unique lease time for each group. This means you can allow laptop users to extend their lease for offsite work, or give a specific project group access to additional modules. All this control means you can make more effecient use of your investment in CINEMA 4D.

MAXON Service Agreement

The "MAXON Service Agreement" (MSA) is optionally available to MAXON customers. Participating customers are kept up-to-date with the newest releases of CINEMA 4D and/or BodyPaint. As soon as a new software version is available MSA participants will receive these automatically, allowing participants to immediately take advantage of all new features and advancements.

The MAXON Service Agreement is ideal for companies working with fixed budgets - no more surprises when planning next year's expenses. In addition to the most up-to-date software version, MSA participants also receive enhanced services such as preferred support status, expanded use of software or discounted admission to special events.

Ease of Use

As a 3D artist you know that fast, easy workflow is the key to meeting deadlines and beating the competition. MAXON CINEMA 4D allows you to customize almost every aspect of the interface to achieve the fastest and easiest workflow possible. Novices and professionals alike will appreciate the well-designed workflow that makes CINEMA 4D the easiest to learn professional 3D application.

It Works the Way YOU Do

CINEMA 4D's completely customizable interface puts every tool within easy reach. You can easily redesign layouts, palettes and even menus to match your personal workflow or particular tasks. You can also easily switch between layouts and menus with the click of a button. Every tool is completely integrated and can be added to and accessed in any layout.

With cascading shortcuts you can assign a shortcut key to any command and even group commands under a single shortcut. The global pop-up provides easy access to frequently used commands and the HUD puts valuable scene data and tool options at your fingertips. With multiple methods for accomplishing almost any task, CINEMA 4D will fit perfectly into any artist's workflow. You're a 3D Artist In the Real World, and It's Time You Start Working Faster - and Smarter...

Multilingual

"Se habla espa?ol?" or "Sprechen sie Deutsch?" MAXON CINEMA 4D is available in eight languages - your native tongue may be native to CINEMA 4D as well: German, French, Italian, Russian, Korean, Japanese, Polish and Czech. More and more languages are added constantly.

Online Updater

Stay Up-To-Date with CINEMA 4D's Online Updater

Release 11 now checks for updates automatically each time it's launched, so you can quickly and easily apply fixes and enhancements to CINEMA 4D's functionality, help content or presets. If you're in the middle of an important project, you can choose to download an update later or archive your existing installation just in case. Of course, updates can still be applied manually if your workstation is off the grid.

12 Months Free Technical Support

The 3D world is difficult to navigate and you are bound to hit a roadblock now and then. When problems arise you can count on MAXON's technical support specialists to provide quick and free support by phone or email. Don't risk being stranded on the side of a lonely information highway. Travel with the peace of mind our support team provides.

Content Browser

As an integral part of the MAXON CINEMA 4D workflow, the Content Browser ensures an optimal overview and management of projects and related files.

The Content Browser's sophisticated search functions, in combination with its directory structure view of your project's files help you find your files quickly and reliably. Use drag & drop to manage models, shaders or presets.

Sneak Preview Included

The Content Browser automatically generates thumbnail preview images to let you see at an instant what each file looks like. Thumbnails of existing files are "passed on" to other catalogs, which keeps new thumbnails from having to constantly be re-generated.

The fact that presets and preferences from various modules can be managed using the Content Browser lets you work more efficiently and helps you save valuable time.

Workflow and Interface

The world's easiest to use professional 3D application has just been made even easier and even more powerful. MAXON went back to the drawing board for Release 10 and redesigned the CINEMA 4D interface to be even more intuitive and efficient than ever before!

Newly designed icons are now easier to recognize. All icons are group color-coded, making it easier to find the right tool quickly (e.g. all modeling tools are now colored light blue).

We have relocated certain tools and functions to improve your workflow even more.

Research has shown that some users prefer a dark interface and some a lighter one. CINEMA 4D R11 now gives you the choice - a single command lets you switch between interfaces.

Customizable to the Max

Our interface also has serious power underneath the hood. We have made it easier for the beginner to get started quickly. Once more experienced, users can delve deeper into other areas such as the powerful new Layers System that enables you to quickly find and select objects without damaging current hierarchies.

If you specialize in an area of 3D such as modeling or animation then you will no doubt love our preset layouts, designed to make the toolset fit your needs. Simply click on a new layout to change the entire interface to a style best suited for that task.

Need more editor space? Then take advantage of CINEMA 4D's nifty Fullscreen mode. This lets you quickly maximize your editor view to full-screen with a simple keyboard command.

Like Fullscreen but still want to access options? Then use our pop-up menus or add functions to an object with the HUD. The HUD is like an interactive post-it note. Just add whatever features you want and these features will appear in the Editor Window.

File Exchange

"Man is not an island" and neither is MAXON CINEMA 4D. Because real-world 3D artists do not work in a vacuum, CINEMA 4D includes support for a host of industry-standard file formats. Images and movies in PSD, TIF, Targa, JPG, QuickTime, AVI and other commonly used formats can be imported as textures or modeling templates, or used for final output. Support for vector formats extends to Illustrator import as well as Flash and EPS export. Assets can be exchanged with other 3D applications in DXF, 3DS, OBJ and other formats and entire scenes can be imported using LightWave 3D and FBX formats.

Plays Well with others

Architects and engineers can enjoy direct import of scenes from Allplan, Vectorworks and ArchiCAD by purchasing additional plugins. Windows users can even populate their scenes using Archvision's RPC format and extensive libraries of real people and objects. Scenes can be exported to the web using Macromedia's SW3D format and final renders can be exported directly to Adobe After Effects(R), Combustion(R), Final Cut Pro(R), Shake(R) and NxN Alienbrain(R). You can easily transfer data with other tools you use frequently which that makes CINEMA 4D the best tool for the job.

3D Formats
(R/W) 3DS
(R) Biovision BVH/BVA
(R/W) COLLADA
(R) DEM
(R/W) DXF
(R) DWG
(W) Direct 3D
(R/W) FBX
(R) IGES*
(R) LightWave 3D
(R) Monzoom
(R/W) Quickdraw 3D
(W) RIB*
(R/W) STL
(W) Shockwave 3D (Windows only)
(R/W) VRML 1+2
(R/W) Wavefront OBJ

2D Bitmap Formats

(R/W) TIFF
(R/W) BodyPaint 3D
(R/W) Photoshop PSD
(R/W) Targa TGA
(R/W) HDRI
(R/W) Open EXR
(R/W) BMP
(R/W) PICT
(R/W) IFF
(R/W) JPEG
(R/W) RLA
(R/W) RPF
(R/W) SGI (via QuickTime)
(R/W) PNG (via QuickTime)
(R/W) JP2 (via QuickTime)

2D Vector Formats
(W) Flash-SWF
(R) Illustrator
(W) Illustrator*
(R) EPS

Animation and Compositing Formats
(R/W) QuickTime (if available)
(R/W) AVI (Windows only)
(W) After Effects
(W) Final Cut
(W) Combustion
(W) Shake
(W) Motion
(W) Fusion

R = read / W = write

Optional Formats

Allplan
ArchiCAD
RPC (Windows only)
Vectorworks
more than 25 CAD formats via PolyTrans integration

Modeling

The first step in most 3D projects is creating the objects that will be used in the scene. The most basic shapes are provided in MAXON CINEMA 4D as parametric primitives whose paramters like size, fillet and orientation are easily adjustable. Parametric objects can be used as they are or they can be converted to polygons to serve as a basis for more complex objects. A number of deformers and other generators can be used in conjunction with objects. Their non-linear construction history makes it easy to adjust items as the scene progresses. Splines can be used as the basis for extrudes, lofts, lathes and sweeps, all of which can be adjusted dynamically in real- time and even animated.

In Good Shape
CINEMA 4D's extensive polygon modeling tools are essential when creating more complex objects. Automatic and tweak selection modes make it easy to select any element, regardless of the current editing mode and interactive highlighting lets you preview selections and other actions. Polygon tools provide real-time feedback and tasks such as extrusions and bevels can be updated dynamically. A powerful knife tool works in conjunction with n-gons to easily cut holes, planes and paths into objects. The Stitch and Sew tool makes it easy to close holes between objects. With the Brush and Magnet tools you can easily paint point deformations for more organic objects.

3D Painting

MAXON's CINEMA 4D Offers the ultimate control over your textures with complete layers, filters and tablet support - All optimized for working in 3D.

With CINEMA 4D you can paint on up to ten channels with a single stroke. A brush can define an entire material rather than a single color. In addition, CINEMA 4D's exclusive RayBrush technology lets you view the results of your painting realtime in a rendered image.

CINEMA 4D's Projection Painting tool makes distortion-free painting a snap. This quick and easy tool lets you paint across UV seams or even multiple objects in a scene. Even the most complex UV coordinates can be tamed with the help of a complete suite of UV editing tools. CINEMA 4D includes three automatic UV unwrapping algorithms, including the new Optimal Cubic Mapping system.

Raybrush Technology

CINEMA 4D's RayBrush technology allows you to paint directly onto a raytraced image. RayBrush eliminates the need to continually switch applications or perform test renders. You can see the actual rendered effect while painting in any channel, including reflection, transparency and bump. You can even paint on multiple textures at once within RayBrush mode. With CINEMA 4D you can paint an entire material with a single stroke.

Each brush can paint up to ten channels simultaneously, so a single stroke of the brush can affect color, bump, specularity, reflection, transparency and other properties. There's no need to match the various channels in your 3D application.

All your favorite painting tools are available in CINEMA 4D, including Clone, Smear, Sponge, Dodge and Burn tools. The standard Brush tool includes Pressure, Hardness, Size, Bitmap, Distortion, Rotation, Jitter and other parameters for hundreds of painting possibilities. The effect of any parameter can be controlled by the pressure, tilt, direction or finger wheel of your graphics tablet. Over 200 presets are provided with CINEMA 4D, representing a variety of natural media and special effects.

With CINEMA 4D you can paint in the 2D view, in the shaded 3D view or in the raytraced 3D view. Changes that you make in the 3D view are applied to the 2D view in real-time and vice-versa.

You can open and edit multiple 3D views at the same time. This enables you to switch between views quickly - there is no need to adjust camera settings. For example, you can use separate views for important areas and areas that are difficult to reach.

Share and Use Tons of Brushes
It's now easy to create and manage brush presets for your own use or for sharing within a team or the CINEMA 4D community. You can even take advantage of the larger Photoshop community with BodyPaint's new ability to import Photoshop brushes in the .abr format.

Projection Painting

Projection Painting offers hitherto unknown comfort when painting textures onto complex geometry. Visible seams at UV edges are now a thing of the past.

With projection painting enabled you can paint onto a virtual glass plate over the model and then project this painting onto the actual textures. This powerful feature supports all of CINEMA 4D's painting tools and provides full control over the projection and final appearance of your paint strokes.

Say goodbye to unpredictable distortion caused by model contours and perspective - with Projection Painting what you see is truly what you get. Projection Painting even allows users to paint across multiple objects in one stroke to eliminate seams. You can copy and paste between layers while in Projection Paint mode, and you can even join two separate images with perfect blending and distortion.

With CINEMA 4D Release 11 you can now leverage the same powerful matte painting system developed by MAXON exclusively for Sony Pictures Imageworks and used in blockbuster features such as Polar Express, Open Season and Beowulf.

Digital matte painting provides much of the magic of movies, utilizing camera mapping to project detailed paintings onto simple geometry to create an environment that a 3D camera can move around and through. Projection Man revolutionizes the workflow for creating digital mattes, making it simple to setup an initial painting and even easier to patch the matte when necessary.

Close integration with Adobe Photoshop and MAXON's own 3D painting system BodyPaint 3D makes it easy to edit and manipulate extensive digital mattes making it possible to create extended, wild camera rides. Whether you're ballooning over a city, shooting through rapids, flying off cliffs or simply creating a basic set extension, you'll be amazed at the power and speed of the Projection Man matte painting workflow.

Material System

Every 3D artist knows a comprehensive material system is key to creating realistic and convincing 3D images. Whether it is artificial or natural materials you are creating, MAXON CINEMA 4D's material system provides incredible control over the properties of your 3D objects. You can easily define an object's color, diffusion, luminance, transparency, reflection, environment, fog, bump, alpha, specular, glow, displacement and illumination properties.

Normal Maps
This is a technology that, until now, has been used primarily in game development, where it is important to be able to give a low-poly object a high-res look. Contrary to normal bump maps that only contain height information in the Z-axis, Normal maps contain height information for the X, Y and Z-axes. This results in much more realistic surfaces and lighting with low-poly objects.

It Doesn’t Get any Easier than This
One of the outstanding features of the CINEMA 4D Baker is its ability to create Normal maps from displacements. Normally, you would have to create a high-poly object as a reference from which to generate a Normal map for a low-poly object. With the CINEMA 4D Baker, though, you can create Normal maps using SubPolygonDisplacement*. You will not get faster results anywhere.

The Baker offers even more new possibilities. You can also "bake" the Ambient Occlusion function and add this data to the diffusion map*.

The basis for most channels is a texture or shader. For textures, CINEMA 4D supports most popular image formats including layered PSD files and QuickTime or AVI movie files. A wide range of 2D and 3D volumetric shaders make it easy to create procedural aspects of any surface and easily simulate glass, wood, metal or almost any other surface. Using the filter and layer shaders you can easily combine images, shaders and filter effects. You can also paint details directly on objects in 3D for the ultimate control.

Material magic makes your scenes come alive, and CINEMA 4D provides the tools to make your real-world projects look like a reality.

*Subpoly Displacement is part of the Advanced Render module.

UV Editing

MAXON CINEMA 4D features an arsenal of UV editing solutions that ensure your models and their materials line up properly.

Texturing in 3D is governed by UVs - a set of coordinates that relate polygons to textured areas. Properly aligned UV coordinates are essential to successful painting and quality texturing in 3D. Because almost all 3D models involve contours in 3D space, standard projections like spherical and flat mapping alone can never provide distortion-free texturing. Each model must be set up with properly aligned UVs prior to texturing - just like taping off the trim in a room prior to painting.

Relax UV

CINEMA 4D includes numerous tools to help you create the best UV map for each individual model. You can utilize one of three different algorithms, including Cubic Optimal Mapping, to automatically optimize your UV coordinates and remove overlapping points. The Relax UV tool adjusts the size of UVs in relation to their associated polygons and the UV Terrace tool lets you easily include additional

geometry in an existing UV map. The Store and Remap UV features let you easily remap areas of UV coordinates to eliminate seams. Using CINEMA 4D's powerful Interactive Mapping feature you can generate UVs based on standard projection types for different areas of a model. Of course, CINEMA 4D also includes move, scale, rotate, shear and other tools to manually tweak individual UV coordinates.

The LSCM unwrapping method, which lets you unwrap the UVs of a model based on defined seams, also comes in handy when working with complex shapes. Whether adjusting UVs for a low-res game model or a high-res matte painting, CINEMA 4D provides the UV tools you can count on when the UV mapping is not as perfect as the model you have built.

Let There Be Light

Lighting is perhaps the most important aspect of any 3D render. Just like a poorly lit photograph, a 3D scene without proper lighting will fail to meet the expectations of clients and colleagues. MAXON CINEMA 4D offers a complete array of gaffer's tools so you can make your scene outshine the competition.

Various different types of light and shadow calculations provide the basis for an extraordinarily powerful lighting system. An abundance of additional parameters allows you to adjust color, brightness, falloff and other properties.

Beware of the dark side

You can adjust the density and color of each light's shadows, and create visible or volumetric lights with noise patterns that appear in the light cone. A wide variety of options allow you to create tons of different lens flare effects. You can even cheat reality by including or excluding particular objects from the effect of each light.

It is also possible to assign an Area Light any shape in order to give your scene optimal lighting. In addition, falloff is now calculated more realistically. Lights possess settings such as contrast, lens reflexes, shadow color, and volumetric light and noise, among others, that can be edited for each light individually.

Rendering

The MAXON CINEMA 4D rendering engine is known for its legendary ability to deliver stunning image quality with unprecedented speed.

When a deadline is breathing down your neck it is good to know that you can rely on CINEMA 4D's outstanding renderer to deliver great-looking results in a very short time.

CINEMA 4D supports almost any broadcast or film application, with a maximum image size of 16,000 pixels square, and support for QuickTime, PSD, TIF and many other commonly used formats. CINEMA 4D's raytracer computes reflection, refraction and other high quality shading effects with ease. Adaptive and object-based antialiasing options save render time and eliminate artifacts. A variety of modes let you adjust the antialiasing for broadcast, print or other mediums.

CINEMA 4D also supports rendering in 32-bit per color channel, for high dynamics range images in HDRI or OpenEXR format. With support for multiple processors, HyperThreading and Multicore technology, CINEMA 4D squeezes every ounce of rendering power out of your computer. For even faster renders, you can use the Net Render module to spread the rendering workflow to computer systems across the office or around the globe. With fast, high quality results you can count on, CINEMA 4D delivers real-world results on a real-world schedule.

Multi-Pass Rendering

Use MAXON CINEMA 4D's Multi-Pass rendering to gain the ultimate control over your renders. Easily render color, shadow, reflection and other effects to individual files for tweaking using your favorite compositing application. Multiple object-based alpha channels make it easy to layer elements with other 2D and 3D assets. With direct export to Adobe Photoshop(R), Adobe After Effects(R), Final Cut Pro(R), Combustion(R) and Shake(R) your multipass layers will be ready to composite in no time.

Supported Compositing Software

CINEMA 4D renders the passes in any desired format (image sequences, AVIs or QuickTime movies) and creates a compositing project file that automatically brings all sequences together in the correct format. Depending on the compositing application used, additional data, such as 3D cameras, 3D lights or reference object, will be exported as well.

The following compositing applications are currently supported by CINEMA 4D

* Adobe After Effects* (V6.5 and higher)
* Apple Final Cut Pro (V4.5 and higher)
* Apple Motion (V1.0 and higher)
* Apple Shake (V3.5 and higher)
* Autodesk Combustion* (V3.0 and higher)
* eyeon Fusion (V5.0 and higher)

* = 2D- & 3D-Support

Animation

Shift your scenes into the fourth dimension with MAXON CINEMA 4D. Virtually any object, material or tag parameter can be keyframed by simply clicking the animation dot next to its name. To make keyframing even simpler you can activate automatic keyframing of all or selected parameters. The Power Slider lets you quickly define keyframes of the current state at any frame and modify existing keyframes without leaving the default layout.

F-Curves
Use F-Curve mode for more detailed adjustment of keyframe interpolation, or to simply view the animation. Edit multiple curves instantly and take advantage of the snapshot capability to view a previously stored curve while adjusting the animation.

Non-Linear Animation
With non-linear animation, it's easy to build, layer and loop discreet motions containing hundreds of keyframes in complex hierarchies. You can easily block out animation based on predefined motions and build upon the basic movement by overlaying additional keyframes or motions.

XPresso - Making Connections

Build extensive relationships and add powerful interaction to your 3D scene with XPresso, MAXON CINEMA 4D's visual node-based expressions editor. An expression is a relationship between objects in your 3D scene that often includes some mathematical manipulation, such as using the rotation of one object to change the position of another. Normally, these types of relationships would require programming, but with XPresso they are a matter of drag & drop.

XPresso - The Graphical Expression Editor

XPresso is a tool artists can use to intuitively create relationships between almost any object, material or effect parameter. Most module parameters are even accessible through XPresso, and Thinking Particles is almost completely controlled through the XPresso interface. Relationships can be saved to XGroups to use later on your own projects or share with other users. Variables within your XPressions can be linked to sliders in the attributes manager to create driven-key animation and complete slider-based interfaces to your 3D scene.

XPresso gives you complete control over the 3D scene, and dramatically improves workflow by providing a visual interface to scene properties. Explore XPresso and discover the power of relational animation in CINEMA 4D.

Your Own Scripts and Plugins

If there is a specific task you need MAXON CINEMA 4D to do that it cannot do already, then why not program it yourself using our SDK? If you already have programming knowledge then you should be able to understand our programming language, C.O.F.F.E.E., really quickly. If you are not a programmer, simple scripts are easy to write. Check out www.plugincafe.com for handy plugins and to download our SDK, FREE!

Once you've made a script, it works like any other command in CINEMA 4D. Just click on it to run it.

Scripts and plugins can be made as complicated as you need them. They can run continuosly in the background if you wish or only when you click on them.

If you are looking for maximum performance and thinking of a major plugin, then C++ plugins are the way to go. You can even connect external applications to CINEMA 4D using our SDK.