Placing Materials on Cloners - Elsevier

19  Creating Elements for Motion Graphics   327

Placing Materials on Cloners Here are several ways to place shaders on cloners.

Step 1 Navigate to Chapter 19>C4D Files>Shader Colors.c4d. Step 2 Drag the material Gradient and drop it on the Platonic object. Render the Editor window. The material is placed individually on each clone.

Step 3 Drag the Texture tag upward and drop it on the Cloner object. Click on the Texture tag, and in the Attributes Manager choose Flat Projection. From the Object Manager menu choose Tags>Fit to Object and check yes in the Sub-objects box. Render the Editor window.

Step 4 Delete the Texture tag. Select the Cloner object and choose Shader Effector from the MoGraph menu. In the Attributes Manager Parameter tab under Transform, uncheck Position, Scale, and Rotation.

Step 5 Under the Shading tab choose Custom Shader from the Channel pulldown menu. Click on the shader triangle and drag down to Gradient. Click on the Gradient button and edit the black and white tabs to colors of your choice.

Step 6 Select the Cloner object, and under Transform, set a key frame for 0 R.P at 0 frames. At 90 frames, enter 360 in the R.P box, press Return, and set a key frame.

Step 7 With the Cloner object still selected, under Transform, every 10 frames, edit a new color in the box next to Color and Control-click a key frame.

Step 8 Press F8 to play the animation. Now select the Shader Effector, and under the Attributes Manager Parameter tab try each of the blending modes, letting the animation cycle through once for each one. Figure 19-16  Material on Single Clone (Left) and Entire Cloner (Right).

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Figure 19-17  Randomized Color.

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328   CINEMA 4D: The Artist’s Project Sourcebook, Second Edition

Step 9 With the Cloner object selected, choose a Random Effector from the MoGraph menu. In the Attributes Manager, under Color choose Effector Color and Alpha from the Color Mode pull-down menu and Multiply or Divide from the Blending Model pull-down menu. Check Rotation on and keyframe some rotation values at 0 and 90 frames.

Step 10 Delete the platonic and try some other primitives as a child of the Figure 19-18  Lights in MoGraph.

cloner. Feel like you’ve been around in circles? That’s MoGraph, a neverending cycle of “what-ifs” and effects on top of effects! Needless to say, if you intend to keep track of predictable behaviors you’d better keep a notebook nearby. So far we’ve been using primitives as clones, but theoretically any model can be a clone. Lights, hair, Metaball objects, deformed objects, complex groups of models in a null, particle and thinking particle systems, single polygons with Alpha channels, even Cloner objects themselves can be clones. Naturally, the memory of your computer is where your artistic dreams reach their limit. So, if you are dreaming big, save up for some more RAM! On the DVD: Now that you’ve had a simple introduction to the basic working structure of MoGraph, try more advanced MoGraph projects in Chapter 19>EXTRA!EXTRA!>MOGRAPH MASTERWORKS. Explore endless combinations of MoGraph with other C4D tools, processes, plugins, and modules (including Thinking Particles) to create complex typog­raphy, dense geometrics, and wild organic abstractions!

Figure 19-19  “Seaweed,” MoGraph Tracer.

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19  Creating Elements for Motion Graphics   329

Rendering Single Elements for Compositing

Figure 19-20  Twisted Thorns, MoGraph.

All you have to do to render a single layer for After Effects compositing is check the Alpha check box on the Save page in Render settings. The background will be clear, and the edges of the objects smooth. The Alpha check box creates a pre-multiplied alpha. In some video compositing situations anti-aliasing can cause an unexpected edge behavior, in which case you should choose Straight Alpha instead. Stay away from floors, skies, backgrounds, or foregrounds when rendering Alpha channels. On the DVD: Navigate to the Chapter 19>EXTRA!EXTRA!>In­Depth >C4D_AE folder for more information on Multi-Pass layers in After Effects. Explore additional motion graphics projects in the Chapter 19>EXTRA! EXTRA!>InDepth folder. They contain embedded explanations in their Object Managers or have accompanying instructional PDF files. The Planet Eternal project rotated elements in front of a stationary camera. The projects on the DVD use camera fly-throughs and other types of motion design.

Figure 19-21  MoGraph Cloner Object in Object Mode.

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330   CINEMA 4D: The Artist’s Project Sourcebook, Second Edition Figure 19-22  Matrix within Instance. Courtesy of Tim Clapham.

Figure 19-23  Scaled Lights in MoGraph Cloner.

Figure 19-24  Metaball Object in MoGraph Cloner with Formula Effector.

Figure 19-25  MoGraph Cloner with Single Polygons.

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