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The Best Cinema 4D Tutorial Ever!!! 63 Comments

There is a feature in Cinema 4D that I think is the most unused, most helpful feature there is. So useful, I’m calling this “The Best Cinema 4D Tutorial Ever!!!” So, what is it? It’s the ability to click on anything in the Cinema 4D interface and pull up the exact section in the manual that describes what it does. Just Right Click or Control Click on the setting you want to know more about and BOOM, you are there.

More Than Words
Of course there are tons of technical descriptions of what is going on behind the scenes in Cinema 4D, but there are also many visual examples to show you exactly what happens when you crank up that slider or click that button.

The Only Cinema 4D Book I’ve Read
You ever wanted a good book on Cinema 4D? No need to buy one just yet. Just print out some of these pages and follow along. There is even a section of tutorials on things like Modeling, Animation, Xpresso and Materials. Ever wonder why there are 9 different GI Modes? It’s in there. Want to know the difference between Mitchell and Cubic Anti-Aliasing? It’s in there, too. Want your render buckets to start from the top instead of from the center? Type in “Bucket Sequence” in the search feature of the help menu and find out how.

Really Nick? The Best Ever?
OK, OK. Video tutorials are still the favorite and most entertaining way to learn. But, I have learned so many useful things from the help menu, it’s worth making sure you know about it. I use it a ton because it’s so accessible and easy to use. When I ever get stuck, I check here first before searching google for tutorials or forum posts. Especially for some of the mundane things that really don’t have a tutorial. Things like learning what the MIN and MAX values do and what the different GI settings do are usually too dry for a video tutorial, but work great in the help. Go give it a try. I think you will be surprised.

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63 Comments

  2. Emre

    Exactly! The help menu includes all information step by step and from A to Z..of course tutorials are great but sometimes we only focus to what we need and skip over other important stuff. Thanks Nick, good suggestion for sure

    Reply

  5. DFMN

    Or you just hover the thing you need help with and press cmd + F1 (mac). Guess its like ctrl + F1 in windows

    Reply

  6. Adrien

    I fully agree with you Nick, but on a separate note, I wish there were also a printable pdf of the whole help file. I can’t stand reading pages and pages of technical stuff on my comptuer and would rather have a reference book sitting on my bedside table…How come Maxon does not provide it?

    Reply

    • Rich

      Hey I just had a whinge about the same thing A, should have read yours first.
      Its a real pain in the ass.
      Rather have it as a pdf for an iPad at the very least.
      Every other piece of software I own can manage it, must be a classified document.

      Reply

      • Mike

        Well the help is actually in html (for mac in the {install root}\help\{lang-code}\html folder) so to read it somewhere else you could copy that folder and read it in any browser. The main index is 1000.html.

        Cheers

        Reply

  7. Throb36

    This is a good post, if only to prevent people from asking Nick so many dumb questions. Like “How do ya make ribbons!?”

    Reply

  8. Mauricio

    cmd + F1 its been a great friend of mine since version 9.1.

    Reply

  10. Brian Cain

    I’ve always loved this feature. It is miles beyond any of the adobe help. I wish this was the industry standard for these sometimes very technical programs with individualized vernacular

    Reply

  12. Simon

    The C4D help menu has saved my bacon a million times. The fact that you can right click on anything and get a thorough breakdown of what it is, how it works, and what each setting does is streets ahead.

    Reply

  13. Jibe

    As my sound design teacher would always say if you asked him a software related question: “RTFM!”

    Reply

  14. Michael

    Thank you a lot for this Tutorial…
    I´ve got only one question, is there any way to make the Fontsize bigger?

    -Michael

    Reply

    • No Hype Here

      You can change the font size by hacking the css file as follows:

      CINEMA 4D R13/help/files/wickie.css

      Open up wickie.css in a text editor and change the font-size on line 35 (body) from 11px.

      You may need to adjust the permissions first.

      I picked this tip up from a Maxon rep at a recent training day in London.

      All the best.

      Paul

      Reply

  16. LoveUrBlog

    Oh, F1, So easy. Now I could remove ur blog from fav ;)

    Reply

  17. Aftab

    Hello Nick,

    So nice to hear your voice, you are such a nice presenter, sometimes its not about the knowledge but how you present it. we love learning from you, I hope you can take help from Chris Schmidt’s on some advance stuff and present it yourself… no offense to Chris, he is a nice artist and presenter but we come to GSG because of you :) its like we went to see spiderman film and found Ironman there.. he might be more powerful but want to see spiderman :D

    All the best dude..

    Aftab

    Reply

  18. frank

    Grand evercool tip!
    I use cmd_f1 alot on icons but never realized it works with text & menus as well

    Reply

  20. Hobo

    The most important point in this tutorial: Try to figure it out ON YOUR OWN before defaulting to Google!

    Reply

  21. Gordon Stewart

    If you’re ever bored, just ctrl+F1 on some obscure option button or checkbox you’ve never used before and away you go.

    Reply

  22. Rich

    Hey Nick

    I was wondering how come there is no pdf file of the cinema 4D manual?
    When I look at the help manual online it is so small and for some reason when I hit the command + keys damn thing just stays the same.
    Also I can’t put it on my iPad for when I want to put myself to sleep at night.
    Real pain

    Reply

  24. Scoo

    C4D has ruined every other application’s help system for me. Adobe’s CS help feels like banging rocks together.

    Reply

  25. haiha

    lal. really think , its better with a PDF version ^^

    Reply

  27. Sirius

    thanks Nick great tip!

    @Ronnie
    the best way to find out how an animation is done is watching it frame by frame. Download it and watch on quicktime.

    Reply

  28. Bund

    4 Minutes of my life I won’t get back. Thanks for that. RTFM.

    Reply

  29. Ronnie

    Thanks a lot Nick, I’ll post the final animation video when completed.
    Thanks

    Reply

  30. Dave Woodhull

    Thanks Nick, as always appreciate you digging out these little gems.

    Reply

  31. Kutaputa

    Have to give it to MAXON they did a GREAT job with the help files.

    Reply

    • Chris192

      i like the animation, I see that your using ease-ease allot for the camera animations. although this is good for long sweeping shots, for shorter shots i would try linear animation. It makes the animation look sharper.

      Reply

  34. auto

    Please get Simon Holmedal back for some advanced tutorials!!!!

    Reply

  35. Chris192

    How have i not looked at the help-file yet. I guess i was just turned off by some other programs help-files, thanks nick.

    Reply

  36. Steve

    small typo “Just print these out some of these pages…..” in the “The Only Cinema 4D Book I’ve Read” paragraph. O

    Reply

  37. hanumant

    Thanks,

    But frankly, content of this tutorial doesn’t justify the topic’s name. It’s sufficiently exaggerated.

    Good food for google’s BOTs, but not a best way to attract visitors on your site.

    Disappointed…

    Reply

  40. Tony

    Thanks Nick and good advice! This persuades me I should really sit down and read that manual properly.

    Reply

  42. vector

    @Adrien > on macs, you can right click in any help page and choose “print”, and then print it to a PDF.

    Reply

  43. Koldunas

    That is a bit of an overstatement. Sure the manual is useful to look some stuff up, but the examples it uses are sometimes so vague and brief. I found a search in any cinema4d forum is usually way more informative than reading the manual.
    Also, your layout is still all-kinds of messed up in Opera.

    Reply

  45. Tim

    It is an awesome feature. I converted the help to a PDF document long ago, simply because it explains what everything does.

    I haven’t compressed it down for my iPad yet though…I really should do that but it is pretty damn big.

    Thanks Nick…as always!

    Reply

  46. iKitebear

    Hi Nick,
    Every time I visit your 3D ‘Gorilla Jungle’, I get a smile on my face.
    It’s so nice and many thanks for the work you do.
    I’ll be back ;-) (that was not an Nick I believe)

    Reply

  48. Harneyy

    Guys That Want A Downloadable .PDF Go Maxxons Website The Go Documentation And Look For Your Version And Click One That Is Around 28 mb And When It Opens It Give You A Chance To Download And Print

    Reply

  49. Jeff Cavanaugh

    This has changed my life. Not the first time you’ve done that.
    Thank you Nick Campbell.

    Reply

  50. Rajeev

    Hey can anyone help me ?? how can u isolate an object in cinema 4d like 3ds max has short cut altQ

    Reply

  51. Andrew Hoeveler

    Apparently it’s just me, but I think the Cinema4D manual is one of the sloppiest, copy-pasted manuals I’ve had to deal with. Why does the manual talk about OTHER effectors when I’m looking at the help items for a specific effector? Quoted from the manual, for example, in the shader effector section: “The following applies to Effectors … with the exception of Shader and Random Effectors: ” Why tell me about something that is an exception to the shader effector IN the shader effector section? There is simply too much that is copy and pasted around the manual that simply makes the manual more confusing than it otherwise should be. It’s been that way for years… I just wish they would clean up the manual. It can be utterly confusing, even when I re-read a section over and over to understand it better.

    Reply

    • Andrew Hoeveler

      One more example of writing that confuses me, and perhaps others could shed some light on this… from the Step Effector color parameters section: “When using the Shader Effector, random colors will be generated by the Random Effector for the shader defined in the Shader tab. When using other shaders grayscale values will be generated that reflect the effect of a given Effector.”

      What does that even mean?! I am looking up information about the way the STEP effector handles the color settings and I end up with two run-on sentences about other effectors that don’t make any sense (to me).

      Reply

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Comment Rules

This is a friendly community. Please treat everyone with respect. We don't all have to agree, but we do have to be nice. Criticism is fine, but rude comments and name calling will be deleted. Use your real name and don't be spammy. Thanks for adding to the conversation.