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Need help with tutorial / course resourses


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Greetings!

I've been using Cinema 4D R12 for about 7-8 years now, but as a result of learning the software on my own I've developed a comfort zone of bad modeling habits and not exploring features out of frustration from trying to understand them.
I'm getting better at modeling, but very very slowly.
Because of my endless struggles with the software, I wanted to reach out for help here, since I've used the forum occasionally and got plenty of feedback in the past.
I want to use C4D for work, but I can't do that with lack of understanding and time-wasting methods
(My focus for work would be interior design / prop modeling, not character modeling / animation. What I show below is what I work on as a hobby)

I'll use the screenshot below as an example for my issue :
I'm unable to plan my topology ahead so what I do is start building a model from one section, polygon by polygon (in this case - the chest) and then work on another piece (the hand) so that I can connect the mesh in a location with less deformation. That way if I have any topology errors, I'd have triangular polys in a safe location where they wouldn't interfere with deformation.
I was never able to learn how to build model by cube method because of my lack of understanding for topology.image.png.a5db307e75e835da7ae23eb54fed5904.png
Once a model is complete, I struggle to UV it properly and end up having an inefficient spread over a huge canvas.
I also have yet to understand how the texturing tools work. I have tried fiddling with different kinds of maps and see what they do, but I don't know how to make a proper diffuse / specular / normal map for something.
I've been reworking this model 20-30 times over the past 4 years and I'm finally getting somewhere with its topology, but it's too much time wasted.

I couldn't find any tutors in Bulgaria for C4D and my attempts to find helpful tutorials have lead me nowhere.

If any of you have any resources on the following, be it paid courses or free tutorials anywhere on the Internet, please post them  below:
1. Anything on how to understand topology for characters and props, fundamentals of poly order and where 5-way poly crossroads should be located (I need these for characters and static objects / props)
2.Anything on how to do UV mapping and UV adjusting, texturing in Cinema 4D, what the texturing tools do , how to understand maps (I've watched tutorials on these in other softwares, but can't apply what I see there in C4D because of the different rendering engines)
3. Anything on using modifiers as hypernurbs tools, cloners, splines etc (My experience ends with making pipes through splines + hypernurbs and subdividing models)
4. Anything on how to streamline modeling / texturing work in C4D

Any and all help will be greatly appreciated!
Thank you for your time!
 

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Hi. 

 

There is alot to cover there but I will start with knowing the fundamentals of modeling and how to reproduce structures is the key to understanding topology as that what topology is, the structure of something.  Topology for characters is about two things, anatomy flow, and deformation loops.  You will always have poles where more than 4 faces share a single vert as when a direction change is required is where your see these.  This means you generally choose poles to be on flat surfaces as poles tend to produce star artefacts on curves with sds applied.

 

You need to understand how to model for both sds models and non sds models which will then need to hold its own bevels on edges.  You would generally not assume that any hard surface had a perfect hard edge, this is not the case in real life and all edges have a bevel this is  one reason why renders look flat and unrealistic.

 

Modeling is best done low poly, this will let you get the basic structure in place.  Another thing you need to take into account is where your edges are for selection of seams for UV mapping. The Uv map needs to reflect the 1:1 shape, scale and ratio to the actual model otherwise there will be distortion.  A checker texture map is often placed on the model during this process to check that each square is the correct shape and size to others over the model.

 

Dont worry about the texturing side too much at the moment, get the modeling down, and Uvs.  I will post some links up for some tutorials.

 

This guy has some good tutorials, both free and paid for

 

https://elementza.com/mastering-3d-modeling-cinema-4d/

 

 

 

Here is a nice resource on topology.  https://topologyguides.com/

 

@Cerbera does one on one training which will get you there faster.

 

And here is a book thats worth getting which  got myself  https://gumroad.com/l/TepOz

Dan

 ArtStation    Website 

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