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MAY 06, 2003 No, Really, It's Just a Cube!
Part 3: Adding a camera You can manipulate the look with the editor move tools and a few hot keys, but a camera is really the best way to do this. After adding a camera, lets attack the attributes of our lens. (Sorry v7, you'll have to double click your camera icon; in 8, we'll just click on the Attributes tab). Set the Focal Length to 5 and the Aperture to 55. This is a superwide lens, so it looks like we've moved miles away from the model. Switching to an overhead/top view of the scene reveals otherwise. [an error occurred while processing this directive]  We'll have to move the camera closer to get the model to fill the screen. Be sure to switch back to the Object Tool in order to move the camera around. Let's move back to Camera View to see what we have.  Because I want to move this off-center, I'll manipulate the camera in this view until it looks right. A closer look at the top view shows how close I am to the model.  The Camera view shows a strange wall of green, until I render.  This looks close, but I want to throw a light - dead center of the model. Cinema will allow me to use a >100% light value. I'll take advantage here, and set my light to 200% brightness. A final render produces a graphic I can use as is, or as an element in a comp.  Additionally, if you want this to animate, it is a simple camera move will produce all sorts of interesting irregularities. For other strange looks, place the camera inside the model, and put the lights on the outside. And you don't have to tell anyone that's it's just a cube, a camera and a light.... The only geometry in all of these images is a broken down cube. If you have Cinema 4D XL version 8, you can download any of these project files here and see for yourself. Don't have 8? You can download it at http://www.maxoncomputer.com. Contact the author: Ko Maruyama is a freelance animator and compositor in Los Angeles. His work spans music videos, commercials, promo and film. Having worked on Quantel, Discreet and Mac, he's been exposed to almost all of it. When he's not on his PS2, you can find him at komaruyama@mac.com or in the DMN After Effects Forum. Prev 1 2 3 Related sites: • Animation Artist • AV Video • Creative Mac • Digital Animators • Digital Game Developer • Digital Media Designer • Digital Post Production • Digital Producer • Film and Video Magazine • The WWUG Related forums: [an error occurred while processing this directive] 
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