Tutorial Details
- Program: Cinema 4D, After Effects
- Difficulty: Beginner
When it comes to motion graphics, exporting camera data from a 3D program to a 2D compositing program is one of the most important techniques you could know. In this tutorial, you will learn the basics behind getting Cinema 4D and After Effects to talk to one another, including using exporting tags, using the camera data in After Effects within 3D layers and effects, and how to set up and tweak your render for the best results.
This tutorial is Day 1 in a series – Go to Day 2
Before you dive in, I’d like to stress a few points:
-I’m using AfterEffects CS3 and Cinema 4D R11. Even though things may look different, the basic idea and functions are the same (but I’m not sure if you can do this prior to Cinema 4D R10 cuz it’s been a while).
-You can put any questions you may have in the comments, and I promise to read them more often and provide whatever help I can. If there’s some details you missed in this, I’ll try to put it into a future screen cast, sort of a “in case you were confused” type of thing.
-This was my first screencast, and I was really just testing out the process. I promise more of a storyboard atmosphere and better structure in the future, and I’ll have some graphics put in as well to help you understand what’s going on. I’ll try to get something that tracks my keystrokes too, but I think that might end up cluttering the screen, so I’ll wait to hear what you guys have to say. And yes, that includes improving the horrific audio. Since I was using the microphone in my webcam, it made me sound like I was 10 years old, and inside a plastic drum.
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Note: click the ‘Monitor’ icon to view tutorial in full-screen HD.
This tutorial is Day 1 in a series – Go to Day 2
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By Harrison Ambs
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Nice Man This was useful, could we like have more cinema 4D Tuts, like rigging and animating a character or somthing like that thanks again Harrison.
That would be sweet
Nice tut – just what I needed :)
When is the “sequel” coming? Looking very much forward to it.
Thanks again for sharing.
Cool stuff and man, you are fast!
Now I’m waiting for the more advanced stuff.
Thanks for sharing your knowledge.
greetz
human0id
Character rigging for C4d would be wonderful!
Thanks for this tutorial!
good job,more C4D please!
“living an energy drink ad” LOL
Cool tip, thanks.
nice tutorial, looking forward to the next one.
also, some matchmoving together with c4d would be really awsome
I’m not going to start part two until probably this weekend. Let this sucker sit and stew, so I get some ideas for what to do next time.
So if there are any things you’d like to see next time (background music? everyone a Beatles fan? good.), just go ahead and leave it here in the comments.
Oh, and you should all email Kaleb and tell him how awesome I am. I’m not sure if that will have any bearing on anything, but he’s really busy, and it’s fun to mess with people.
Hi Harrison,
very well explained tutorial. Great detailed tips on organizing and taking care off the cam data – I never assumed that there could be some wrong values by transfering the cam data, I thought thats pure math. Thanks for pointing out that this could go wrong, too. Maxon ain´t Adobe you where right ;)
What I suggest to see in a next Tutorial is the other way: Transfer an AE cam to C4D. I know, at the first look it makes no sense because the cam tools in C4D are much better, but sometimes it would be cool to animate in AE´s 2.5D space and add a real 3D render afterwards. Also I use a lot of expressions inside AE on the camera (i.e. Wiggle), I dont know how to simulate this in C4D, so just sending the AE Camdata over seems much cooler to me.
Oh, and here I just found a script which can handle the data translation:
http://aenhancers.com/viewtopic.php?t=653
Maybee you find the time to check it out, I am in a hurry right know…
Thanks for the kudos. As for the AE > C4D, I’m not a fan of AE’s camera. I come from a 3D background, and I’m spoiled from having a camera in a 3D program, so I don’t do much with AE’s cam.
If you’re talking about putting expressions and random movement onto a 3D camera in C4D, there’s a phenomenal set of plugins called ‘CG Tools’ that are available for C4D. I’d recommend trying those out, the results are spectacular.
http://sugarfilmproduction.com/CStools.zip
But I’ll definitely check out the AE trick you mentioned, and try it out for a bit, maybe make a tutorial in the future to help everyone else out. Just because I don’t do something, doesn’t mean it doesn’t work (I have to keep remembering that…).
i Definitely Agree with illd !
I find it sometimes much easier to get the camera movement i want in AE, rather than C4D. And there are alot of tuts about the C4D>to AE, but not AE>to C4D :\
CStools are cool. but theyre not focused on camera work.
in AE you can find some plugins to simulate a Very convincing Handycam\shaky motion, and thats what i Personally wanna export to C4D.
i just wish someone could teach us that…
p.s-great tut! way to go, my friend! :D
Hi Harrison,
I totally agree with you – animating the AE Camera is crap. But I came from AE to 3D and got used to this crap ;) It is like learning it right to do it the wrong way. CSTools look like a nobrainer, but I hadnt the time to figure it all out – its a big bundle;)
Anyway, i did today a quick test on the ae2C4D script and it worked nicely, only thing you have to do is set up the FOV manually in C4D.
There is one thing I wish you could show up in your follow up tutorial: How to render out a uvw-pass out of C4D? I set it up like all the other (nicely rendered) passes, but it is just a black pic.
…[oh! and i forgot! :]
Dont forget about Mocha that’s build into AE now, Harrison!
Sometimes you need to track footage in AE, and only Then import it to C4D for implanting 3D objects….Hence, an AE>to C4D is just screaming out: “ooh! ooh! me! pick me for your next tutorial!” :D hehe..
Thats a good point with mocha, but you gotta be aware of it – mocha aint a 3D tracker – which means you won´t get any usefull data out of it using it for a real 3D matchmove. Although you can do some “2.5D” tracking which will look 3D in the end, you cannot use it in a 3D application.
Seriously?
i thought Mocha has parameters for X, Y, & Z space [like the old AE tracker]…
You wanna tell me the only option is using Boujou or something?
Sheesh…thats quite a tough one..to figure out these kinda softwares.. :\
Hey Miki,
yeah 3D Matchmoving is really an “art” – I use for about 6 months now syntheyes, and sometimes it works nearly as a onecklick solution, and at othertimes you have to analyze every frame of your shot to find out what is wrong. If you are looking for a good and cheap 3D tracker go for PF Hoe:
http://toolfarm.stores.yahoo.net/pifapf21.html It is easy to use and worth every cent.
i can’t import the .aec file… do I need a C4d plug-in for After Effects? Where do i get one?
Thanks
It’s in your C4D “Exchange Plugins” Folder, copy it to the AE “Plugins” Folder
I’m having the same problem. The plug-in in my Exchange folder does not work for some reason. I’m running CS4 with R10 would that make a difference?
I am not shure about CS4 – But CS3 Works fine, with R10 and r11
Yeah, I have this problem export the .aec file to AE. It doesn’t import! :S
I guess I need my After Effects CS4 to work with Cinema 4D r11, not r10?
Hi Jason,
I just spent 3 hours solving the same problem. Seems to be related to the render folder. It works if I render to a folder on my dekstop (and assigning composition tags to the camera). The renderfiles (TGA) and .aec should also have the same name.
I’n not 100% sure if all of the above are nescesary, but at least it works :)
Hope this helps you.
Great tut! This is VERY promising. Really looking forward to tons of C4D/AE tuts!
I would love to see the same tutorial done except importing Maya’s cameras in AE.
This is a great tutorial! You run through a lot of the basics that C4D/AE people need to know.
Finally someone that uses Cinema 4D
This tut is very helpful. Im so looking forward to your next tut about using compositing tags… Please write more tutorial on Cinema 4D and After effects integration.
thanks so much!
Thanks for the nice tut! It is very useful. But I want to ask you one thing — сould you please pronounce a little bit slower in your next tutorials. And make all the actions while screencasting a little bit slower too so the people can understand you better… Thanks for that! :)
Aw, come on. Really? I think he´s great. Sort of a “Andrew Kramer flow”.. :)
I mean it, man… :) Harrison is fast. English is not a native language for me but I do know English very well. And even though I missed something in his speech… 30fps is not enough for Harrison while screencasting I believe. :)
Hmm, I am no native speaker, too. But to me Harrisons normal pace is perfect!
Just what I was looking for. Thank you a thousand times.
didn’t work with CS4 for me. :-(
Man, I like the way you talk. It’s better to talk a little faster than the boring slow pace. You managed to help me learn this tutorial real quick!
Great tut BTW. Everything you taught me was very easy and understandable.
Amazing tutorial, thank you very much, in the begining i cant import into my AE Cs4, but i copy the file C4D.plugin ( app/Cinema4D R11/ Exchange Plugins / Aftereffects / mac os x / CS3/ CD4Mac.zip)
into the After Effects Plugins Folder .. and Works.. thank you for the tutorial!!
Harrison, where´d you go man? ;)
So looking forward to that sequel. Cant wait.
Take care / Nic
Great tutorial, it helped me a LOT! Thanks buddy!
I’m really looking forward to the next Tutorial. Love to see some workflows on exporting Deph passes for AE.
Why my Cinema 4D 11.5 doesn’t work with my After Effects….:( Do I need a different plug-in or what??? Can you please help me, because it was working find with my Version 11, but not with 11.5….:(
not very usefull…try to change particles to red color or something and you will see it :-)
Great work….. been searching for such indept tutorial… got a lot of answers .. guess your style is my style… looking forward for new tutorials
Hey guys, in case you don’t know where to get the plugin, you can download it directly from Maxon here:
http://www.maxon.net/downloads/updates-co/updates/plugins.html
Can’t believe people are still commenting on this thing…. :)
i cannot open the aec files in after effect (pc version cs4). please tell me how can i open aec files.
i’ve do all the processes but cinema 4d won’t save the targa file!!? please help me!
Nice tutorial! Also i was wondering if you know of any plugins to enable me to export my c4d prims into a 3dm format so i can upload to second life. Or just make a tutorial on how to make a simple object and upload to second life. There is only 1 tutorial i have found to explain this and its in german, soo please help me thanks :)
Real nice tutorial, am a total newbie at both After Effects and Maxon, but am trying to make a short intro for a video of mine, unfortunately when i try to do the seemingly ‘easiest’ part of the tutorial and open the saved file in AE it says an unsupported file type was found, and it doesnt seem to matter what i do, im unable to get it to work?
Dude how many energy drinks did u have?
thanks for the tutorial
Next time take it a bit slower.
I landed here via a search for camera movement from C4D to AE. My camera imported to AE (thanks to a lynda.com tutorial), but there’s no movement in the comp window. I was hoping this would help, but it’s far too fast and there’s waaaay too much mumbling, which a lot of online instructors do. They mumble to themselves while working extremely fast, pushing buttons without any step-by-step explanation. So if the person watching blinks, they’ll miss one or more vital steps.
That’s great for yourself. It shows you’re talented. However, when teaching others, even in the form of a video that can be rewound, it’s ineffective. I spent a lot of time scrubbing back and trying to understand the mumbling. Now I’ll just do another search instead.
Thanks anyway, but maybe consider that when ‘teaching.’
I have the C4D demo version that’s been activated (able to save and apparently export)…I do everything you did in the tutorial but nothing opens when I import the files in AE. Please help!!!!
Hi – found this after searching for this very subject, very impressive tute thanks. I’m new to C4D and would appreciate someone explaining why it’s beneficial to use a C4D camera inside AE (rather than using the AE camera which numerous people seem to like less) and go to all this effort to do so…
Does the C4D camera just work better? Sorry for the nube approach, but a soem of the more experienced commenters here might be able to shed some light on the benefits of this method?
great work, learnt a lot of stuff about C4D just here!
Hi – found this after searching for this very subject, very impressive tute thanks. I’m new to C4D and would appreciate someone explaining why it’s beneficial to use a C4D camera inside AE (rather than using the AE camera which numerous people seem to like less) and go to all this effort to do so…
Does the C4D camera just work better? Sorry for the nube approach, but a some of the more experienced commenters here might be able to shed some light on the benefits of this method?
great work, learnt a lot of stuff about C4D just here!
This tut is freakin’ awesome!
Just one small omission – you didn’t mention cool once so I’ll say it for you – “Cool!”
thanks alot for explaining – it really helped. ( Isearched a bit – till I found that I needed a Plugin – but apart from that it was all very easy to understand and to go along with) :)
Hi there can I reference some of the material here in this site if I reference you with a link back to your site?