11.0

16
CINEMA 4D R11 Quickstart – Interface
The term “spline“ has its origin in ship building. The wooden slats which were elastic enough to conform to the
shape of the ship’s hull were called splines. In the 3D world splines can be defined as “point-based curves“. A
spline “follows” several previously defined points while still retaining a curved form. This group window offers
several tools for drawing splines, as well as predefined shapes from which to choose. A spline can act as a path
for a camera to move along. Just draw a spline and let the camera move along its path. Splines can also be
used to model. To put it simply, splines are placed in a row as a wire frame over which a skin is stretched using
“Loft NURBS“, for example.
The next (dark orange) group icon hosts probably the most important CINEMA 4D object, the “HyperNURBS
object“.
If a polygon object is a sub-object of a HyperNURBS object it will be virtually subdivided to a higher degree.
Visually it will be comprised of many more smaller polygons than before the subdivision (the object automatically
looks softer / rounder). As you can see in the next screen shot: The outer mesh (light blue) shows the polygon
cube’s actual subdivision.
The finer inner mesh (black) shows the subdivision of the HyperNURBS object. Change the cubes’ display mode
by selecting (deactivating) Tools / Isoline Editing in the main C4D menu and switching to Gouraud Shading
(Lines) in the Editor’s Display menu. In the end it’s up to you how you want your objects displayed in the
Editor. However, for this tutorial, this is the most effective way to show the effect HyperNURBS objects have
on polygonal objects or primitives since it shows how the cubes are subdivided and the final result is therefore
also easier to visualize.
The advantages, especially in modeling, are obvious. Since the object contains few points (edges / polygons)
that can be edited it remains very manageable. You can drag just one point of the original wire frame and the
HyperNURBS mesh, with its finer subdivision, will follow the point being dragged (see next screenshot).