Hi!

Lately I've been more interested in 3D design than audio making at the moment. I've learned the basics of animation and I can now work in Cinema 4D. I also watch tutorials on youtube to get better.

Basically the problem I have is that I don't have a lot of horse power under the hood of my laptop so I can't make anything relatively complex looking longer than 2 seconds. And even that takes 12 hours to render lol. I was wondering if there are any graphics programs that were from the early 2000's era that I would be able to use that would render alot faster but with obviously less fancy looking renders? Fancyness I could care less about, if it looks like unreal tournament 1 graphics i wouldn't mind. Any suggestions? Fast render over looks.

 

bryce5? free.

 

Last edited by a moderator: Feb 7, 2020

First of, some info on your laptop (cpu , video card...) would be helpful. Second, some examples or info on what you are trying to create. There are ways to optimize things to render faster. If it`s taking so long to render, you might be doing something wrong. Which Cinema 4D version are you using?

Brice is an environment creator... like e-on software Vue.

 

Last edited: Feb 8, 2020

google for: "Render farm"
tremendous timesaver

 

latest version R21.. I'm just creating pretty basic cube/etc.. 3d text rotations pyramids with nice textures right now nothing insanely complex.

Recently I sold my quad core 4790k cpu. in the process of the cpu removal i bricked my motherboard cpu pins. what a mistake. Plus a graphics card that I still have but now can't use, just sitting around..Now i need the render power more than ever but hey thats life right? we all make mistakes.

By modern standards my laptop sucks, there is no doubt about this, however i am trying to work within its realistic limitations right now. So, I have 2.3ghz dual core but with 4 threads (which helps a bit for threaded apps) 12 gb DDR4 2133 mhz Ram. 1 TB SSD WD sata (great ssd drive). It has a nice accurate 15.9'' color ips. intel hd 520 graphics no actual card (lol..)

Thank you for the suggestions. Also I am looking at older programs like softimage, 3ds etc......

 

What I would like to know is how Tale of US & Afterlife, those guys how do they make these "smoke/particle" VFX animations.
Is this Blender's Smoke FX with Particles does anybody knows a youtube tutorial close to this:

 

I really don`t think older versions will get you faster renders, because render engines also evolves and get better and faster with time. You should search for `how to optimize render times in C4D`. Things like texture sizes, number of lights used and Global illumination settings can slow your renders. A good alternative to C4D render engines is Corona Render. It`s a CPU renderer, works well with native materials and is faster than C4D Physical render. I would try it if I were you, before looking any further.
I think C4D is a very capable software and easy to use. I would stick with it.

 

Last edited: Feb 8, 2020

I've used strata 3D many years ago but I doubt that's what you're looking for. If you want to make characters move & dance, Mikumikumoving is optimized to do that, and nothing unnecessary. ofc, you can add effects/shaders & scenery. You have a timeline with keyframes, etc. I have no GFX card (i3 iGPU), it runs fine.

 

Old 3D tech is not going to help, quite the opposite.

If it's render-speed you're after, you won't get any faster than the UNITY real-time 3D development platform, which i believe is free for non-commercial developers. It's principally a games engine, but man it's shaping-up these days to be quite a bit more than that: https://unity.com

My other recommendation would of course be Blender, which is a terrific open-source 3D creation suite. It's fairly computer resource-friendly (compared to 3dmax/maya etc), has massive online community support and in many respects is for 3D what Reaper is to DAW music production: https://www.blender.org

 

Last edited: Feb 8, 2020

A great source for Cinema4D projects, VJ Loops and inspiration...

 

Last edited: Feb 8, 2020

Cool stuff guys. I did try the 2004 3ds max 7 yesterday to though, and it was a pretty quick render although not complex since i don't know how to texture in it yet. After playing around with that old version of 3ds for awhile I put it aside for awhile then I went back to Cinema 4d R21. Now I love C4D. It seems you can do anything 3ds can do in it, just easier and better layout. After using 3ds for awhile makes C4D look like a breeze. I just use the standard render, It is still faster than he physical or corona render on my low spec laptop. My 12 second clips usually take about 12 hours, I think that is because I am exporting on high quality 1920x1080 72 dpi, geomety anti-aliasing etc.. pretty hi res textures and scene setup but it looks great like almost hollywood level. I still have a lot to learn but this is just way too much fun. I only wish I hadn't bricked my old socket 1150 motherboard now. I think its worth the time it takes to render and I'm sure if I sacrificed quality a bit it would be about half the render time, and so what if I have to leave it on over night right? As long as I don't burn out my i3 cpu? lol.

 

Hi guys, This is an example of what kind of stuff i am able to make. Yes i am a beginner but having lots of fun. i am improving everyday.

1.3GB HIGH QUALITY (44 seconds sorry not much compression) : https://gofile.io/?c=TwvGE3

 

perhaps Blender?
it's free and definitely capable, yet lightweight

 

@Nostalgia_Rocks Have you checked out Blender? In the 2.8 version they implemented EEVEE which is a real-time render engine and it's really fast.
It's not like the cycles engine though but you can get great results. EEVEE works differently with shadows among other things but once you learn it everything will be so much better.

Also Blender has a great community with a lot of tutorials, information and lots of free addons.

DM me if you have questions about Blender or want more information.

 

and... if one gets heavier into Blender, and you have a decent nvidia card, there is that E-Cycles render addon (pay) which absolutely kills for speed reductions. https://blendermarket.com/products/e-cycles

on the free side, there's also the very cool LuxCore for Blender as well, which also uses the GPU. (physically accurate lighting

 

i actually downloaded blender the other day. fired it up once, then promptly deleted. i had no idea how to use it. but i am happy with c4d now. between c4d, after effects 2020, magix vegas, boris fx, red giant plugins etc.. i got all i need. learning how to use them is the part that counts. awesome easy to understand program,s not too bad of a learning curve. check out my example above,, yeah im not pixar yet lol but its fun.

 

The thing is using the programs you mention you probably won't find any setting/profile/codec that works outside a fast computer.
You'd need to work hard to find a "rendering-only" very low quality alternative that can handle C4D projects. If that even exists..

Edited: damn me, I should have read all the thread lol, this seems your best bet and it actually exists:

 

mixamo.com is great and free! any animation you can think of for your 3d character. just used it for the first time. highly recommended.

 

Beeple is world champion 3D artist: it it impossible to understand his c4d projects, too intricate for a regular human like me

 

Huh, today I am zero musically inspired. So let's play video to reset..;)

+1

+1

@Nostalgia_Rocks - this^^ is so f*ckn true, I have to give it +2. I only wish audio SW would get the same optimization, rendering engines (shaders) got in the past years. On the same HW the V-Ray Next (thats what I use) is up to 7(!) times faster than the previous version. I don't use Corona, but it is also a superb shader (I think it can in fact read V-Ray scenes..).

I would really consider investing in some "decent" HW, the most important thing being that it plays well with your renderer. You should always buy HW for your SW, and not just an expensive "power" machine.

The modeller itself is not the bottleneck, so it can be blender, C4D, 3ds MAX.. but waiting 7 hours vs 1h for the renderer...

You are also introducing the software like AE, RG.. also here. After Effects (RG makes plugins for it..) is a different beast. Of course you can combine a 3d modeller with AE, and they also overlap in certain cases. But I would "flag" it as a "cheating" program..;) Not in a bad way though! In fact, if I can make you think something is 3D - let's say a sphere, while you are looking at a circular surface - and save precious rendering time with that, it's a win.

Let me give you an example and also respond to what @PartyShit was asking.. I tried to vaguely recreate something similar to the Afterlife animation (forgive the quality, it's just for demo purposes..).

In this case I would always use AfterEffects particle systems (like RG's). I played with this for an hour+, rendering less than a minute. It is fake in a sense it is not really a 3D scene. But it kinda looks like there are some shadows.. well you'd be the judge. It is only a cylindrical emitter, wind up, gravity down, aux particle system and everything pushed through turbulence/fractal field. And 3 lights + some blur masking..

It would be possible to make this scene in a modeller and render, but no way in an hour (at least not for me). In fact there are tests to (re)produce analogue results with e.g. particle system in AE and in a 3d modelling SW.

You have to evaluate from case to case and always try to trick people. For a Spacey Frappé like this, I'd go for AE. For an architectural rendering, always 3ds/blender/.. + a fast renderer like V-Ray, Corona, Redshift...

 

Last edited: Feb 28, 2020