Holding down the Alt-key when clicking O/S/H on your keyboard (O = Frame Active Object; S = Frame Selected Elements; H = Frame Active Scene) will perform the frame action in all views at once (XL 8.5).

 

Checking No Specular on the Details tab for the lights will make for much faster renders.

 

- Disable "Generate GI" on the illumination tab for each material (except materials for sky and floor, which should have this enabled but strength for the sky should be reduced to 50%)
- Disable "Receive GI" for the sky material
- If you use a second sky with HDR, disable both "Receive GI" and "Generate GI" and in the Compositing Tag disable "Cast Shadows" and "Receive Shadows"
- Disable "Cast Shadows" for the floor with a Compositing Tag
- Disable "Cast Shadows" and "Receive Shadows" for the Sky
- Set the radiosity accuracy down to 40% in the rendersettings
- Set Diffuse Depth to 1 or 2
- Set Stochastic samples to 400
- Set Min to 100 and Max to 200

 

Go to Window > Layout > Edit Palettes, then assign a key combination to Next Project and Previous Project.

 

The Alpha channel in BodyPaint does not provide real time feedback, so it can be pretty hard to get a visual response on what you're painting. One way to get around this is to paint your alphas in the Transparency channel instead. The Transparency channel is updated in real time time and ehen you're done, just move the layer to the Alpha channel.

 

When you use deformers such as Bend, Twist or Bulge in combination with a HyperNURBS object, place the deformer on the same hierarchy level as the actual HN. This will ensure that the deformer affects the subdivided mesh rather then limit itself to the polygonal mesh. The hierarchy should look like this:

 

Ever wanted to find how many triangles there are in your mesh? Select your mesh, switch to Polygon Mode and then go to Window > Structure Info and there you have it. If you want to highlight all triangles just click on the plus-sign (+).

 

Here's a cool tip when working with polygons and Extrude and Extrude Inner: increase the Maximum Angle from default 89° to 90° or above. What's this good for, you ask? Try this: create a cube and make it editable (press "C" on your keyboard) and then switch to polygon mode. Select the Extrude tool (or click "D" on your keyboard) and then extrude the polygons by click-dragging your mouse over the workspace. It will look something like this:

Extrude with Maximum Angle: 89° and Offset: -30 m

Now Undo the extrusion and click on the Active Tool tab to get the variables available for the extrude tool. See how the Maximum Angle is set to 89°? Change that to 90° and try the Extrude command once again. This time it will look something like this:

Extrude with Maximum Angle: 90° and Offset: -30 m

This tip also works for Extrude Inner. In the image below I've selected the middle band of polygons and performed the Extrude Inner command:

Extrude Inner with Maximum Angle: 89° and Offset: -30 m

As you can see the polygons will extrude but not as a continuous band. Change the default Maximum Angle from 89° to 90° and you will get this:

Extrude Inner with Maximum Angle: 90° and Offset: -30 m

 

While using the Live Selection Tool, holding down the left mouse button and spinning the mouse wheel will increase the circle-selection area.

 

If you are fed up of setting up your render settings, snap settings, grid settings, magnet settings, lights, objects, etc. every time you open a new scene then set up everything the way you want it to be and save the scene as new.c4d in the root directory where Cinema 4D is installed. Now everytime you open a new scene you will immediately have the settings you require as the file new.c4d will act as default scene.

 

While using the Live Selection Tool, holding down the left mouse button and spinning the mouse wheel will increase the circle-selection area.

 

All three available from www.sean-paul.com as PDF.