MAXON Unveils Robust Cinema 4D Release 16 (R16)MAXON today unveiled Cinema 4D release 16 (R16), the next generation release of the company's 3D motion graphics, visual effects, visualization, painting, and rendering software application. In addition to countless workflow enhancements, Cinema 4D R16 delivers new features including a modeling PolyPen "super-tool," a motion tracker for easily integrating 3D content within live footage, and a reflectance material channel that allows for multi-layered reflections and specularity. The company says Cinema 4D R16 reinforces Maxon's commitment to provide creative professionals with exceptional stability and performance, unmatched integration, and a straightforward, efficient and flexible interface to optimize any workflow for VFX, motion graphics, visualization, and game development. [Note: Maxon will debut Cinema 4D R16 at the SIGGRAPH 2014 convention in Vancouver, BC, August 12 - 14, 2014, in booth #1422.] "Cinema 4D R16 elevates the 3D design experience so that creative professionals in film, broadcast, digital media, and visualization can create, share, and manage compelling content and collaborate more effectively on the most demanding projects," says Harald Egel, co-founder and CEO of Maxon Computer. "Our programming team has optimized modeling and rendering capabilities while adding powerful advanced capabilities that not only bolster performance but also insure our customers have the most efficient pipeline to other digital content creation tools for streamlined productivity." New features in R16, available for both the Mac OS X and Windows platforms, include: • Motion tracker -- Delivers quick and seamless integration of 3D elements into real world footage. Footage can be tracked automatically or manually, and aligned to the 3D environment using position, vector, and planar constraints.
• Interaction tag -- Gives users control over 3D objects and works with the new tweak mode to provide information on object movement and highlighting. Ideal for technical directors and character riggers, the tag reports all mouse interaction and allows object control via XPresso, Cofee, or Python.
• PolyPen -- Utilize the new "super-tool" to paint polygons and polish points as well as easily move, clone, cut, and weld points, edges of 3D models. You can even re-topologize complex meshes. Enable snapping for greater precision or to snap to a surface.
• Bevel deformer -- The bevel toolset in Cinema 4D can now be applied nondestructively to entire objects or specific selection sets. Users can also animate and adjust bevel attributes to create all new effects.
• Sculpting -- R16 is packed with numerous improvements and dynamic features to sculpt with precision and expand the overall modeling toolset. The new select tool gives users access to powerful symmetry and fill options to define point and polygon selections on any editable object. Additional features give users more control and flexibility for sculpting details on parametric objects, creating curves, defining masks, stamps and stencils, as well as tools for users to create their own sculpt brushes, and more.
• Other modeling features in R16 include an all-new cogwheel spline primitive to generate involute and ratchet gears; a new mesh check tool to evaluate the integrity of a polygonal mesh; deformer falloff options, and cap enhancements to easily add textures to the caps of MoText, extrude, loft, lathe, and sweep objects.
• Reflectance channel -- The new reflectance material channel in R16 provides more control over reflections and specularity within a single new channel. Features include the ability to build-up multiple layers for complex surfaces such as metallic car paint, woven cloth surfaces, and options to render separate multi-pass layers for each reflection layer to achieve higher quality realistic imagery.
• New render engine for hair and sketch - A completely new unified effects render engine allows artists to seamlessly raytrace hair and sketch lines within the same render pass to give users higher quality results in a fraction of the time.
• Team render, introduced by Maxon in 2013, features many new enhancements including a client-server architecture allowing users to control all the render jobs for a studio via a browser.
Cinema 4D is noted for its image quality and an intuitive, easy-to-use interface that puts professional results within reach of artists at all levels of CGI experience. Additional productivity boosting features in R16 include: • Content library -- Completely re-organized and optimized for release 16, the preset library contains custom made solutions with specific target groups in mind. New house and stair generators, as well as modular doors and windows have been added for architectural visualizers. Product and advertising designers can take advantage of a powerful tool to animate the folding of die-cut packaging, as well as modular bottles, tubes, and boxes. Motion designers will enjoy the addition of high-quality models made for MoGraph, preset title animations and interactive chart templates.
• Exchange/pipeline support -- Customers can now exchange assets throughout the production pipeline more reliably in R16 with support for the most current versions of FBX and Alembic.
• Solo button -- Offers artists a production-friendly solution to isolate individual objects and hierarchies for refinement when modeling. Soloing also speeds up the viewport performance for improved workflow on massive scenes.
• Annotations -- Tag specific objects, clones, or points in any scene with annotations that appear directly in view for a dependable solution to reference online pre-production materials, target areas of a scene for enhancement, and more.
• UV peeler -- Delivers an effective means to quickly unwrap the UV's of cylindrical objects for optimized texturing. Cinema 4D release 16 is scheduled to ship in September, 2014. 
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