The following is a short guide to the use of the CINEMA 4D Exchange application with ARCHICAD. Please bear in mind that this short guide does not replace the comprehensive CINEMA 4D Exchange Reference Guide; we recommend that you use both documents together.
CINEMA 4D Exchange is MAXON’s high-end 3D modeling, rendering and animation solution. Installing the CINEMA 4D Exchange for ARCHICAD allows CINEMA 4D Exchange to function as a powerful visualization tool or a graphical GDL modeler and editor tightly integrated with ARCHICAD. The connection between the two applications, using the C4D format (version R18), offers a streamlined 3D design workflow on both Macintosh and Windows platforms.
With the CINEMA 4D Exchange add-on connection, elements created in CINEMA 4D can be transferred to ARCHICAD as GDL objects.
Notes:
•With the introduction of the Morph tool in ARCHICAD 16, the CINEMA 4D Exchange Add-on is no longer necessary for some of these functions.
•For architectural visualization, CineRender, the new built-in rendering engine of ARCHICAD, provides most of the rendering capabilities of CINEMA 4D. For professional purposes and to further exploit the texture mapping, rendering and animating capabilities of CINEMA 4D, please use the built-in Export to CINEMA 4D command in ARCHICAD (from the Render pop-up button of the PhotoRendering palette). This export feature lets you precisely export the ARCHICAD model, together with the surface- and the rendering settings, into CINEMA 4D with one click.
Software Requirements
ARCHICAD and CINEMA 4D Exchange must be installed on your computer prior to the installation of the ARCHICAD add-on.
The latest ARCHICAD add-on can be downloaded free of charge from the following webpage:
http://www.graphisoft.com/products/archicad/addons/cinema_4d/cinema4d_download.html
Important Note for ARCHICAD 19 and earlier:
Before exporting with CINEMA 4D Exchange, make sure that ARCHICAD Working Units are set to centimeter. If the programs use different working units, you may find scaling problems after the data exchange.
As of ARCHICAD 20, the units of exported ARCHICAD models will be converted automatically in CINEMA 4D.