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There are actually some really good YouTube videos that explain how to use Xpresso for Railroad lights, flashing lights, etc which are "oscillation" type effects (in a manner of speaking). They at least introduce you to the relevant Xpresso nodes. I actually studied those tutorials to create a two gun anti-aircraft type of rig that oscillates the recoil back and forth between the left and right guns. What I have found is that Xpresso is like any other type of computer language...you need to keep using it or else you forget how. So, there is always a bit of recovery time to re-learn and pick it up all over again for simple things that Signal can do in literally a few clicks. That is why it was such a great addition to my toolkit for $69 USD. Even if GSG wanted to charge me $35 for each update, it would still be worthwhile to maintain for the convenience it offers. Sorry, but for $399/year - no way. True I get tutorials, texture collections, HDRI collection and other plugins for that amount, but there are far cheaper alternatives to their texture/HDRI collections and tutorials and all of their plugins together are not worth that much each year to maintain no matter how good they are. Not sure why GSG has to take a "Adopt our subscription program or you will get NOTHING! Submit and obey" type of attitude to on-going software maintenance. Even Maxon offers its C4D perpetual license holders an upgrade option outside of their subscription plans. Not sure why GSG cannot do the same. Dave

it was not my intention to defend anything. but the situation is extremely difficult. Just as this forum is not a political forum, you can see that the topic moves people to take a stand. and I think it's the same with Maxon. they have nothing to do with it, but want to take a stand. I think this whole discussion definitely shows another weakness of subscription models, but to be honest, if my country would be the clear aggressor, I would not complain, but with the freed up time rather try to change something at the cause. Even though that's much easier said than done, of course. Because the suffering of the people in the war is just not to compare with having to use another tool or search for ways around.

Hey Guys, just finished up a 3D animation inspired by my favourite racing game, Forza Horizon 2.

The great @everfreshonce gave me this advice for working with xrefs, and it has never failed me: " use xrefs. no files get ultimatively broken by them, if so it’s easily fixable. but you can avoid that trouble all together, if you obey the follwing rules: never ever tick the hierarchy tickbox in the xrefs options, and don’t mess with the hierarchy in your xrefs. only make hierarchy canges in the master file that gets referenced. untick the “relative file path” tickbox in the xrefs options in the file tab right from the get go. there’s a bug with relative file paths in xrefs, resulting in everything gets greyed out (easily fixable though by cutting the xref out and pasting it in again), but still, other weird things also can happen with relative paths, so better just use absolute paths… since you are not working in a team it doesn’t matter anyways. be aware that material changes don’t get stored, so make your material adjustments alsoin the original file. that’s it, if you follow these rules xrefs are perfectly stable and reliable. i have used them in every production since 8 years, never had a single show stopper. and it saves you a LOT of trouble in bigger productions. " Thanks again, everfresh! And good luck, Davetwo! :)

I said the same thing about R25 and yet... here I am. 😉

Not just subscriptions but any online activation scheme. I called it two years ago or whenever it was that the online activation nonsense was announced, and argued at the time that users could easily and without notice lose access to their bought and paid for software for any number of reasons including the company going out of business, a war, a global disaster, a powerful computer virus, or any other number of reasons. I just didn't expect it to happen so soon.

Just checking we've all spotted that C4D overlord Chris Schmidt is back from next Wednesday (30-03-22) for the annual resumption of ROCKET LASSO. Thats normally 8 pm UK time and 2 pm CST. CBR

Thanks all! I've been burned by takes in the past (user error) but I think I'll definitely use xrefs in this project. In terms of mindset it should be exactly the same as linking files in design apps like indesign - so that shouldn't be much of a leap conceptually. It'll be nice to work smarter for a change.

Superb 🙂 CBR

@keppn you have perfectly encapsulated my cautious enthusiasm for both xrefs and takes. Hope you don't mind if I steal these words of wisdom and put them on an inspirational Instagram post over a picture of sunset!

Harder than I'd like ! 🙂 To be honest for that sort of thing without Signal I would use C-motion rather than XPresso, which is delightfully not tied to the character object as some people imagine, and works on anything, in much the same sort of way that signal does, albeit perhaps not so simply or intuitively ! CBR

Yes ! But he's usually too modest about blowing his own trumpet, so I have to blow it for him, figuratively speaking (!). CBR

One thing no one has mentioned is the birds flying around outside at the start of the video. Pretty good animation actually especially as they are landing and kind of doing that reverse flapping type of move prior to touch down. Were they real time? Did they motion capture a bird? Or were they hand animated or an imported image file of real birds. Like the women in the shot, we will never know their true origins. But no matter how much you pick this apart, the fact remains that it is amazing. I don't think we are criticizing it because we are unimpressed. I think the criticisms come from a need to rationalize something that goes beyond what we are customed to understanding. I mean real time photo realistic humans is a level of technology that borders on magical. To quote Isaac Asimov: Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. Now, what is NOT being discussed are the ethical implications of all of this. AI programs are now replicating peoples voices, deep faking their likenesses. and now rendering their actions in real time. Is anyone other than me a little scared by where all this will go in 10 years? This takes identity theft to a whole new level. Think of how far real time rendering and AI has come in the last 10 years and project that forward another 10 years. Trust me....the next scary advancement will be when someone creates an AI program that turns a few candid photos of yourself into a real life replica of yourself for your video game avatar. People will flock to it because it will be so cool. But when that happens, the flood gates are open. Here is why: As we all move to a "hybrid work" model, our relationship to the outside world will be via Zoom calls: essentially digital images that can be manipulated. Imagine what hackers could do in the not so distant future: You get the point. We all worry about someone stealing our financial identities, but these advancements put our ownership of our own physical identities at risk as well. That is not only fundamentally dehumanizing but extremely frightening as well. Not really sure we should be excited about this. Dave