Mike A

Anyone up for helping an xpresso challenged user 🙂 I have a basic linear spline drawn on the XY plane. I want to generate a copy where the point positions are smoothed (averaged) on the Y axis only. The Y position average being based on a user definable number of surrounding points. The important constraint being: I want to maintain both the same number of points and their X position. All the tools / methods I've found for 'spline smoothing' so far end up redrawing splines with new point numbers, or new point positions. I need an exact match on everything apart from the point Y position. My Xpresso vector manipulation skills are not up to the job! Any willing volunteers - or any obvious solution I've overlooked? Thank you!

As an R21 Perpetual licence holder I'm waiting with bated breath for all the new things I probably won't get : )

This is an interesting thread for me as I keep coming back and chipping away at learning some of the very basics of Houdini. From my point of view it seems the main difference is 'access to the fundamental building blocks'. C4D hides - or at least makes it much harder to access - a lot of the really core data manipulaion from the user. That's good in many respects - more artist friendly. But it becomes an issue when you hit the limitation of the provided tools / controls. In that case in C4D you're sometimes at a dead end. I've had that happen on one or two projects in the past. In Houdini you've got access to just about everything at a really fundamental level. That's great if you need the power and have the understanding to manipulate it, but it can be demanding and overwhelming if you don't.

...and CPU's not to exceed 37° at any time... : )

Pushing this back on track... Any suggestions of good training on Houdini for absolutely new users - ideally users coming from C4D ?

Scouser or Mancunian, I'd be happy with that : )

jed, I've not been a regular user of c4dcafe until fairly recently - so this is the first time I've watched a video of yours. Not only was it interesting, but as a fellow northerner, I couldn't help but smile, and felt right at home - what an accent : )

Dave, There is one slight issue with your analysis... The vast majority of the population has some degree of immunity to the standard flu - that's why only a small proportion of us get it each year. None of us have immunity to the new Coronavirus. That's why many of us will get it. Multiply that by the suspected higher mortality rate and you have a much bigger problem. The other thing you might want to consider: Do you have any family, friends or aquaintences who are elderly or in poor health? I do. If someone passes Cv on to them - they have a much higher mortality rate. I have people in my family who will probably have a 50/50 chance of survival if they get infected with Cv. Bear that in mind folks.

You might be better off drinking it : ) To be useful as a disintectant you need about 70% alchohol content - around 125 degree proof.

OK - I really hope you're able to get them back on line somehow / somewhere! They're far too valuable to be sat unviewed in storage!

What has happened to the C4DCafe youtube channel? I thought all the training video were there - now I only see a series on Xpresso - that's all.

Maybe MAXON and Adobe could do swapsies : ) Red Giant for Allegorithmic... LOL!

Just for a moment... when he pulled it out of the wrapping.... I thought the box was going to say... new UV tools : ) LOL!

Yes - I agree. Confusing at the best of times. It would be interesting to hear from Mr. McG. if this is just a temporary 'issue' or a permanent and deliberate change.

Given the change of management... this year I did actually read the EULA before purchasing the R21 Perceptual. I did notice this clause - the emphasis is mine: "2.1 A perpetual license grants the user a time unlimited, remunerable, non-exclusive, non-transferable and non-sublicensable right to install and use the software...." Unfortunately I don't have the R20 EULA to hand, but the R19 EULA included this clause, which is conspicuous by it's absence in R21 EULA: "3.6 Subject to compliance with Section 3.8, you are entitled to sell the original Software license to third parties in accordance with the terms of this Section: Resale of the Software to third parties is permitted if you identify the third party who will receive the Software and use rights to MAXON before the sale.... " So, my interpretation of 'at this moment...' is... No. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news. I nearly posted this when I read the EULA, and maybe I should have, but it was at a time when there was a huge amount of upset here already, so I held back. You would think with the '14 day check-in' licencing scheme a licence transfer would be quite possible. Mike

WhUteVer it is, I guess it will be for subscribers - since we've just had a service update. If so, I'll try not to cry... : )

OK guys - a process of elimination and think I've got an ID on the culprit : DEM Earth 4.005 Everything works as expected with that removed. Can anyone else on Windows with DEM Earth 4.005 installed confirm this? Rick, Hrvoje - could one of you guys drop Paul E a message and follow up? It's a crazy co-incidence that Paul and I have been having a 'bit of a chat' this morning about a customer service / licencing issue (completely unrelated to this) - and he probably won't want to hear from me again for a while !! LOL!

Guys - it looks like a plugin related issue. I'm investigating and will report back

...and a follow up: Just powered up 21.115 on my Windows laptop - with exactly the same results. That's running a slightly different version of Windows - Win 10 Home, 10.0.17763 In the C:\Program Files\MAXON Cinema 4D R21\help\ directory I've just got a html redirect file - is that correct?

Rick, Thanks for the follow up. First things first - thanks for listening to us and responding on this! OK: System: Windows 10 Pro, Version: 10.0.18363 Build 18363 C4D: R21.115 C4D prefs are: Online Content: on External Browser: on I've got a new scene, dropped a cube in, right clicked on cube and selected 'show help...". I don't get any browser launch (using Chrome as default). Repeating above right click with Prefs: External Browser: off still results in no action. I've tried this with various parametric object parameters, tool parameters etc - same situation, so it appears to be a 'global' problem at this point. I can launch the internal help window directly using the direct menu : Help > Show help. This also launches my default browser if prefs: External Browser is on. Are there any other C4D prefs / settings that could affect this?

Guys - with the R21.1 I can no longer get contextual help - eg: right clicking on an object / tool etc and selecting 'show help' no longer works. Is it just me?

OK - great to see this has been worked on for the R21.1 update... thanks to all who heard our cries and took action. However - I've got the offline help installed, but I'm not getting any context sensitive linking to the 'right-click > Show help' menu. Any ideas?

I'm really hoping Rick is still subscribed to, and reading, this thread... : ) The other aspect of the help system that needs improvement is the search function. Currently it just seems to be a simple search on the main content text. It would be really helpful to have a specified phrase - ie: "a multi word phrase" in quotes.

PS: Re the "with our limited resources" comment... Prime users will soon be paying 'studio' level subs, perpetual 'studio' users could be facing a 50% increase in upgrade cost next year, you're telling us you're going to have all these new renters coming on board... OK, maybe I shouldn't have opened that particular can.... ; )

Everfresh could have typed the response for me : ) - I'm perfectly happy to have that additional option as long as it doesn't detract or interfere with the core info - and that it's clearly separated from that info, not all jumbled up together. The sort of help info I typically need is: What does 'parameter A' do? - or some other very focused bit of info. I need the info I want, quickly and accurately to get the job out of the door. For me, Cineversity fulfuills a different role: it's for when I want to explore or discover a new feature or toolset in more depth - and I have the time to watch and absorb a longer video or playlist. Hence the need to keep these two routes clearly separated. I noted your comment about the current difficulty of incorporating user reported typos, inaccuracies etc - and your efforts to enable the integration of that input. I'd very much like to see that improved. If you could enable an easier route for user contributions that would be a very good thing. I'm not talking about directly accessible user content here, but about submitting content to yourselves that you could review, consolidate and consider for your next 'documentation update'. I guess my ideal solution would be an online system that gives you the ability to make continuous updates, corrections etc - but one that would allow the user to download a local copy (of the core info - similar to R20) at any time of their choosing for local off-line help. This could then be updated by downloading a revised copy of the help as and when the user felt necessary - and when they had good connectivity to do so.