Maxon continues to deliver enhancements and optimised workflows to artists using the Maxon One toolset with a surprise June update. A substantial Cinema 4D update pairs with ongoing Redshift development and key improvements and compatibility updates to Red Giant tools and all updates are available immediately to subscribers of individual tools and Maxon One.
While it’s typical to deliver a service pack shortly after a major release like Maxon’s April launch, subscription offerings and agile development now make it possible to deliver valuable features more quickly so artists can make use of them immediately.
Cinema 4D 26.1 includes an enhanced Node UI and improvements to Simulation, Fields and Volume Modeling, in addition to numerous fixes and workflow enhancements. Maxon’s ‘Redshift Everywhere’ initiative brings performance improvements for the CPU, along with enhancements to Redshift RT and Volume Rendering. Red Giant includes new Trapcode features and improved compatibility with Apple Silicon and AMD GPUs, as well as several host applications.
1) Cinema 4D- In addition to general stability improvements and bugfixes, Cinema 4D 26.1 introduces great new features, with a new curvature option for fields and smooth bevels in volume modeling. The Node UI in Cinema 4D 26.1 includes a big upgrade in appearance and interaction, making it easier than ever to create and explore Redshift materials and node capsules. Organize graphs for better readability and easily add nodes into an existing network by simply dropping them onto a wire. These key usability enhancements pair with visual upgrades to maximize your node editing workflow.
It’s now possible to explore and edit existing Capsules directly from the Object Manager with the new ‘Edit Asset as Group’ command. With Maxon delivering powerful node capsules on a regular basis, you can now learn from the work of others or easily tweak capsules to match your needs.
As part of Maxon’s continuing effort to add value to its Maxon One subscription offering, the Capsules library adds valuable assets for photorealistic rendering, including Surface Imperfections, HDRIs and Redshift Materials. A pack of high-end Redshift ArchViz Materials created by design Studio Fuchs und Vogel has been added to the Maxon Capsules collection (quickly accessed by searching ‘fv-rs’ in the Materials/Redshift category of Cinema 4D’s Asset Browser). A set of twelve beautiful interior and exterior HDR images created by Jørgen Herland are available for all subscribers to create realistic lighting and reflections (also quickly found by searching ‘jhdri’ in the Asset Browser).
Cloth and rope simulations can now be influenced by Cinema 4D’s powerful Fields and Field Forces. This top user request after the April release of Unified Simulations offers incredible artistic control to make cloth flow outside the bounds of physical forces. Additionally, the performance of cloth and rope simulations has been improved and Cloth collisions have been enhanced.
In Cinema 4D 26.1, the Volume Builder now features an improved performance thanks to OpenVDB 9 and Booleans can be smoothed based on a radius.
Advanced MoGraph artists can now use any object’s Curvature in Fields, to define the strength of falloffs, colors of clones, or alignment of field forces. Use vectors from curvature to align clones or generate field forces based on the concavity of objects.
2) Redshift- Recent updates to Redshift include ‘bokeh’ depth-of-field in Redshift RT and blackbody temperature controls for volume shading. When rendering using the CPU, Redshift artists will enjoy improved performance and with the addition of round corners now enjoy full feature-compatibility with GPU.
3) Red Giant- Trapcode Suite 18.1 introduces time-based mapping to complete the Layer Maps feature-set in Particular. Additionally, the Grow Bounds utility now runs natively on M1 machines, and this service pack includes several bug fixes for Particular, Form and 3D Stroke. Magic Bullet 16.1 brings Halation and Diffusion to Cinema 4D – letting artists add film-like bloom and aberration to their renders in Cinema 4D. Workflow and compatibility are the main focus of PluralEyes 4.1.12 and Universe 6.1. PluralEyes 4.1.12 adds Vegas Pro 18 and 19 as well as RED Komodo compatibility and restores full compatibility with FCPX. Universe 6.1 provides improved support for AMD graphics cards and a number of bug fixes across various Universe tools. VFX Suite 3.1 improves the performance of Real Lens Flares and includes several bug fixes.
