Modeling LCD TV in Cinema 4D

Cinema 4D is complete modeling software with all the necessary tools for creating
realistic inorganic and organic models. Modeling an object calls for a fine balance
between creativity and technique. If you have the basic idea of the tools and techniques of
the software in question, you can easily create a model you have in mind.
I wanted to create a flat panel TV, along the lines of a Sony model a friend recently
bought. I tried it in cinema 4D and result is for you to judge.

In this tutorial that contains very basic modeling exercise, we will learn how to make
LCD TV model step by step. Preliminary knowledge of the menus and the modeling tools
such as ‘knife’ and ‘extrude’, and panning and dollying the camera in Cinema 4D is
necessary to follow this tutorial. I use Cinema 4D release 11. I think you can do it in
previous versions as well. Here we go:

1. Open Cinema 4D, click primitives and select plane object.

2. In the lower right hand corner of your screen, called Attributes Manager, click
object and enter the following parameters in the object properties:
Width: 440 Mts
Height: 253 Mts
Width segment 20
Height segment: 20

3. Set the orientation of the plane to +Z axis. Your object should look like this:

4. Rotate the camera (not the object) to bring the object in front so that you can start
modeling in proper way.

5. In the object manager in the upper right hand corner of the screen double click the
plane object and rename it as TV Frame.

6. Hit the C key on the keyboard to make the object editable. Screenshot should be
like this:
7. Click polygon tool icon in the left vertical menu. In the main menu, click structure
and select extrude function.
8. In the Attribute Manager, in the field entitled offset, enter -15m. The TV Frame
will extrude from the front.

9. Rotate the camera and move to the back of the frame. It is hollow. In order to
close it, click structure menu again to select ‘close polygonal hole’ function.
10. Move the mouse over the hollow area and its color will change with borders
becoming dotted, meaning you can close it, as shown below. Click it and the
hollow area will be closed by a polygon.
Creating polygon to cover up the hollow area at the back of TV Frame using “close
polygon hole” function

11. Click the polygon tool and select the live selection tool. Keeping the “only select
visible elements” function checked in the Attributes Manager, Select the borders
of the TV Frame as shown below
12. In the main menu, click structure and choose extrude. In the Attributes Manager,
in the offset field enter the value -13.6M and click apply. The outer portion of the
Frame will extrude to form the borders and inner portion will now look like TV
screen.
13. In the bottom of the screen, called Material Manager, click file>new material.
Double click the material dialog to open material editor.

14. Check the “color” option in the material editor and click the color icon to open the
color picker in the editor. Using color sliders choose black color and close the
dialog.

15. Drag and drop the black material to the selected portion on the Frame. Render
your view to see how it looks. It should be like this
16. Rotate the camera (not the object) to check the other portion of the frame. You’ll
find that only front borders are black while rest of the frame is still white. This is
because we haven’t applied the black material to the entire frame completely.
Let’s do it now.

17. Select the portions you want to be black and drag and drop the black material on
these portions. Now your entire frame, except the inner portion where the screen
should be, is black.

18. It’s time now to make the stand for this frame. There are two ways we can do it:
one, to attach a separate stand made of a totally new object and then attach it to
the frame and two, to make use of the polygons of the existing frame to create
stand out of them. While both methods are effective, for my part, I prefer to use a
different object to create a circuit box and stand for the TV.

19. Click primitive object in the main menu and select cube.
20. In the attributes managers, enter the following values in the object properties:
Size X 225 M Segment X 5
Size Y 90 M Segment Y 5
Size Z 20M Segment Z 5

21. Rotate the camera view to move to the back portion of the frame and using move
tool, move the cube to the back portion of the frame so that it snaps there. Like
this:

22. You can rename the cube as “circuit box-cum-stand” in the object manager.
Renaming the objects is always a good habit as it makes easier to identify them at
later stage should you want to edit them.

23. Circuit box cum stand will now help us create stand for the TV. Move and rotate
camera view in such a way that the bottom portion of the circuit box cum stand is
visible.
24. Select the circuit box in object manager and hit C key on the keyboard to make it
editable. Click on polygon mode and select the polygons from the bottom portion
of circuit box using live selection tool. The screenshot should be like this:
25. Using move and rotate camera function get to the frontal view of the TV Frame.

26. In the main menu, click structure and choose extrude. You now have to extrude it
twice in small degrees. Click and drag on the screen to extrude the selected area
of the circuit box so that it protrudes slightly below the bottom portion of TV
Frame.

27. With the extrude tool still active click and drag it again to extrude it further in a
small degree. The screenshot should look like this:
28. Select live selection tool and click on the screen to deselect the selected portion of
circuit box.

29. Now select the front polygons from the bottom of the extruded portion of the
circuit box.
30. Go back again to the extrude function and extrude the selected polygons along the
Z axis. You can do this by clicking and dragging anywhere on the screen. The
result should look like this
31. That completes the modeling of your circuit box cum TV stand.

32. The next step is to paint it with black material. You already have the material
ready as you had created it to paint the borders of the frame.

33. Select polygon mode and choose live selection tool. Click circuit box cum stand
in the object manager and select it using live selection tool. You’ll have use the
rotate camera tool once again to go to the rear view of the circuit box to select it
completely.
34. Drag and drop the black material into the selected circuit box. Render the view to
see the result.

35. Because the default background in the rendered view is black, you will have to
add floor to the scene to see the black stand of the TV clearly.

36. In the main menu, click icon showing light object and choose floor. Adjust the
height of the floor using move tool so that the stand touches it. Also select light
(omni) from the same menu and using move tool adjust it in such a way that it
brightens the area, especially the bottom area, around TV. Rendered view of your
screenshot should be like this:
37. To further enhance the clarity around the scene, create sky from the same menu
from which you chose floor.
38. But the dull grey sky is not going down well with the scene. To create a realistic
sky, go to material menu, click new material. Double click material dialog to open
material editor. Check and select the color option in the editor. On the texture tab,
in the drop-down menu, click surfaces>cloud.
39. Drag the new sky material to the sky in the object manager. Render the view.
 40. Let me say that there are much better ways to create a far more realistic sky and
flooring in cinema 4D, but that will take more time and put a big pressure on your
pc in terms of rendering time. It is also beyond the scope of this tutorial as it’s
meant for the beginners.
Always remember that effective modeling is a harmonious combination of rich details
used in such a way that render time doesn’t become a test of patience.

41. Nevertheless, we will create some material for the floor, which looks good and
renders faster. Click again new material in material manager, go to color option,
click texture tab>surfaces>checkerboard.

42. The default checkerboard color is black and white. You can change its color by
clicking on the black and white shader and changing the black color to blue. We
are doing this to create a contrast between the floor color and the color of the
stand. Render the scene.
43. An interesting part is to make the screen live so that it looks like real TV. You
must be having some photograph stored in your PC. We will get that photo on to
the screen of the TV. This is called texturing.

44. The technique is simple. Click on the TV Frame in object manager. Click on
polygon tool and using live selection tool, select the screen portion of TV Frame.
45. Go to the material manager>new material>material editor>color>texture tab>load
image. The steps will lead you to hard disk of your PC where you will have to go
the folder where you stored your image and click it.

46. A message will appear and you have to click yes. The image will reflect on the
new material. All you have to do is drag and drop this material on the selected
portion, that is, screen of the TV.
47. In the attributes manager, for this material tag, there is field called projection that
gives you a drop-down menu, from which you have to select “frontal”.

48. In the final part, you have to write down the brand name and manufacturer’s name
to complete the TV. Go back to the main menu and click MoGraph>text object.

49. In the attributes manager, in the field called depth, enter the value 0. In the field
called height, enter the value 12. Type Bravia in the text field. Using move tool,
place it in the upper left corner of the frame.
50. In case, you want to make the stand a bit rounded, choose the HyperNurbs object
from the main menu and in the object manger, drag and drop the circuit box cum
stand into HyperNurbs thus making it a child of HyperNurbs.
Rear view of TV showing rounded circuit box cum stand after parenting it with
HyperNurbs.

51. Rotate the camera to bring the object to front view. Go back to object manager,
select text object. Click + control key and drag it downwards to duplicate it. Use
move tool to move it down on the frame just above the stand. In the text field,
type SONY and place it carefully on the vertical border of the TV Frame as shown
below.
Congrats!! You have made it. For the steps to save a still image or an animation in C4D,
you can refer to my other tutorials on cinema 4D published on scribd.com

Have fun with C4D.

Shuja Shakir
shujashakir@rediffmail.com