Cinema 4D Live Tutorial - Using the Bend Deformer to Create 3D Logos Video Lecture | Create stunning 3D Graphics with Cinema 4D - 3D & Animation

all right so let's make some bendy text
in cinema 4d shall we alright so I think
the first thing we're gonna need to do
is just create a little line not an
empty spline we need to get our pen tool
go into our front view here and
let's just create a spine
all right so we're gonna try to make an
M I think that's what I want to try to
do first so to make it bendy we're gonna
have to kind of pre plan that we're
gonna bend it probably like halfway up
the actual letter so what we'll do so
let's just sketch this out really quick
so basically you're gonna kind of make
something that looks like an a Boop
and just because you can see when we
actually fold this we're gonna it's
gonna form an m capital M just keep
drawn here and closed out the spline
there and we'll just do some tweak in
here just uh make this look a little bit
better
I've just been this is the first time
I'm really experimenting with how to
really achieve this kind of bendy text
look so sure there's a few ways we can
go about achieving it
the main thing right now is just trying
to make this blind so all of our
throughout the entirety of our text here
our spline it's gonna have a equal
thickness so that's what I'm doing right
now hmm
that's looking pretty pretty good it's
probably the sides a little bit thin
right here I think that's pretty good
now once we got our spline looking good
we'll throw this into a extrude so
here's our M spline and our M extrude so
now we actually have some geometry we
can play around with
I'm sure all right so let's not give it
any thickness right now so we have our
little object here let's give it some
color shall we give it this kind of blue
yes kind of thing and maybe this dark
blue with some reflection and - lets get
our bend object in here now to make this
work
since we haven't extrude we'll have to
actually just group all of these objects
together so typically for then to work
on anything you would make it a child
but since we have an extruder you really
can't make a child of that because that
would just not work very well so we're
gonna have to just group everything
together and since it's on the same
level in the hierarchy that Bend is
gonna then effect that extrude so this
can be the M will do the bendy M and
let's see is this our left view here
yeah
so now we have our bend object and let's
go ahead and we got the bend the bend is
always always never fails is always in
the wrong orientation we got to fix that
so I think let's see that's actually
going backwards so let's rotate it 180
and let's go yeah so now it's bending
forward but we have some really weird
janking us going on so to fix that I'll
have to go and horse spline here or
let's see let's try the extrude and the
problem here is if I go to my line
shading here you can see that we don't
really have any lines kind of giving
definition to our geometry here so what
we can do to change that is by going in
our cap settings and making some
quadrangles and that's giving us a lot
more geometry a lot more subdivisions
that we can actually Bend
now we are having some weird janky
issues coming coming in here so let's
see what's going on there so you can see
what's going on you can see what's
happening there so I think that's due to
our yep that's our angle our spline so
we need enough definition on our spline
and that kind of fixed everything like
that so now we have our bendy flat
object here and you'll notice once we
shrink this bend deformer so well needed
to bend all the way over we'll turn on
the keep y-axis length and then little
such a just so here's our side view here
you can see what's happening shrink this
down so you can actually see the bend
and adjust the size so how much of an
arc you want in your actual object on
your bendy text but you can see that by
bending that basically that a we are
creating that M so now I can move this
bend deformer up and that's the nice
thing about making your deformer in the
same level of the hierarchy because then
you can move it independently of the
object that you're bending so now if I
render this we have a really cool kind
of bendy M we still have some like weird
janky issues here let's see if we can go
in to see if changing the quadrangles if
that really fixes it at all maybe go
triangles now that really doesn't fix it
let's see let's go back into our spline
and let's go from adaptive to subdivided
and subdivided is really handy because
it it does two things it interpolates
based on the angle and also the maximum
length that you want between two points
so if I really crank this up a lot
you'll see that we're losing some
geometry but then we can also do the
angle and then even get some definition
there so you're controlling intermediate
points by the angle between two points
and then just the length between two
points you can really fine-tune how this
looks so let's see I think as long as we
have this maximum length pretty low
don't want to get too low but I think
that cleaned up our mesh here looking
good so now what I can do is kind of
tweak this because right here we have a
lot more thickness than we do on the
sides here so what we can do is go into
our spline and you can see that we can
actually let me get out of interactive
render region there we can actually
adjust this and see how it's going to
look when it's bent as well so we still
have that bend deformer and we're just
adjusting this spline and you can see it
right up here how it's being affected
with the the been deform or applied to
it so we're adjusting the spline and we
can see live feedback which is pretty
handy because then we can tweak the heck
out of this so let's move this up and
again we're just trying to get the same
kind of thickness in here as we do on
the outside so just doing a little tweak
ejection a little bit I think that's
pretty good move this up a little bit
more shrink it scale that down and I
think we're looking pretty good that up
all right so now we render that we have
some really nice bendy text we can go
and adjust where our bend is to kind of
figure out how we want this end to look
so you can get a little creative with
how how you position your Bend and say
you want a little bit of thickness to
this will just increase the thickness on
our extrude and we can then add some
caps to round out our edges add some
steps to our fill it caps
you can see right there getting a little
it's a little too thick I just want some
really nice rounded edges right here
it's looking good
cool so there's our M now let's see
let's actually make it so this Bend is
actually 180 degrees so we're getting a
full 180 turn on this and we can also
adjust with the size how big of an arc
this is what just like so there we are
so there's our bendy tax let's let's try
another one
why not so there's our M let's just turn
that off let's create let's see how
about about an e so again you can't have
to visualize how you're gonna want to do
this so I'm thinking we have the e come
out like this let me actually just draw
let me see if I can sketch where's my
where's that little handy dandy doodle
paint yeah there we go so we have the
eve that will come out like this and
then we'll have the middle part and so
since this will Bend will actually Bend
horizontally so maybe I'll have the
middle part of the e
come over here probably have to make
this middle part thicker and then have
the bottom of the e
like so so we'll Bend this side to this
side and this part will then shift over
to here I mean again we just got to make
sure this middle section is large enough
doodle tool yay all right so let's go
ahead and do that go ahead and get our
pen tool and we'll just draw this
basically draw what I sketched
and so the pen tool this is the new pen
tool in r17 it's pretty awesome it's
it's if you're familiar with using
illustrator I would say this this kind
of rivals the pen tool in Illustrator so
it's very intuitive really easy to use
really easy to come in here and the nice
part is is you can actually see where
your path is gonna where your spines
gonna go before you even hit your next
click your next point which is really
cool so let's go ahead and so now we're
gonna make sure with this middle section
stick enough and then we're gonna draw
our other part of our e a little middle
arm I think those are called little arms
or appendages or whatever thingies they
are and just finish this off now you
complete the spline and now we can just
go and clean this up a little bit like
never create a spline correctly the
right way always need to go back in here
and tweak a bunch of crap so again we
want to make sure that this thickness is
about double what we have here and right
now our middle appendages and this thick
is what we have there so let's fix that
and make sure and this is just kind of
like eyeballing it I really should be
using like snapping and really
positioning this with the grids but
whatever we're just flying by the seat
of our pants here and have them flown in
anyways so let's see that looks good
let's make sure this bottom part lines
up but I think if we select these two we
can actually yeah we can actually line
them
by zeroing out the size on the y so
let's do the same thing here zero out
the y so these two points are lined up
and I believe we can do the same thing
and zero out the X I'll see then that
will get rid of the curve so gotta be
careful with that so you might want to
just see what what the value is on the X
so 145 and then just plug that into that
other point two so we can do the same
thing with these so X just do 145 what
that was one that was a lot more than
145 so there we go so now all these
points line up so we are kind of do a
little bit better than eyeballing it and
round that out really nice line these
suckers up zero out them and the X same
thing for these guys up see I did it
again so let's say let's say that's 33
and then 33 in the x position there so
these guys will wind up okay so this is
looking pretty dang good let's make sure
did I line these guys up just ever so
slightly off all right so one these guys
up to up so let's say that's 10 negative
10 this is negative 10
all right let's make sure this is just a
flat surface there
and that up just flat there
all right what do you think enough
tweaking on a freaking spline it's
probably really boring okay let's go
ahead and now we can do the same thing
extrude I think we probably know that
I'm looking at this we'll probably need
to move these guys down so we're gonna
double the thickness here and again just
eyeballing it yeah so we got our extrude
let's go a regular view here we already
got some some thickness so again we're
just gonna do the same exact thing we
did with our M extrude this will be our
e true so we had all the subdivisions
here quadrangles or turned on so we'll
just do the same thing with this
and again our spline we needed to do the
subdivided spline so we'll do the same
thing here and now let's just go ahead
and duplicate this Bend group the bend
with the extrude OOP that together and
this will be been de bendy and turn that
on and first thing you do is actually
let me just bring in a brand new bed
because that just kind of blew
everything out so let's see so again
Bend is in the wrong direction as always
typical bed and diploma let's get this
in the right way here see like that and
basically we'll want to line this up to
this middle part again keep Y axis the
length I think yeah we should get some
nice smooth bends just we'll just
to zero out the movement for now its
position our been it's actually scale or
bend down here a little bit so we can
actually see the full Bend right now
we're going 390 ours
yeah 392 we just need 180 so we just
need a just a curve at 180 let's bring
this scale down and the Y here and then
we can just move this and there is our
bendy e so again we can shrink this even
more to get this even sharper curve
let's see if our mesh is okay well so we
got a little weirdness going up at the
top here you can even see it overhead so
we might need to go into either our our
spline or maybe our quadrangle try to
fix that let's see what's what's the
major malfunction with this guy maybe we
need to make this taller nope
maybe I need to mess around with the
actual spline itself so let's do that
let's see if that's gonna fix anything
so you can see this little weird
Archy thing happening I think it might
just be on the top I think it's just on
the top there to do I'm just trying to
move things around to see what the
culprit is on this it's a little weird
right there - man the end was so much
easier
what am I missing here Stuart Phillip
caps
bring this down fairly low
is not liking the bender for some really
weird stuff going on no matter how I
wonder if it's because let's see if it's
because our spline if our splines are on
different parts of the Z and that's it
that's it
so we have a little bit different Z
depth and that's what that's what's
creating this so we'll just zero
everything out we want this on the same
plane BAM fixed it so at some point mm
so you can even see in the overhead view
uh here's our spline I must have
accidentally pulled one of these points
out so they're not on the same z
coordinate so they're a little bit off
so which legs deal with that out that
took care of our little issue so now I
can go back and I think all this is a
little overkill so I can go back in here
and get rid of the excess geometry here
still might want to make this it'll be
nice and smooth let's see let's go and
maybe make this middle part a little bit
thicker
move this a little bit over
so actually I just want to like overlap
this part with that so let's bring in
these little arms bringing the armies in
like that and we'll bring this side in a
little bit too and let's see let's just
see if I can just make that a little bit
thicker in the middle here
right now when you do it just so these
edges are nice and curved
well what happened here doesn't look
good I'll spring this in here there we
go
whoa what happened at the top let's see
what I did there in the bottom man I
just screwed that all up way to go me
let's see I wonder if I'll have to just
bring up the if this is a just mesh
subdivision issue looks like it maybe
yeah so now it's nice and rounded I
don't know what happened there must be
something with just the angle of the
curves causing that little crunchy
crunchiness happening all right now we
can move over our bend a little bit more
so just overlapping that back portion of
the e and me and having some weirdness
going on here - let's make this thick
again
oh let's free single object that do
anything no let's see what was the
thickness on this this was for give this
three actually what this was for
give this four four and see our fill its
steps are four and the radius four five
so will match that and throw on that
blue texture there boom there's our
folded II let's see in relation to the m
RM was way bigger so let's let's change
that let's increase the size of our E
move this guy down so now I think what's
going on so now we have way too much
subdivision since we just increased the
size now it's really slowing down my
scene here we go so what move this whole
entire thing over let's move our Bend so
I think that's about the same size as
our M now we just screwed a lot of stuff
up huh
we just screwed a lot of stuff up right
there so now I got this weird stuff
happening there - man II is not being
nice with me just this it's just okay
just in the maximum length there kind of
helped see if adjusting
Quadrangle so I'm almost thinking if
there's a better way to do this like
maybe with a cloth object or something
like that maybe just making some flat
polygons and doing it like that I'll
have to mess around with that a little
bit more see so yeah right right here
overhead there's some weirdness yeah
when crease that maximum length
so you can see the angle is adjusting
the angle between two points so that's
kind of getting rid of or losing some of
the angle and then there's always a
threshold of five centimeters between
points always working there so I think
we fixed that we fix it this look good I
think we fixed it but now I think now I
think that I'm looking at it this middle
portion is a little bit too thick so we
can easily fix that just bring this in a
little bit
moving over our bend it's a little bit
still too thick over just a little bit
more here we go that looks good
it looks like constant with constant
thickness so there is our bendy II again
we can increase the size let's see what
the size was for this let's call this
one 60 I'm super anal retentive about
having nice rounded numbers in here so
let's go 160 on the bend there we go
still having some weird stuff happening
up here darn it
I think that fixed it
okay oh come on look at that
what the heck man look so let's just
just double check that I'm not I didn't
screw anything up with the Z okay that's
all good okay cool at least that wasn't
me from just really think I need to add
a lot more definition there okay so I
think really I mean you can see how
highly subdivided this sucker is so I'm
gonna maybe have to think of a different
way to do this I hope to do some
tutorial later about this but I think I
gotta go back to the drawing board a
little bit as to how this really how to
make this look good
or work well enough because I think this
doing the extrude a little bit of a pain
but I mean it worked well with the end
what I didn't have a lot of issues with
the M but holy crap this e not cool not
cool at all
right now I'm just kind of adjusting a
thickness to match the thickness of the
M so this kind of matches
I think that's pretty good you know just
this bend again what all right maybe
even make just uh just because how wide
our M is I think what I might want to do
is just extend the e appendages like so
just so it's a little bit more boxy move
this out
all right let's see that bad I think
that by scaling that down my Bend size
got messed up so let me just make this
back to 160 again so they're both same
width of Bend
zero out our camera line this up these
guys over render there we go we got some
bendy text what if this looks cool right
a separate angle here yeah maybe I don't
know see what this would look like if I
put the E and I kind of push it down
into that M
like so see what that looks like man I
need an H it's kind of meh what about
this what about this that's kind of cool
kind of kind of cool
all right so let's let's uh let's say
that's done that's done so I think
that's it I think I think I'm gonna have
to go back to the drawing where I'm
gonna try another way to do this I feel
like there's a better way than doing the
subdivision and all this stuff I feel
like they're especially with the II
follow these dang subdivisions I don't
know thinking thinking that let's see if
I just had like a flat plane Z and so
here's my guy there and just make this
like this so what I'm thinking is you
throw this into a subdivision surface we
got that nice rounding let's make that
editable let's extrude this I mean I
don't know I don't know if that's really
gonna extrude this guy down here look we
wanted that on preserve groups
so now so let's just see this will
actually work move this up there's a
little bit of modeling kind of stuff so
it takes a little bit more modeling
knowledge than just extrude okay so now
let's see if we put a bend on this guy
if the quality will be better so it's 90
degrees yeah and let's see I think we
did that's yep we need to go 90 degrees
that way we'll shrink the size make this
even more so now
yeah we're getting still getting a
little weird stuff going on Oh keep
y-axis length
just 180 so I don't know if this will
work so we might need to do so we have
this weird arcing and I don't know if I
put this any cloth really don't think
that's gonna help ya cuz we still it's
just subdividing that crappy eNOS so
yeah this is this is you have to be way
more mindful of subdivisions and where
they are so if I made this thinner I
need to make a cut right there and then
bend it and now it's a little bit better
but that's that's so much more work man
so I don't know if that's really good I
don't know if that's really a good plan
I think I think maybe my original way is
the way to go yeah that's just too much
work that's a pain in the buttocks yeah
all right I think I think I know what I
want to do so that was basically it that
that I think that's what I'm gonna do
for a tutorial I'm gonna make a little
bendy guy here with some bendy text
using the extrude the bend
yeah I think that I think that I think
that'll work I think that's better way
to do it and doing a whole bunch of
modeling at least this doesn't take any
modeling takes a little bit of tweaking
some options here but anytime you can
save yourself from modeling especially
when you second modeling as much as I do
this is the way to go
all right well that was my stream made
some bendy text had a lot of fun along
the way and maybe you'll see a tutorial
on this very thing that's way more
prepared and cool-looking than this
all right well everyone enjoy your
Friday I am out
bye bye