Collie Tools V 3.0 - Manual

Collie Tools is a plugin collection for the well-known 3D animation program Cinema 4D. The current version has been compiled for version 8.5 and 9.1 respectively from C++ sources.

Where does it come from?

This is a set of various (interconnected) tools I originally developed for personal use since version 7 of Cinema 4D. Since the functionality of C4D has changed since then, the tools have changed with it, and are now supported by new functionality and additional useful tools.

What does it contain?

This is public release V3.0 of the Collie Tools, which implements eight kinds of toolsets:

Kinematic Tools. These tools are expressions that can be added to an object and link it to one or more other objects kinematically.
Commentary Tag. Does nothing dynamic, sits there and allows comments to be added for a better documentation of scene and assemblies.
Branch Open/Close Tools. These commands (with an additional tag) open or close whole branches, and allow the subdivision of a model with a deep hierarchy into sub-hierarchies that are quickly opened.
Visibility Tools. These commands (again, with an additional tag) set the visibility flags (visible/invisible/undef. in Editor/Renderer) in a subhierarchy for all children.
Layer. A tag and a dialog that implement layers: groups of objects that are not connected by kinematic or constructive dependencies, but by logical grouping. An arbitrary number of objects can be marked as grouped in a "layer", no matter where they are located in the object tree. With a single mouse click, they can be set to visible or invisible, or they can be selected or deselected together.
Named Structure Tools. A tag and a dialog that implement marking and grouping through symbolic names. Visibility and selection can be controlled through those symbolic names, where even logical operators are allowed to form the controlling expression. Named structures are actually the foundation of the layer functionality - layers are a simplified and more user friendly interface for the named structures and will seamlessly work together with them. Named structures are designed to be used together with the Open/Close and Visibility tools for maximum efficiency.
Posing. Tags and dialog to create, save, and apply poses. The module Mocca (which contains an own, differently designed pose manager) is not necessary! Named Structures are supported to limit creation and application of poses to certain parts of the model.
Unicode Input Dialog. A little toy (and a preparation for more interesting functionalities in the next Collie Tools version): Enter a string with encoded Unicode values (like \u003F), and you will get a real Unicode string which you can copy and paste to any name field within C4D.

Layers, Named Structures, Posing, and the supporting functions are the core of the package and, for me personally, the reason to make the whole thing available for everybody.

Click on the item to view the documentation for that tool group.

What is new in version 2.0?

The new items are the Posing functionality as well as a Spline Controller tag and a Limit Transformation tag in the kinematic tools.

What is new in version 3.0?

The new items are the layer dialog as user-friendly add-on for the Named Structures, and the Unicode dialog.
The kinematic tools now contain correct expression priorities. (Warning: The plugin now uses Cinema's own "Active" flag that comes with the "Expression" tag attributes, instead of the previously used plugin-specific "Active" flag. You will notice that whenever you load an old scene with the new 3.0 plugin, the kinematic tools are set to Active, even if they had been deactivated previously. In that case, you will need to reset the Active flag manually (once, of course), and save the scene again. After saving, the (new) flag is set correctly and will stay that way.)
The wildcard search in Named Structures is no longer supported. It was too complex in that place and caused too much confusion (and I implemented it!). Since it also collided with some new internal implementations, I removed it. Hope you don't mind. (Did anybody actually use that?)
The previous (2.0) limitations for names and scene structures have been removed. You may use arbitrary names now without being bound to programmer's rules (you may need to put these names into quote marks though). Warning: Named Structures which used angular brackets or the @ sign in their names must be renamed - these special characters are no longer allowed.
Likewise, all functions that are supposed to operate on "the whole scene" now really operate on the whole scene instead of just the first object and its children.
The pose dialog (and the new layer dialog) connect permanently to the respective storage tag. It is no longer necessary to keep the storage tag selected all the time. The previous user-unfriendly methods to copy or move a pose from one storage tag to another are no longer necessary - there are now standard menus available to copy and paste poses and layers.
Existing poses can be overwritten by new content. That is especially useful when modifying a pose.
The pose dialog (and the new layer dialog) allow multiple selections to speed up deletion and re-sorting of poses and layers.

What do you need to keep in mind?

The big theme of version 3.0 is user friendliness and compatibility. Functionality has been adapted to work just like C4D's own (kinematic tags), specific limitations have been removed (name patterns and scene structure), for complex functions an easy and accessible new interface has been created (layers).

The following caveat is still valid: If you encounter an error, this may not show up as dialog, but as message in the console output window. Even if the operation shows an error dialog at the end, the error specifics may still be printed only in the console output. Why? Because most functions traverse whole trees, where multiple errors are possible, and some even do it as expression which is called for every move and every redraw. This would lead to a flood of error dialogs you'd have to click away. So, you may want to open the console every once in a while, or if something doesn't work as expected.

Technical hints:

This is a C++ plugin compiled for V8.5 (and V9.1 respectively) on Windows PC (CollieTools.cdl) and Apple Macintosh (CollieTools.xdl). Many thanks to Klaus Busse (Kabe) who was kind enough to compile the tools on his Macintosh and to check out certain incompatibilities.

Theoretically, the plugin should run with versions 8.0, 8.1, and 8.2. I don't have any test installations available for those, so I can't promise anything. Just try it. The versions V7 and below are not supported; the plugin will not work with these.

The plugin and the documentation currently support the languages English and German.

All icons have been carefully designed to work with the standard color schemes, but no guarantee whatsoever is given that they are suitable for any color scheme, especially on dark background colors. See the images here for examples.

The package has been carefully tested and is more or less in everyday use here, but if you find an error, please report it to me. And since we're at it:

Legal hints:

(I am not a native English speaker, so these legal hints are provided for your convenience only. Should there be any discrepancy between the English and the German text, the German text takes precedence.)

This package in the current version is freeware (but not public domain). It may be redistributed freely as archive in the form it has been delivered in, including all documentation and copyright information. Source code is not provided with the package and not for public use. I cannot prevent you from analyzing the byte code and reverse-engineer the whole thing, but if you do that, you're crazy as a doorknob anyway.

No registration, serial, dongle, or other identification means is necessary.

Distribution with commercial packages, like magazine CDs or pay-sites, is prohibited, unless explicitly negotiated with me. When in doubt, contact me.

(Or in short: You're not supposed to make money with my work.)

Use is unrestricted: You may use the tags, functions and objects within in any private, free, or commercial project. Acknowledgement is welcome, but not required. Donations are also welcome, but not required. Letters of praise are... well, you get the point.

No warranty is given regarding the suitability of the package for any purpose. You install these tools entirely at your own risk. The author of this package cannot be held responsible for damage to data or hardware caused directly or indirectly by this package, or any resulting damage to property or finances on your side.

(Or in short: You get as much warranty as you pay for.)

Contact:

Contact the author at cairyn (at) tigress (dot) com (sorry, no mailto link due to spambots and addy-collectors). Please set a useful topic (e.g. Collie Tools) and use a non-spamming provider, or the mail filters on the way will throw away your mail.