Arndt von Koenigsmarck wrote a book that teaches you how to create objects in Cinema 4D R10. The book comes with a CD-ROM on which you will find demos of Cinema 4D for Windows and Mac OS X (not Vista and not Leopard). There are also training files and an extra plug-in on the CD-ROM. The book itself is true to its subtitle.

Cinema 4D R10 workshop is a book that will guide you through a number of projects, including the creation of a Power Mac G5 enclosure, a car, a ball, a shiny CD, and a cube with Yin/Yang symbols on its sides. Finally, there’s a tutorial on animation.

The back of the book claims this is for novices and intermediate users alike, and I found that you will indeed learn a lot of Cinema 4D by following this book as a guide. As with any tutorial book, you will have to carefully follow each step in the book, apply it to the enclosed files and see the results come into existence.

It’s the old way of teaching things: you show it to people and by copying what the master does, you can eventually become a master yourself. Luckily, von Koenigsmarck’s book contains enough different projects to enable you to find out more by yourself, as I find most of these self-teaching books to be flawed by the scarcity of the topics covered. That is not the case here. There’s enough different material to break your teeth on, if it weren’t for the guidance of the master himself.

I recommend the book to anyone who is serious about spending a week with Cinema 4D in order to learn the program’s finesses and then go on by yourselves.