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CINEMA 4D R11 Quickstart – Caustics
5. Quick Tutorial – Caustics
Have you ever observed the lighting effects at the bottom of a swimming pool? This phenomena is known as
caustics – light is cast through a transparent material and is broken upon entry and exit.
Open another new (empty) scene. Create a floor object (objects / scene / floor). Create a platonic (objects / scene
/ platonic) and give it a Y-position of 140 using the Attribute Manager.
Create a new material in the Material Manager. Activate the transparency channel in the Attribute Manager and
switch to the “Transparency” menu. Set the color to blue. Set refraction to 1.4 and drag the material from the
Material Manager onto the platonic object in the Object Manager.
If we would have left the setting at 1 the light would have passed through the object unbroken without
a caustics effect. Create a spot light (objects / scene / spot light). Place it at the following position:
X=270, Y=300, Z=-100 at an angle of H=70 degrees, P=-25 degrees using the Attribute Manager.
The light is now shining through the object onto the floor. Render the scene.