DiCloner+ is a very powerful generator object that is able to clone objects on surfaces or splines in several different ways. DiCloner+ operates by having at least two child objects. The first DiCloner+ child object is used by DiCloner+ as a source on which clones will be positioned. The following child objects in the hierarchy are used as clone sources and will be positioned on the first child’s surface. Objects can be either polygon objects, primitive objects or even splines.

• Editor Max: This sets the maximum number of clones generated by this object to be displayed in the editor.
• Render Max: This sets the maximum number of clones generated by this object to be rendered.
• Start/End Element: These settings can be used to specify what the first and last object is that should be displayed. If the value “0” is selected, these fields are not considered by DiCloner+.

• Orient: This dropdown menu lets you choose a method to control the orientation of the clones.
  • None: Using this method the clones won’t be reoriented. They will be generated using the original object’s orientation.
  • Normal: This method determines the normal orientation of the first child and aligns the clones according to this normal. .
  • Tangent: This method generates all clones orienting them in tangency with the first child’s shape. This setting is especially useful for splines.
• Draw Type: This dropdown menu defines how the clones that exceed the Editor Max number will be displayed. For instance, if the Editor Max is set to 50 and DiCloner+ generates 60 clones, this field determines how those remaining 10 clones should be displayed.
  • None: In this mode, no exceeding clones will be displayed. The editor window will only display the amount of clones specified in the Editor Max field.
  • Handle: Exceeding clones will be displayed as a handle, which is asmall square slightly larger than a point.
  • Box: Exceeding clones will be displayed as wireframe boxes.
  • Polygon: Exceeding clones will be displayed as one face polygons.
  • Spline: Exceeding clones will be displayed as a spline.
  • Circle: Exceeding clones will be displayed as spline circles.
  • Point: Exceeding clones will be displayed as points.

• Result: This dropdown menu determines what kind of object the generated object will be. The difference between the first three options is only visible when the DiCloner+ is made editable with Cinema4D’s “Make Editable” command.
  • Merged: Using this option, all generated clones are merged as a single object.
  • Separate: Using this option, all generated clones will be different objects.
  • Instances: Using this option, all generated clones will be instances of the original object.
  • Spline: Using the spline option, the DiCloner+ will generate a spline instead of clones.
• No Editor Objects: When this option is activated, DiCloner+ will display all the editor clones according to the Draw Type option while still rendering correctly. This is useful when, for example, clone count is getting high, resulting in a slowdown of the editor window. This option behaves much like if the Editor Max setting is set to 0.
• Animation: When this option is activated, DiCloner+ will calculate the results every frame, allowing animated shaders to be used, for instance.
• Clone method: These options define how DiCloner+ will operate. They define how the second object’s shape will be interpreted and where to place the clones.
  • Vertex: In Vertex mode, the clones will be generated on the first child’s vertices position.
  • Edge: In this mode, clones will be positioned centered along the first child’s edges. This mode doesn’t work with splines.
  • Edge Length: This method is the same as Edges, but it activates the Area/Size settings field to allow for further options, as multiple object placements per edge.
  • Polygon: This mode places one clone at each polygon’s normal.
  • Random Polygon: This mode also places one clone at each polygon, but at a random position. This mode also enables the Seed field to control the random factor.
  • Area Polygon: This mode allows for the placement of multiple objects within each polygon and enables the Area/Size field.
  • Spline: In Spline mode the clones will be placed along a spline, equally spaced from one another. Each spline will only produce one clone if Iterations is set to 1.
  • Spline Length: This mode is much like Spline mode except it uses Area/Size to determine how many clones should be placed along the spline. Clones will also be equally spaced.
  • Placer Tag: To use this mode, the first child object in DiCloner+ must have a Di Placement Expression tag assigned and a spline painted with DiPainter. DiCloner+ will then generate a clone for each point painted by DiPainter.
  • TP Particle: In this mode, DiCloner+ will generate the clones in the Particle Group specified in the Selection/Group field.

• Iterations: This setting works like a multiplier for the amount of clones generated. The iteration works differently for the different clone methods. In vertex mode, increasing the iteration results in multiple layers of the source object (distance between these objects can not be altered). In Edge, random polygon and spline mode, aditional clones are placed on the edge, polygon or spline.
• Seed: This is the random factor, available for Random Polygon and Area Polygon modes.
• Area/Size: This setting determines which area each clone will occupy. To have more clones, the number should be lower. This setting is only available for Edge Length, Area Polygon and Spline Length modes.
• Color Channel: This setting can use a texture from the Texture Tag tab to determine the color of the clones. This option requires that the clone object contains a DiColor Expression Tag.
• Clone Channel: This setting can use a texture from the Texture Tag tab to determine if a clone should be placed. This is independent on the material, filter settings and % value.
• Filter: This is the filter used to define how DiCloner+ will interpret the texture channel.
• %: This setting defines where to create clones by interpreting the intensity of the texture. If this value is set to 40%, clones will only be generated in areas with 40% intensity or more.
• ColorSel. Channel: This setting can use a texture from the Texture Tag tab and determines which clone object should be used to clone to a specific position. This option requires that the clone object contains a DiColor Expression Tag.
• Selection/Group: Vertex or Polygon tags may be dragged to this slot to limit clone generation to these areas only. When using the TP Particle mode, this field is where the Particle Group should be dragged to.

• Min/Max: These settings determine the minimum and maximum values for either Offset, Scale or Rotation, depending on the tab. These values influence the clones’ Offset, Scale and Rotation.
• Channel XYZ/HPB: Textures from the Texture Tag tab can be used to affect the clones’ Offset, Scale and Rotation.
• Filter: This is the filter used to define how DiCloner+ will interpret each texture channel.

Above: a visual explanation of dicloner using a texture to modify its cloning effects: at left, a sphere with a simple checkerboard texture; center, the same sphere with cubes cloned over its surface; at right, the result when z scale and B rotation are modified by the luminance of the checkerboard texture.

The Lightcloner tab is specifically designed to be used with lights as the clone source.

• Brightness: When activated, this setting allows to dim or enhancethe brightness of all light clones.
• Shadow color: This field can be assigned to a texture. The texturewill determine the shadow color that is casted by the clone sources.
• Scale: The Scale field can be used to adjust the color intensity ofthe casted shadow.
• Shadow density: Can be assigned to a texture and determines theintensity of the casted shadow. The filter field determines how thetexture should be interpreted.
• Scale: With this field the shadow intensity can be globally adjusted.
• Visibility: Can be set by a texture and determines the size of a lightsource visible area. (you need to set the visible light option in thelight object other than “none”). The Filter field determines how atexture should be interpreted.
• Min/Max: The Min. and Max. fields determine the minimum andmaximum size of the visible area of each light clone.

This special tab is used to pass Dicloner values to X-frog objects ( X-Frog is an organic growth plug-in for C4D).

• Draw Color: Here you can customize the color used to display the objects that exceed the Editor Max number.
• Text Color: This is where the color for any DiCloner+ text in the editor can be customized.
• Colored View: When this option is activated, it will display all clones,if no editor objects are selected, or all clones that exceed the rendermax setting value, with the color according to the Color Channel texture, which will make redraw slower. When off, objects will be displayed using the color set by the Draw Color field.
• Show Clone Count: This option activates or deactivates the clonecount visibility in the Editor window.
• Show Errors in Editor: When this option is activated, error messageswill appear in the view port every time DiCloner+ can not calculate correctly.
• Trace Clones: This option, when active, will generate a copy of the clones for each frame, leaving them at that position. This is like if the animated clones leave a trace, but it can generate very heavy scenes. This option can slow down the editor a lot, so it only works when the No Editor Objects option is active.
• Light Shadow: This setting only works when lights are being cloned.It works as a shadow bypass option. If the cloned lights are set to cast shadows, then increasing this value will turn those shadows off.

• Track Shader Changes
• Use PolyScale: This option only works for Polygon, Random Polygonand Area Polygon modes and can be used to scale the clones.
• PolyScale: This option sets the polygon display size for the Polygon,Random Polygon and Area Polygon modes.
• Clones Pos. Ignore: When this option is deactivated, clones aregenerated using the world coordinates system, which may lead todeformed clones if the object’s coordinates aren’t 0, 0, 0. Whenactivated, this option makes DiCloner+ use the object’s coordinate system.