View Tutorial Style Guide
Style Guidelines
This is a style guide used for Cineversity naming conventions, how titles and descriptions should be formatted, and how to set up high search result for your tutorials
General
Please use “CINEMA 4D” (all caps) or “BodyPaint 3D” (mixed case) the first time you reference the application in the Long Description. It’s okay to use “C4D” or “BP” in the Title, Short Description and subsequent references in the Long Description. Do not use any other abbreviations for CINEMA 4D or BodyPaint 3D. Similarly, any third-party applications should be referred to by their proper, trademarked name the first time you reference them in the Long Description (“Adobe After Effects”). The Title, Short Description and subsequent uses in the Long Description can use generally accepted abbreviations (“AE”).
In general, specific CINEMA 4D editions (Prime, Broadcast, Visualize, Studio) need not be mentioned unless the tutorial pertains specifically to that edition. Individual features can and should be mentioned, as well as “feature sets”. Please remember that CINEMA 4D no longer includes modules, so titles of new tutorials should refer to the “MoGraph feature set” or just “MoGraph”, not the “MoGraph module”. Please refer to the application for the proper spelling and capitalization of individual features.
Title
This should be a descriptive title that uniquely describes the tutorial, and should match the title card of the tutorial (though for existing tutorials it’s ok if it doesn’t match as long as the CP title is more descriptive than the title card). Note that in Cineversity 2.0 tutorials are not as clearly linked in a linear or project fashion, so rather than using a title like “Installing the Plugins” that infers the user knows about the series it’s better to call the tutorial “C4D ZBrush Pipeline, Part 01: Installing the Plugins”. Similarly “Quicktime Preview” is not a good title - “Intro CINEMA 4D R10 Tutorials, Part 03: Quicktime Preview” would be preferred. Titles can be up to 100 characters - use them.
Standard title capitalization should apply.
So the title card would read:
This is a Title, Part 1:
This is the subtitle
and the title would read:
This is a Title, Part 1: This is a subtitle
In practice the title card placed at the front of a video should look something like this:
Image:TitleScreenCV2_2012.jpg
Format for titles on the tutorial creation page:
One-Off Videos
This is a Long Descriptive Title
Multi-Part Projects
Project Name, Part 07: This is a subtitle offering more information
Trade Show Presentations
Freelancer, only one presentation:
Trade Show 2013 Rewind - Presenter Name: Content of presentation
Freelancer, multiple presentations:
Trade Show 2013 Rewind - Presenter Name, Day 01: Content of presentation
Studio Artist, only one presentation:
Trade Show 2013 Rewind - Studio Name’s Presenter Name: Content of presentation
Studio Artist, multiple presentations:
Trade Show 2013 Rewind - Studio Name’s Presenter Name, Day 03: Content of presentation
Key Points
* Project names for multi-part tutorials should be short and sweet.
* Subtitles (the part following the colon) should be descriptive of the content of this particular video, if you were searching for a tutorial on this topic, what terms would you use?
* Project names follow Title Rules of Capitalization, but subtitles are: Capitalized like sentences without punctuation
* The first letters of Product & Studio names should be capitalized.
Short Description
This should include some supporting information about the tutorial.
The Short Description appears only in the bubble popup that appears when the mouse is over the tutorial title in the tutorial search results. Its content is searched, along with the Title and Long Description when using the search box on the main Cineversity site.
The short description could be as simple as copying the subtitle, but do feel free to use alternative text to increase searchability.
Long Description
The Long Description should clearly describe what the user will learn watching this tutorial. For tutorial series, the first paragraph can recap the overall goal of the series, while the remaining paragraphs should describe the goals of the individual tutorial. Please write complete sentences.
It’s okay to include links to other Cineversity tutorials or external sites within the long description using standard HTML syntax. Links to external sites should include target=“_new” to insure they open in a new tab/window.
The Long Description appears in the bubble popup that appears when the mouse is over the tutorial title in the tutorial search results, and to the left of the tutorial video. Its content is searched, along with the Title and Short Description when using the search box on the main Cineversity site.
Make sure any applicable tools or features are mentioned in the Long Description. For instance “This tutorial shows two methods for painting with displacement maps” is not a good description. The two specific methods “Raybrush” and “Displacer” should be specifically mentioned. Otherwise, users searching for those terms would not find the tutrorial.
So better description should read:
“This tutorial shows how to interactively create displacement maps in BodyPaint 3D using BP’s Raybrush feature or the Displacer”
Made With
Should list the major-release version used to create the tutorial
Works With
The earliest version should be set to the earliest application version which contains the features necessary to complete the tutorial (for BP, use the related C4D version by adding 7 to the version number).
The latest version should typically be set to the most recent version in the list. This will be changed by the admin as necessary to denote tutorials that can no longer be completed due to drastic changes in interface or removal of specific features or preferences.
“Always Works with Latest Version?” should typically remain set to Yes. Again, the admin will switch this to “No” as necessary to denote tutorials that can no longer be completed due to drastic changes in interface or removal of specific features or preferences. If the layout or menu structure has changed, but the overall method and technique is still intact, we continue to classify the tutorial as working.
For the purposes of Works With, we assume that users have upgraded to the latest available free update in a release cycle. So a tutorial that works with 12.021 and not 12.016 would still simply say “Works With R12 and greater”. A note can be added either in the Long Description or Comments/Notes field explaining that the update is necessary. If for example a tutorials works in R11 and R12, but does not work in the latest R11.5 update due to a bug, it should still indicate that it Works With R11 and greater, with a similar note in the Notes/Comments field explaining the issue.
Comments
These appear in the Notes section to the left of the tutorial video, and should only be used to clarify the tutorial in response to viewer feedback or interface changes.
Comments are not searched.
Utilizes/Feature Set
Any feature sets, plugins or external applications that are required or prominently featured in a tutorial should be checked. You can be somewhat generic with features, especially since this list would be ridiculous if it listed every feature. If a tutorial describes a technique both with and without an external application, the external application should still be noted here (it’s not a list of requirements - it’s more like “if you’re interested in x application, here’s a tutorial that shows it”).
Also consider the way an application or feature is used, a tutorial that merely shows an image in Photoshop would not necessarily indicate that it utilizes Photoshop, but if a technique or process is shown in Photoshop it would. A tutorial that shows extracting a plugin does not need to list WinRAR, WinZip, 7-Zip or any other extraction app as it’s a general process that can be accomplished without that specific app (in fact it can be done completely in the OS). WinRAR would only be mentioned if a special feature of WinRAR is intrinsically used for the tutorial.
Note that if a single tutorial within a project series uses Photoshop, only that tutorial should be marked as using Photoshop, not the entire series.
When adding new feature sets, plugins or external applications to this list, please always use the full proper name of the feature or application (ReelSmart Motion Blur NOT RSMB). There’s no need to distinguish between free or commercial versions of plugins or applications (ie Riptide). Plugins for third-party applications should not be specified here. Simply indicate that the tutorial utilizes the main third-party application. List any necessary plugins in the Long Description or Comments / Notes.
Note:
If there is not an applicable option for Utilizes/Feature set be sure to check “None”
Discipline
Check any disciplines or industries for which this tutorial might apply.The Character discipline includes both Character Modeling and Texturing. Technical Director discipline would include rigging, scripting and xpresso tutorials. The texture painting discipline primarily pertains to BodyPaint 3D. In general, tutorials that are referenced-based may not have any discipline because the feature applies to a wide variety of disciplines. In this case, be sure to check “None”
Process
Check any of the processes that apply to this tutorial. The “Support” process only applies to things like installation and configuration, not anything you might have gotten a support question for.
If a process doesn’t apply to the specific tutorial be sure to check “None”
Type
Project-Based
A project-based tutorial is primarily focused on accomplishing a task. It will commonly be part of a larger series, but could be an individual tutorial that covers a project. For example, the Comedy Channel Promo and Power Integration Tour tutorials would all be project-based.
Reference-Based
A reference-based tutorial is primarily focused on describing a feature, technique or concept. Most of Dr. Sassi’s Daily Tooltime tutorials are reference-based. The MoSpline Turtle Basics tutorials would be reference-based, while the Tournament Bracket tutorials which describe advanced MoSpline concepts in the context of creating a tournament bracket would be both reference and project based.
Resource
A resource tutorial describes or includes a plugin, script, preset, layout, scheme, etc. Basically a resource tutorial is about something that you download and install to extend C4D. Typically a resource tutorial will not also be project or reference-based, although for instance a tutorial about how to write a Python script to generate Xpresso tags that also includes the final script would be a reference-based and resource tutorial.
Presentation
Tutorials of this type include marketing-oriented videos for each new release, trade show presentations, and archives of Cineversity live shows. Most presentation tutorials will also either be reference or project based.
Be sure to note that Resource-type Premium tutorials are NOT accessible to Trial users.
Production guidelines can be found at: Production Guidelines
Category:Cineversity Author Information