Getting Started
Q: How do I install this tool?
A: Through Cargo, Greyscalegorilla's app. Open Cargo, go to the Tool page, click Install, then restart Cinema 4D. See Installation in the user guide for the one-time Connector setup.
Q: I do not have Cargo. Where do I get it?
A: Download it at greyscalegorilla.com/cargo and sign in with your Greyscalegorilla account. See Installation.
Q: Where do I find Snoot after installing?
A: In the Greyscalegorilla menu at the top of Cinema 4D. It is not in the Extensions menu.
Q: What is a snoot, anyway?
A: A hood you mount on a light to control its throw. Photographers and gaffers use them constantly to put light exactly where they want it. This is the same attachment in 3D.
Q: How do I get those hard cuts of light everyone is doing?
A: Rake the light across the surface, push Length up, and pull one size control way down while leaving the other wide. See Cutting light.
Q: What is the fastest way to see it work?
A: Set your renderer to Redshift, Arnold or Octane, select an area light, and run Greyscalegorilla > Snoot. Then drag the Length slider up.
Usage
Q: Do I need a light already in the scene?
A: No. Run Snoot with nothing selected and it offers to build one for you, aimed on a controller null and configured for your active renderer.
Q: How do I tighten the throw?
A: Increase Length, or decrease Size X and Size Y. Length has the bigger effect. On Redshift and Arnold you can also pull the light's own Spread down, which narrows the emission before it reaches the snoot. See Controlling length, radius and shape.
Q: Can I still change the light after adding a snoot?
A: Yes, at any point. It is still a regular area light. Intensity, color, temperature, samples, falloff and Spread all work exactly as they did. Snoot only controls the shape of what gets out. Resize the light and the snoot even rebuilds itself to match.
Q: What is Spread and where do I find it?
A: It is a parameter on the light itself, not on Snoot, and it controls how wide the light emits. Redshift and Arnold both have it on their area lights. Turning it down is the fastest way to tighten a cut without touching the shape you have already built. Octane area lights have no direct equivalent.
Q: Can I shape it in the viewport instead of the Attribute Manager?
A: Yes. Four orange handles control Length, Size X, Size Y and Roundness, and they stay visible even when the Snoot object is not selected.
Q: What does Match Light Size do?
A: Copies the light's dimensions into Size X and Size Y, which gives you a straight hood instead of a taper. Good starting point before narrowing the mouth.
Q: Why is my Roundness control doing nothing?
A: You are on a disk or disc light. The opening is already an ellipse, so Roundness has nothing to round and the handle is hidden. It only applies to quad and rectangular lights.
Q: I am sending this to a render farm. Will the snoot show up?
A: Only if the farm has Snoot installed. If it does not, select the Snoot object and press C to make it editable. That stamps it down to regular polygon geometry that renders anywhere, with the material and visibility tag still attached. See Stamping it down for a render farm.
Q: What do I lose when I press C?
A: The live link to the light and all four shape controls. It becomes ordinary geometry, so resizing the light will not update it anymore. Duplicate the Snoot object first, or stamp down a copy of the scene, so you keep something adjustable when a note comes back.
Q: Can I edit the material it creates?
A: Yes. "Snoot Material" is a normal material in the Material Manager. Tinting the white inside face is a nice way to warm or cool the light.
Q: How do I stop the snoot itself from being visible?
A: Turn off Visible In Render on the Snoot object. Or, if you prefer your renderer's own controls, every snoot carries a native visibility tag, so you can click that tag and turn off primary visibility there instead. Both do the same thing. See Hiding the snoot from camera.
Q: I turned the visibility off on the tag, but the checkbox still says on.
A: That is expected. The checkbox writes to the tag, but not the other way around, so a manual tag edit does not update it. Your change is still in effect. Just be aware that toggling the checkbox later will overwrite it. Pick one of the two controls and stay with it.
Q: Should I move the snoot to aim it?
A: No, move the light. The snoot is mounted on the light and carries a Protection tag on purpose, so aiming the light aims the snoot with it.
Q: What happens if I resize the light?
A: The snoot rebuilds to match. It reads the light's size every time it updates.
Q: Can I use more than one snoot on a light?
A: The tool adds one per run. Nothing stops you from having more than one child snoot, but they will overlap and fight each other. One per light is the intent.
Compatibility
Q: Does this work in my version of Cinema 4D?
A: Cinema 4D 2023, 2024, 2025 and 2026, on macOS and Windows. See Requirements.
Q: Which render engines are supported?
A: Redshift, Arnold (C4DtoA) and Octane. Standard and Physical are not supported.
Q: Which light types work?
A: Area lights only. Redshift RS Lights set to Area with a Quad or Disc shape, Arnold Lights set to Quad or Disk, and native Cinema 4D Lights set to Area with an Octane Light tag. Spot, point, infinite and dome lights are not supported.
Q: Does it work with Fields?
A: No, Snoot has no Fields integration. It is a generator, not an effector.
Troubleshooting
Q: I installed it in Cargo but I do not see it in Cinema 4D.
A: Give Cinema 4D a full restart. Newly installed tools only appear on a fresh launch. Check the Greyscalegorilla menu, not the Extensions menu.
Q: The Snoot object is in my scene but there is no geometry.
A: It has to be a direct child of a supported light. If it got dragged out, or under a null, drag it back directly under the light. See Troubleshooting in the user guide.
Q: I got "The selected object is not a supported light type."
A: Snoot only works on Redshift, Arnold and Octane area lights. Check the light's type and shape in its own settings.
Q: I got "The currently active renderer is not supported."
A: Set your active renderer to Redshift, Arnold or Octane in Render Settings, then run Snoot again.
Q: I got a message about the renderer not matching the light type.
A: Your scene renderer and your light are from different engines, for example an Arnold light in a Redshift scene. The snoot still gets created and still works, it just skips the material because there is no correct one to build. Switch the renderer to match, or assign a material yourself.
Q: The snoot is showing up in a reflection or casting a shadow.
A: The visibility tag on the Snoot object handles that, and it only applies while the tag is there. If it got deleted, the quickest fix is to delete the snoot and run the command again.
Q: Match Light Size does nothing on my Octane light.
A: Known gap. On Octane, read the size off the light and type it into Size X and Size Y by hand. Everything else works normally.
Q: The snoot is blocking my view of the scene in the viewport.
A: It should not, it ships with a Display tag set to wireframe isoparms. If someone deleted or changed that tag, set the Display tag's shading mode back to Lines and its wire mode to Isoparms.
Licensing
Q: What do I need to use this tool?
A: An active Greyscalegorilla or Everything Bundle subscription. Tools install and stay licensed through Cargo.
Q: I have a subscription but the plugin is not loading.
A: Snoot checks its license at startup and will not register without a valid one. Open Cargo, confirm you are signed in and your subscription is active, then restart Cinema 4D.