Quick tip: Always - Always - SAVE YOUR EXPERIMENTAL PROJECTS!

Save your work! Save as you go!
You've read it a hundred times. Everyone has told you.
I know this and more than likely you know this. And do this while working.

Even more importantly is something Confucius didn't say. "When experimenting, save your project file as a separate project file and save them often."

 And if you do do experimenting in your software you probably already know how important that tidbit of info is. If not and you disregard the advice, or think, as I did this time.
"Eh, I'm not going to take it further than this." Or "Let me just render this out for the goof"
 and close the app before saving it as a separate project file not wanting to ruin the one you are working on. Then, my friend you will undoubtedly find out how important this advice is.

Save your work, sure, but save your experimental work as well. Save it as a separate project for each change if you have to.

I came back to this advice the hard way, which I'm kicking myself for now as I'm really good at saving my experimental work. I have upwards of 75 to 100 separate project files for some experimenting I've done on the same project. But that said, You can delete them later on!

What you can not do is get them back if you can not remember what you did. You can come close... or by some luck do it exactly the same but the luck thing is not something to rely on. Make your own luck in this regard, save the project file separately!

I was reminded of this in a recent project I was working on. I had no intention of taking the experimental side as far as I did and of course even though I did and saved as seperate project file. I didn't save the experimenting I did while experimenting. And for the life of me can not remember how I did it or how I had it lined up or the lighting for that single " Let me render it out for the goof render"

Thing is - that render came out pretty dang good if I say so myself and I decided to take that experiment all the way. But how I got the look originally, I can only come close. Because I didn't save the file in either C4D or my post app especially my post app. I saved the image but not the project file. And to make it worse, I can't remember which render I got the final with... a 32 bit or a 16 bit. and yes there is a big difference in the out comes.

So heed my advice, not only save your work during the process, save your experiments and the experiments of your experiments in a separate project file. So if you like what you did, you can easy redo what you did or at least be closer to figuring out what you did while experimenting.

Till next time,
Happy Turkey Day and keep rendering.
- chase -