Mastering Corona through community support and training

Chaos Corona has long been a go-to renderer for artists in architectural visualization, and its popularity continues to grow. With its creative and vibrant user base, it’s no wonder that tapping into the collective knowledge of this strong community offers significant benefits. The Corona community has evolved into a space for insightful learning, networking, and project collaboration, all centered around the Corona renderer for architectural visualization. This blog post will explore how the community has helped shape and influence the development of the product and all of the benefits its users can reap by joining it.

What’s part of the Corona community?

The Corona community is diverse, and offers many numerous ways to connect with artists. There is the Corona forum, where you can start conversations and troubleshoot issues, as well as suggest ideas for new features; social media groups on Facebook, X and Instagram so you can follow the latest archviz trends and get inspired by other artists’ projects; a YouTube channel with a dedicated playlist for Corona tutorials; and of course the Corona Academy, the official training ground for artists that want to learn Corona from A to Z. By discovering how Corona empowers 3D artists, you can also gain valuable insights that enhance your experience within the community. Whatever your goal with Corona is, joining a support network for artists is important and will help you improve your rendering skills, troubleshoot faster, gain from the professional experience of others, and master the art of giving and receiving feedback on projects without breaking a sweat.

Available training resources

There are many ways you can learn how to use Corona, through dedicated documentation, helpful video tutorials for both Cinema 4D and 3ds Max users, as well as exciting webinars and masterclasses. Before you dive into the video material, for beginners, we recommend you check out this getting started page for 3ds Max users and this one for Cinema 4D. Afterwards, you can review the how-to series playlists that cover everything from getting familiar with the Corona layout and tools, to leveraging LightMix, denoising, Decals, Scatter, and everything in between. Additionally, be sure to explore 5 features for easy renders that highlight how Corona simplifies the rendering process.

Following a new product update, our Product Manager, Tom Grimes, also hosts a release webinar, uploaded on YouTube, outlining the new features and demonstrating how they work. We encourage you to join the conversation and share your impressions of how the product is developing and any considerations you may have for the future, by posting right in the comments. Your feedback has been, and continues to be, a crucial part of shaping the way we evolve our product.

Corona Academy

Corona Academy is the best place to learn Corona through guided videos covering every parameter, tool, and feature of Corona. You will develop your rendering skills through the creation of scenes from start to finish, applying your knowledge in a typical real-world workflow. In fact, we’re so sure you’ll be confident enough to share your renders with other students right away!

We recommend you first read through the Corona documentation, and watch the tutorial videos on the Corona YouTube channel, before you dedicate yourself to the in-depth lessons and structure of Corona Academy. The academy is available for anyone with an active Corona license.

Leveraging community support

One of the best ways to troubleshoot an issue or get a fresh perspective on a challenging project is by engaging with other artists in the Corona forum. Apart from problem-solving threads, artists also have the chance to read through the latest Corona news, share their works in progress, and even browse through job opportunities! Eager to get a feature in the next Corona release? Go ahead and give feedback to Corona developers in the request new features thread, as well as report bugs and suggest improvements.

Networking, collaboration, and challenges

Connecting with fellow artists is a critical step on your journey as a 3D visualizer and an important habit to get into on a daily basis. Chaos Campus is an educational community of like-minded creatives who live and breathe 3D visualization, and passionately discuss rendering, give regular feedback and encouragement to beginners and advanced alike.

It is your go-to place for sharing scenes, materials and models, but also portfolio tips and career advice that very well may land your next dream job. Want to collaborate with someone who will bring a fresh style to your archviz animation? Just post the storyboard with a short description, and you’ll be sure to find an artist who has just the right idea to take your project to the next level. With over 5K members, Chaos Campus is also a great place to get matched with a mentor who is willing to share his knowledge and experience with you, giving you invaluable insight on areas of improvement and encouraging you to experiment in new ways.

Additionally, participating in challenges and contests, such as the CG Architect 3D Awards, can help artists hone their skills and gain recognition within the archviz community.

Staying updated with new features

Apart from chatting with the developers in the Corona forum and following our YouTube channel, if you’d like to keep up-to-date on future releases on all fronts, you should definitely subscribe to our blog. The Chaos blog regularly publishes news on new releases and explores the latest features in-depth and in an easily comprehensible manner.