Read and write asset metadata to describe and organize assets and collect technical information on them.
Assets are associated with multiple forms of metadata and some assets like category and keyword assets are used as metadata themselves which can be referenced by the metadata of other assets. Assets contain administrative metadata like identifiers, asset locations, asset dependencies and asset versions as well as descriptive metadata like notes, keywords and categories. This administrative form of metadata is represented by asset descriptions which are used to store and handle assets on a database level. The descriptive metadata is attached to these asset descriptions and is shown in and manageable with the Info Area of the Asset Browser. The descriptive metadata associated with an asset depends also on the asset type of an asset. For example, only image file assets carry metadata describing if their image has an alpha channel and only scene assets carry metadata denoting the number of materials contained in the scene asset.
Assets are represented as asset descriptions by AssetDescriptionInterface references when interacting with asset databases in the Asset API. The interface can access the AssetInterface reference for an asset, holds the Url of an asset and can read and write descriptive metadata for its asset. The identifier and version of an asset are accessible through AssetIdentifierInterface, one of the base classes of AssetInterface. See Asset API Assets for details on the asset model of the Asset API.
The majority of asset metadata is accessible through AssetMetaDataInterface references which primarily contain descriptive metadata, but also information about the asset type, the location of preview images and more. The interface provides read-only access to metadata and the ability to retrieve all set metadata properties for an asset. One of the retrievable metadata entries are the "meta properties" of the metadata, a DataDictionary which contains most of the descriptive metadata shown in the Info Area of the Asset Browser. Write and delete access for metadata is provided through the AssetDescriptionInterface referencing the AssetMetaDataInterface. Both read, write and delete operations of metadata are realized with generalized functions which accept a metadata key for the operation. The keys for the metadata can be found in the namespace ASSETMETADATA and for the meta properties in the ASSET::METAPROPERTIES namespace and its sub-namespaces.
The KeywordAssetInterface is an asset type to define a keyword which can be referenced via its identifier by the metadata of other assets and the CategoryAssetInterface is an asset type that defines a category other assets can be grouped with. Both interfaces provide static functions to set their respective metadata for an asset. The AssetUtilitiesInterface interface provides static convenience functions to write the name, version and category and retrieve its icon.
| Articles | Asset API | Provide content as reusable assets served with the Cinema 4D Asset Browser. |
| Interface Basics | The interface system of the MAXON API is a toolset to define public APIs and to hide implementation details. It is the base for most components of the MAXON API. | |
| API Entities | AssetTypes | Contains the declarations of asset types. |
| ASSETMETADATA | Contains the declarations of asset metadata attributes. | |
| ASSET::METAPROPERTIES | Contains the declarations of asset metadata properties. | |
| AssetDependencyStruct | Not yet documented | |
| AssetDescriptionInterface | Represents an asset as its administrative metadata and provides access to its descriptive metadata. | |
| AssetIdentifierInterface | Contains the common methods to obtain type, identifier and version of an asset. | |
| AssetMetaDataInterface | Provides access to the descriptive metadata of an asset. | |
| AssetUtilitiesInterface | Not yet documented | |
| CategoryAssetInterface | Not yet documented | |
| KeywordAssetInterface | Not yet documented
| |
| SDK Plugins | Asset API Basics | Showcases basic interactions with the Asset API to modify asset databases and their content. |
| Common Tasks | Read Administrative Asset Metadata | Not yet documented |
| Read Descriptive Asset Metadata | Not yet documented | |
| Write Descriptive Asset Metadata | Not yet documented | |
| Add Keywords to Assets | Not yet documented | |
| Add Assets to Categories | Not yet documented | |
| Create Category Assets | Not yet documented | |
| Create Keyword Assets | Not yet documented |