In this tutorial, I'm going to go through the basics of object creation, material editing, lighting, rendering, and a very neat feature called Multi-Pass Rendering which I will tell you more about later on in this tutorial. (Note: this tutorial was made in version 7 and many of the tools are arranged very differently from previous versions).

Start off by opening Cinema 4D XL 7, a new scene will automatically be created. Hold down your cursor over the icon with a spotlight on it and click on the Ground button, a big plane (that never ends) will be created in your scene.

Let's make a sphere to put on our just-created plane. To do this, go to the icon were you see a box, click on it, and select the Sphere icon. A sphere will be created in the middle of the scene.

As you can see the sphere is going through the plane, so we need to move the sphere up just above the plane. It can be hard getting it perfectly above the plane, so to get a better view click on the little rectangular button () in in the upper-right corner of your Perspective View. Your screen will now be split up into 4 sections: Perspective, Side, Top, and Bottom.

In the Side View window, move your sphere up so its lying on the plane.

Now, it's time to make the sphere look a bit more interesting; it's time to make a material for it! Go the the Materials Window, click on File>New Material and the Material Editor will Pop up. In the Color Section, choose a fairly dark red color. I used R:266 G:6 B:6. Go down to the Reflection Section, check the box to the left of Reflections and choose a Brightness of 25% (the higher the brightness, the more reflections the material will reflect). Next, go down to the Specular Sections and enter the values of 82%, 69% 0% 0% and Mode: Plastic. Congratulations, you've just created a material. Now, close down the box and make another material the same way, but with a light blue color. This material is going to be for the Plane (Feel free to experiment with the Specular settings and Reflections).

It's time to add some lights to the scene. Click on the Spotlight icon and select the Light icon. A Light will be added to your scene. Move the light around some and try to get it above and a bit away from the Sphere. Double-click on the Light icon in the Object Window and a Light Properties window will pop up. Set the Shadow to Soft and close the window. Duplicate the light and place it on the other side of the ball.

The Object Manager should now look like this if you've done everything correctly.