Not sure what's causing the look difference, might be the alpha somehow. Could you please send me the scene (or a simplified version of the scene if necessary) to take a look?
Thank you~
I did some investigation and seems like this is a bug. If you turn off Progressive Refinement (Arnold Render Settings > System > IPR), then the IPR matches the final render. This could be a workaround until the issue is fixed, although not very convenient.
Hi this is fixed in an upcoming release of c4dtoa which should hopefully be released in a few days.
https://help.autodesk.com/view/ARNOL/ENU/?guid=arnold_for_cinema_4d_4751_html