How to make a Dynamic Chain with Cinema 4D

187 people have commented on this post. You should too!

1. Johannes says:

   May 10, 2011 at 7:30 am

   nice tutorial dude! had no problems to follow your instructions and just tried it out:

   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tRP3d_l-5go

   Thank you for this one!

   Reply
2. Ashwani Kumar says:

   May 29, 2011 at 5:43 am

   Hello Nick

   I have tried your tutorial on Cinema 4D STUDIO V 12.016 & 12.043. I am experiencing the same problem in both versions. Even after following the tutorial step by step my chain does not swing down but goes stright down due to gravity. Also I have made the cylinder object the COLLOIDER and Cloner Object the Rigid Body from SIMULATION > DYNAMICS > options.
   I donot know where the problem lies.
   However, My chain explodes into individual segments if I apply the Create Rigid Body tag to Sweep nurbs not the to the cloner object.
   Thanks in advance…

   Reply
   • Ashwani Kumar says:

     May 29, 2011 at 6:03 am

     Thanks Thomas (Reply under ANDRIAN LUNA – 2 comments above). I got the point from you. I removed Fracture and Explosion. Made Cyclinder the Colloider and Clone Object the Rigid body from SIMULATION > DYNAMICS > Options… The Chain is working fine.
     I am using the version 12.043 of Cinema 4D Studio.
     Thanks to all, it was the simulation I was searching for sometime.

     Reply
3. ProMoGraf says:

   June 16, 2011 at 7:37 am

   Hey Gorrillaaaa, what a great tutorial! It all seem to work fine but in my case (I checked 1000 times) when I add a Dynamic Body Tag to the Colner – objects disapear…no idea why but it made me to look for some other solution. What I found was: If you add a Dynamic Body Tag to a Cloner of chain links and set in: Collsion tab, shape to moving mesh it all works the same way. It’s way much easer, less seting up and so on… High efficency on calculations even if objects are made of many polygons.
   http://www.youtube.com/TomaszPlanta check for some details. In summary. If you want to deal with hole objects and dynamic body tags – play with MOVING MESH. Best regards

   Reply
   • ProMoGraf says:

     June 16, 2011 at 7:58 am

     here is a link to a sample test – moving mesh solution!

     http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_QjxOpZ4qEo

     Regards

     Reply
4. Tom Firestone says:

   July 7, 2011 at 2:30 pm

   I gave it a shot this week and learned some nice things about hierarchy in C4D and dynamics.

   http://vimeo.com/26123061

   Thanks for the tutorial.

   Tom

   Reply
5. Chase Steffens says:

   July 7, 2011 at 3:40 pm

   I didn’t notice if anyone else was having this problem, but it stumped me for a while. To make my copy of the Dynamic Chain (that would become the pretty chain) I did a ctrl+drag. For some reason, render instances wasn’t working with this. Eventually, I did the copy/paste method and it started working. Weird.

   Does anyone know why this would be?

   Reply
   • Zekester says:

     January 12, 2012 at 1:13 am

     Not sure, but I was facing the same issue and your post helped me solve it.

     Reply
     • Zekester says:

       January 14, 2012 at 1:50 am

       Actually nevermind. My PrettyChain still does not follow the movement of the dynamic chain.

       Reply
       • Zekester says:

         January 15, 2012 at 1:03 am

         Finally figured out I had not selected “Top Level” for the Individual Elements of the Dynamic Chain effector.

         Reply
6. JJ says:

   July 20, 2011 at 3:53 pm

   Hi Nick.

   I am following your tutorial, trying to replicate it in Cinema 4D. However, when I apply rigid body to the cloner object, and the colider to the cylinder, the chain doesnt fall apart. (It just explodes as one big chunk)
   That’s where the problem starts.
   From that point following another steps doesnt really give me any results…

   Maybe you could help.

   Thanks!

   Reply
7. JJ says:

   July 20, 2011 at 3:56 pm

   I meant 12… Cinema 4d 12…

   Reply
8. JJ says:

   July 20, 2011 at 4:09 pm

   Alright, got it from here:

   http://www.vimeo.com/25566130

   Thanks very much mate!

   Reply
9. EDiitZHDx says:

   August 6, 2011 at 11:45 am

   When I put the explosion down to 0.001% the breakage is still visible

   Reply
10. Joe says:

    August 11, 2011 at 11:38 pm

    hey do you know why my chain just dissapears?

    Reply
11. rroobboo says:

    September 7, 2011 at 9:38 am

    As always, you kick butt man. This was very helpfull, especislly for R11.5 users

    Reply
12. JMKupka says:

    November 4, 2011 at 5:29 pm

    Perfect! I have a project in which I need a pendant hanging on a small silver chain, and this was the solution! You rock! Sorry about all the !!!!!’s

    Reply
13. Camitzake says:

    December 29, 2011 at 8:20 pm

    Great tut!
    wow im blown away by the commitment to educate people, true role model.

    learned bunch of stuff from your other tutorials as well, keep it up!

    Thank you!

    Big up from Sweden !

    Reply