In this tutorial, I show you how to use the Tracer Object in Cinema 4D. The Tracer Object allows you to trace your animation or to connect clones together. I show you how to set up the Tracer Object with a Sweep Nurbs object to make dynamic lines in your composition.
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84 Comments
hah Nick! I see the Patricks Gun range poster you shot at while in Savannah, GA. I used to run the screen printing shop at that place while I went to school there.
Nice!
i loved it.. i love this site too.
<3
Go Nick. Love it. top Tutorial.
WHAT! I JUST figured this out the other day on mograph.net. Had I know you had this in the works I would have just sat back and waited for you to put this out. hahaha
Shawn Roelofsen on June 3rd, 2010 said...
But isn’t it more rewarding when you figure it out yourself?
Waxamillion on June 5th, 2010 said...
This is beautiful and your post Bryan on Mograph.net helps me understand it a bit more…
Thanks GSG and Dotcommer!!!
I haven’t seen this much possibilities of creativity in any kind of software and there is no friendlier and more relaxed community like the C4D community with the Gorilla on top.
Thank you for the time you put in and can’t wait for the next one 
This is fun to use with the MoGraph dynamics, too.
great nick….really thank for your work and the time you spend making this tutorials …you help a lot of people….keep on the good work…with the mistic youput in every new tut, I reallize something about you…you are the gorilla!
Awesome! I have been wanting to know how to do this technique for a long time. Thanks
Also loving this mini tutorials!
Useful tutorial bro!
Great! Love this look. Did the inspiration to make this tutorial come from Onesize’s Quartz clip?
…as usual.
GSG Tuts are becoming better and better. Thank you Nick! Awesome technique!
I think I’ve found my wall art for my new office! I see a poster series in here somewhere. Very nice abstract look.
Kumbaya my lord, Kumbaya.
Very nice, thank virtual teacher !
Hey Nick! you rock, i see these technics on “AOL phase 2″ by UE. Nice with CS tools its a good trick. i will tryed with a rigid body and a little bit of turbulence or with an *.fbx
Got a little influenced by AOL Phase 2 a few days ago. All tracers and attractors.
http://vimeo.com/12219364
http://vimeo.com/12140259
Stephen on June 4th, 2010 said...
Very nice!
Thanks Nick. Another great tutorial !
I noticed the speed of your instruction workflow has increased significantly which, although it wasn’t an issue before, is very much to my own speedy style. Lots of info in a short time.
Thank you again.
(-:
Thanks Nick. I’ve been trying to figure out how to do this for some time. Great tutorials and all-around site.
Hi Nick! I used the tracer to build this digiflower generator some months ago. Tracing is real fun to play with.
Be my guest : http://vimeo.com/6606503
be my guest B
Thanks again Nick !
Trying to pull some cool shit from that with MoSplines, it can lead to something awesome.
Lovin’ the new preview format for your tutorials
thanks nike very nice
oh, this is so cool!
I’m having a lot of fun with the tracer now but I don’t know how to make it interact with rigid bodies… any suggestion?
iacopo on June 5th, 2010 said...
stupid stupid me, I put the wrong tags, of course it works with the proper rigid body tag
Great Tut,
Thanks Nick!
Honestly, Thank you and you are a genius!
really love these short little quick tutorials!
Hey….here’s a given scenario.
scene contains spheres being cloned across an Object (not linear, array, etc). And that object happens to be a platonic one. So when cloned the clones appear at each vertices of the platonic object, which is what we want. Now the problem arises when we do the whole tracing thing. It comes out nicely, but we want to have all the traced lines connect to each individual sphere so that the the final render looks Like a platonic object but only lines and no actual volume…..follow me? if not i can try to clarify further….
if any one knows any other way of turning an objects segments(edges) into linear splines please let me know! thanks
Matt Frodsham on June 4th, 2010 said...
Structure> Edit spline: edge to spline tool! http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4022/4669665199_5323bcb307_b.jpg
Jonny on June 4th, 2010 said...
Matt did I ever tell you that I love you and that in the next life you will be my significant other? lol…just playing
but thanks bro…really appreciate it
heres http://i49.tinypic.com/sys6ww.jpg
edge spline tool…why didn’t I think of that?
iacopo on June 5th, 2010 said...
or, you can have the same result by putting your platonic as a child of an Atom Array. You find the Atom Array in the menu where the Array, Metaball, Boole etc are…
Matt Frodsham on June 6th, 2010 said...
Ah, so you can. Never noticed that before, you are limited to spheres at the points and cylinders for the connecting splines (which is exactly what Jonny wanted anyway) good tip
Toros on June 13th, 2010 said...
Which object to I use the edge to spline tool on? My Edge to spline tool is always grayed out =/
soy bueno on June 17th, 2010 said...
same, toros. how do you use the edge to spline tool in this instance? matt, jonny?
Hey,
i made a Tutorial for the tracer object a while ago.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R7JfR80sfvQ
its in german though. Maybe you can follow along.
cheers
Freed on June 7th, 2010 said...
Thats a pretty neat tutorial m8!
Hey Nick,
Would really appreciate a brief rundown on all the renderers available for C4d especially
OCTANE ARION and any other GPU/hybrid software. This OCTANE looks sick!!!!
The Gorilla on June 6th, 2010 said...
Hi, Mike. I have never played with any of those. I still haven’t mastered AR3 yet and have no need to try any others quite yet. Have you tried Octane? What do you think?
Skandar on June 15th, 2010 said...
Hey Nick and Mike!
this one’s a very nice render engine:
http://vrayc4d.com/gallery/
perhaps you already know it, but i can just recommend it. i use it a lot, gives great lightning at a very nice speed!
plus it’s made in Austria
Greets from here
Hey Nick,
your tutorials are always very inspiring.
I digged a little into expresso and found it pretty easy to make the sound effector control almost every aspect of anything you want. So I made a pulsing ball of connected spheres reacting to a soundfile. Unfortunatly, rendering out would take around 10 days as I use almost anything that makes rendertimes skyrocket.
Nonetheless I rendered out a still to contribute to your awesomness.
enjoy http://img72.imageshack.us/img72/7409/audiotracer.jpg
Matt Frodsham on June 5th, 2010 said...
That shouldn’t be taking so long, remember to add all your glows and blurs etc in after effects. You seen the discussion over at mograph.net about the_monkey’s NAB presentation? Lots of good stuff about xpresso based sound driven stuff
The Gorilla on June 6th, 2010 said...
Very cool render. One of the best things you can learn is how to optimize your scene for rendering. Turn each render hogging setting on and off to isolate what is taking so long. Then turn down the settings until you start to see a noticeable difference.
Great stuff. Keep it coming!
We like fun little spidery balls kinda things going on!
Awesome and free tutorial Nick!
What really caught my eye was the freakin formula effector. Could make some really crazy organic maybe monster things.
Reminds me of some of Umeric’s snazzy monster creature things: http://vimeo.com/1910518
you are great man , i love the videos really i wish you the best
excellent one
Hey Nick – you could have skipped the Formula effector and used the options in the Random effector instead- in the Mode pull down (instead of the default Random) choose Turbulence or Gaussian. These setting cause the Random Effector to self animate.
Just a thought. thanx as always.
mark F on June 5th, 2010 said...
Correction – The Mode needs to be Turbulence or Noise
The Gorilla on June 6th, 2010 said...
Great tip, Mark! Thanks.
Hey. I used tracer for one of my experimental 3D works. Have a look! Great fun!
http://vimeo.com/9325583
Awesome tutorial! Thamk you Nick!
Hey, that’s pretty different and cool! I like the thin lines that came up, I didn’t know that was possible.
You always make me happy young man…
I love the colour scheme on the tests… you even made the strange people object look hip and/or cool
thanks tiger
Very good tutorial. There is a way to do this in after effects?
The Gorilla on June 6th, 2010 said...
It wouldn’t be as easy, but you can use some scripting or expressions to connect objects. Maybe try using the beam effect attached to objects.
and here’s my little test, I tried to make it as sexy as I could!
http://vimeo.com/12323523
I am getting the results i want in the preview window but when i render to picture viewer, the tails have shrunk and are short, anybody know what causes this?
Christian Schmid on June 9th, 2010 said...
i have exactly the same proglem with rendering. is there a workarround?
xregretx on June 9th, 2010 said...
I did some research online,.. seems that there is a buggy problem with the version I have which is V11.0 I tried to update the software but this did not fix the problem. I guess I cant use the tracer object now.
here’s a test i did. 4 x3 is the new 16×9 by the way.
http://vimeo.com/12326563
misra on June 6th, 2010 said...
nice.
null for cam?
put a cool shape for n gon with the sweep nurbs?
animated the sweep nurbs growth?
shader for the color change?
kewl textures. then ae for finishs?
misra on June 6th, 2010 said...
cogwheel?
David Godwin on June 6th, 2010 said...
thanks. it’s just a cam with a slow push in and the shape thing is in a null with the rotation on it. sweep nurb with a grow and i used the star spline for the trace. the color is a gradient on the color channel and duplicated on the luma channel. everything was exported with and object buffer for more control in ae.
Nick, did you get the idea for this tutorial from Beeple’s files? He had something exactly the same.
The Gorilla on June 6th, 2010 said...
I got the idea actually from trying to build abstract scratches like in the example above. Beeple’s file is a great way to get it started though.
Cool as always. Off to explore how to do this in max.
Nice tutorial as always, thank you.
Here’s my effort:
http://www.vimeo.com/12323752
A sound effector working on some polys that are then animated and traced.
MilkyFruit on June 7th, 2010 said...
Wow, it looks very great!
Dear Nick, thanks for the great tut.
I wanted to go further and create sort of thought connection of an object to a Tracer trails: for instance, a roll of tp (an object) and a trailing piece of rolled off tape.
This would require a more accurate tracking of two points, not just the object center.
How can it be arranged to make the two resulting trails from each clone act like two rails for a single Sweep NURBS?
http://www.onesize.nl/projects/vpro-quants-the-alchemists-of-wallstreet thanks now i can make this
Justin on June 6th, 2010 said...
haha i just watched that today and was so impressed. I spent all day wondering how to make something like it, then i check out greyscale tonight and boom, there it is
win!
Onesize on June 8th, 2010 said...
No tracer objects were used in the Onesize “quants” video. Only atom arrays and hair were used.
This is my humble version of the Trace Object…
http://vimeo.com/12309668
Hey Nick. I love playing around with trace. I always had a doubt. is it possible to connect one object to more than other 2 objects? Or connect each object to ALL the other objects? Here have some samples of what i`ve done playing around with it.
http://gabrielrocha.com/#408045/Pendulum-LIVE
Thanks!
Richard Laxa on June 7th, 2010 said...
Thats briliiant!
Hey Nick how would you achieve an animation like this?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIYJcgMzXwY&NR=1
PFhoe, Cinema 4D and AE
Thought I’d show you guys, its representing Pride in abstract form. 7 Deadly Sins is the primary focus of this idea I thought I’d show you guys.
http://vimeo.com/12359392
Even though I didn’t use the tracer object in this animation, your tut inspired me to make it: http://vimeo.com/12338708
used the Formula Effector though, really awesome.
The Gorilla on June 7th, 2010 said...
Dope one, Marcy!!! Love the glitchy audio!
Hey just thought i’d throw in a little tip about the cstools vibrate null i worked with recently. If you want to move the null itself rather than your object to get it to vibrate around a certain point, i found if you drop the vibrate null in a null object and then move that instead and it works. Then drop your object in the vibrate null et voila! Had myself frustrated for a while because i couldn’t seem to move the vibrate null itself.
Good tutorial nick and v.nice renders!
Kieran
very cool huahuahuahu ok nice tutorial but this comercial http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvEMQmhBSUQ
make in cinema 4d?
Hey Nick,
Great tutorial as always- I’m trying the tracer with modynamics and getting a frustrating result…
the tracers do what they are supposed to in the preview window (tracers follow the bouncing balls) but when I render to the picture viewer the tracers are suddenly straight and all go to some focal point above (though they still animate with the ball)…
Aaargh.
Any help or ideas greatly appreciated!
pokeit on June 8th, 2010 said...
Ok… so you have to make the sweep nurbs editable for it to render correctly- only then you can’t have the animation it only works with a single frame (wherever you made the sweep nurbs editable) I’m a noob- anybody see an easy way round this?
Cheers
Hey, kind of random, but you were in my Threadless.com email this morning! I opened it up, and there was the Gorilla in a nice yellow shirt with a camera on it… very fitting. Might have to get one myself
As always, keep up the great work, we all appreciate it!!!
check out something I did with the tracer tutorial.
http://vimeo.com/12373760
used the tracer in this (different ) approach
http://www.vimeo.com/12375610
For you Nick. A tracer homage for GSG.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/carlrjohnson/4680905504/sizes/l/
The Gorilla on June 8th, 2010 said...
Awesome!!! Thanks, Carl!
Check this out Nick.
http://www.tdwlm.fi/idaho/idaho_cubecircles.mov
thank you ever so much nick for leaning me so tricks in c4d. i’m quite a noob still but am learning fast thanks to you
http://vimeo.com/12393167
http://www.flickr.com/photos/benjaminpattin/4681384089/
I used the tracer to create some trails for this submarine:
http://vimeo.com/12405210
Here is a dope example from maxon
http://www.youtube.com/maxonc4d#p/u/5/aybe7iVHJ7E
Hein Lagerweij on June 8th, 2010 said...
fantastico! It’s from Onesize, http://www.onesize.nl
Great tut Nick! I did an animation using what I learned: http://vimeo.com/12393615
Thanks!
Hi Nick, great blog and great tutorials, you help and inspire us a lot.
Some time ago I saw a commercial from a spanish company called boolab and I’d be awesome if you show us the way to start doing something similar to that commercial. The address where you can all watch it is:
http://www.boolab.tv/php/index.php?action=work&action2=reel&pagina=4&idTrabajo=22
Just some shapes (arrows in this case) forming a big 3D shape.
Thanks!!!!!
Jose on June 9th, 2010 said...
I forgot to say it’s a gorilla, I mean, one of us :=)
Hi Nick, hi folks,
here is what i came up with:
http://www.vimeo.com/12435324
I simply traced a particle
system with some
effectors emitting lights.
Imagine what you could do using
Thinking Particles.
Some final touches in AE… et voila.
The lensflare was created using my own
free lensflare project “Free Flare v1.2″.
You can download it at my site
http://www.the-pi.de
Feedback appreciated.
Cya, Pi
how did you achieve the second screen shot from the top
i can’t get mine to match that spherical shape and density
Cool tutorial…I feel like this function would be good for mapping out info-graphics (gonna keep it in mind)
This is what I came up with. I’m happier with the edit than the actual C4d material, but whatever.
http://www.vimeo.com/12467598
my little test with the object tracer : http://vimeo.com/12489794
thanx !
great stuff
Would be possible to link a null to a cloner element. May be an ID for eaxh element—?
This is my experiment based on the tutorial:
http://vimeo.com/13010161
Thanks!
Nick, man. Thanks for encouraging us peasants to play. You make some of the best, down-to-earth C4D tuts around.
The Gorilla on July 8th, 2010 said...
Thanks, Robby!
Gave it a shot with a twist, still had the 5 sec project “Countdown” in my head
http://vimeo.com/13245217
I was wondering if anyone can think of a similar way to apply a ‘tracer object’ like effect but totally within After Effects? or would it be more of a script based work around?
I’d like to have two shapes move independently of one another yet have a connection (line) traced between them, like in the tutorial above.
Any thoughts or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
(great tutorial btw, simple and easy to follow with a satisfying result)
Thanks for the tips! Here’s my test. http://www.vimeo.com/13543902
Any idea how to smooth the spline out so there aren’t those jagged edges?
Hey there everyone. I’m just getting into 3D an finding these tutorials amazing. I am, however, having a little bit of trouble getting past a certain point in this tutorial. It’s when I try and do the sweep NURBS on the splines that is created on the tracer object. I’m not getting the same result at all. As you can see from these following images:
http://i31.tinypic.com/2sb2z68.png
http://i29.tinypic.com/6q8w1x.png
I’ve re done the tutorial a few times now just to make sure that i’m doing things properly yet I get this result every time. Any ideas why? Thanks for the help.
The Gorilla on August 2nd, 2010 said...
Looks like you have your tracer and circle spline in the wrong order. The circle should go first. Hope that does it.
Tyler on August 3rd, 2010 said...
Gawww… can’t believe i hadn’t noticed that… especially after starting the tutorial over from scratch on the 3 occasions. Really appreciate the help!
Hey
Just thought I would post a recent project I did using the tracer object. Feedback greatly appreciated
http://www.vimeo.com/14330162
Can anybody help me?
I have the tracer connected to the Fracture Object. I tried to make the trick with NURBS and a little cirlcle as you did, but unfortunately in the moment of connecting the whole stuff to NURBS… I kinda loose my MoDynamics. The elements I have in Fracture Object don’t fly anymore (THEY SHOULD!). How can I make it look alright?: @ Thanks for any help.
Hi Nick..damn..thanks for your tracertut..wanna see what came out by playing around?
can be seen here:
http://vimeo.com/14415279
thx for sharing your knowledge…..
Hey GSG i have a question about this tut “the tracer object”
Can i at the end of vibrate thing turn this shape into the letter? So at the end some copyline is made from this shapes.
TNX a lot and once again great tuts….