Ok... I've done some very basic animation with Carrara... collision detection, bouncing, rotating, etc. but now I'm in over my head.

I need to create a string/cord that follows (is tied to) an object that goes through a hole in the floor, pulls the string after it, and emerges from another hole in the floor, still dragging the string behind. The back end of the string needs to not go through the holes (it is a long string).

First problem... there doesn't seem to be any way I can think of to create anything remotely like a string. A string that is flexible - that bends and flows as it follows the thing it is tied to. It of course has to collide with the floor and go through the holes (not pass through the floor).

So... whaddaya think?

Is there another place to post these sort of questions?

Any ideas would be helpful.

Thanks loads,
Nate

I might be mistaken, but that sounds like a fluid flow problem. Unfortunately not something Carrara can do easily. It's the same kind of problem as having a furry ball bounce up and down and have the hair lag behind (as long hair would tend to do). Your only recourse in Carrara is to keyframe the entire thing, unless there's a plugin out there for it. Now if you could somehow model a very long chain with very small links in it, then it might appear to be a string...

I think you're right.
I will probably animate everything else and see if I can add the string by hand... fortunately it will be a short animation. (I guess Disney did it this way, but he had minions, and I am but one.)

Tried that animated hair stuff when Poser 5 first came out and it wound up looking like a bunch of spastic fried worms. Haven't tried the latest patches to see if they worked that out yet, but I don't think it (Poser) would help in this scenario.

I'm a complete amateur with animation, but had a couple of thoughts about this anyway :) Is the viewpoint from above the floor all the time? If so............could you animate it by making the string as a very long narrow cylinder, keyframe the movement of the leading object, once it's disappeared through the hole you can start chopping off segments from the end of the 'string' and wobbling it a bit to make it look like it's moving. Does any of that make sense? The object that re-appears through the floor needn't be the same object that goes down the hole in the first place, could be a duplicate with a short string trailing, maybe easier to manipulate. Uhmmmmmmmm - can I explain what I mean a bit more clearly. Object #1 with long tail goes down the hole, once it's out of sight it can stop moving, and the string gets the end bits chopped off gradually the whole way through the animation, to simulate movement. At a certain point Object #2 re-appears trailing short length of string. Probably a daft idea, but it might throw up some workable ideas from someone else.

Maybe something invisible (not rendered in each frame) can be put in the string that works better with collision detection? www.shonner.com

Thanks for the suggestions. Making the string is the problem. I can make a cylinder. It can have collision detection, but it looks like a lead pipe falling to the floor. I can put bones in the cylinder and it then looks like a lead pipe with crinks in it that I have to physically bend at each joint. That looks dorky and requires key frames which are deleted if I add a (gravity) force to make it fall to the floor. The problems seem to be + Making something flexible that behaves like string falling. + A string made of zillions of little spheres would require individual keyframing and endless adjustments to the individual rotation of all those little spheres by hand. Even then it is problematic to make this look like a string affected by gravity and air. - I could make it wave, but the wave force would have no relationship to the falling motion. it's a real puzzler

This is a funny idea, but what about a movie map of a moving string created in a vector art program...I'd use flash, and you can use the map over a flat plane. The plane is attached to the ball and animates as the ball falls. It may be a trick to have the plane pass through the floor but the string at that time must appear that it does not...just a thought.

I think that ominousplay's idea is probably close to a solution. Perhaps I will do the animation without the string. Make the animation into a series of numbered jpeg frames, open these in Flash and add the string in flash...

It's a lot of handwork, but probably the most "do-able" way to work with what I have.

thanks to all for the good thoughts and inspiration!

Can you make a spline object and animate that? You at least can use the bezier curves instead of using bones or endless linked segments...

Well, I'm no guru, but I'd also suggest Dave's idea above. Try to make the string in the spline modeler and animate the location of a bezier control point along the 'string' so that the bend moves from one end to the other. Then have the spline object move in the assembly room so that the bend's location stays in contact with the edge of the hole. This is just off the top of my head, so I haven't tried it.