Animating a Cable

[boarslight]

I'm working on an animation right now where I need to have a computer mouse jump into the air.

I'm having trouble right now with the cable, and how to set it up. I need the cable to follow the mouse as it jumps...and the part of the cable that is by the computer needs to be still.

Any ideas?

[Korvar]

You should be able to use the technique here:

ftp://ftp.newtek.com/multimedia/movies/w3dw/hose.mov

From the Great Thread Of Video Tutorials (http://www.newtek.com/forums/showthread.php?t=77002).

[boarslight]

I think that's going to work perfectly. I guess I didn't do a very good job at searching before I posted!!

Thanks a bunch for the link.

[cagey5]

Here's something similar I did ages back as a learning exercise.
http://www.mediafire.com/?2x5xlnnqmmg [750k]

[boarslight]

Well, I'm back at it. I now have to animate this same cable growing out of the mouse, have it swirl up by the camera as though it's flapping in the wind, and then have it land in a particular position. Since it has to land in a certain position, I don't THINK that the cloth FX will work...could be wrong though. The camera will be looking down on it, as it is part of a logo.

From that description, an anyone think of anything that will give me a natural looking motion? IK boost seemed too erratic to be effective. Again, it could be because of my lack of experience with that tool.

[munky]

Hi,

you might find something of use in this thread.

http://www.newtek.com/forums/showthread.php?t=56473&highlight=leash

regards

Paul

[boarslight]

thanks man. I'll take a look. I've been working with standard ol' FK, and that's doing a half way decent job. I'll see what else I can get myself into!