Hi all. My favorite thing about Cinema 4D has got to be the Mograph Cloner object. Combined with one of the Mograph effectors, you CAN do great things…

Step 1:

Create a torus with 6 ring segments and 6 pipe segments.

Step 2:

Make the torus editable, choose face-select, and select two opposite rings along one axis (see pic).

Step 3:

Scale those rings inward.

Step 4:

Duplicate the torus by ctrl+dragging in the object manager, then move and rotate the second link as shown.

Step 5:

Group the objects into a Null-object by selecting both in the object manager and hitting alt+g, then add the Null to a Hypernurbs object by selecting the Null and alt+clicking on the Hypernurbs object in the menu.

Step 6:

Move into the top view and create a spline (I prefer Beizer Splines as I tink its more natural and leaves less points to move when editing).

Hit Space to drop the tool.

Step 7:

Create a Mograph Cloner Object and drop the Hypernurbs into it.

Step 8:

Select the cloner object. In the Attribute manager, under the object tab, change the mode to object. With the cloner object still selected, drag the spline from the object manager to the object field in the attribute manager.

Step 9:

Below where you dragged the spline to, change the mode from “count” to “step” and lower or increase the distance if needed, then change the H rotation in the transform tab to 90 deg (you might need to play with the settings here to get the desired result, but this worked for me).

Step 10:

Zoom in and alter the step distance to get the correct space between clones.

Step 11:

To edit, simply select the spline point and move. Simple as that! You can also alter the spline to any distance, size or shape. The links will still work.

I hope this helps someone, and above all I hope  that you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it…