tubular objects:  A chain quick built and very optimized
Tutorial part
To build this chain you'll need Rhino3D and 3DS MAX 2.x. 

The objective is to make the model with Rhino, all the great 2D stuff will make you able to make this quickly and easily.  

Because there aren't  any polygon or meshes in this stuff and with the great new features of MAX, rendering this will be very quick. The viewport manipulations will also be boosted up. 

Such tubular objects aren't a problem anymore.
The final pic
 
Modeling of the chain with nurbs curves
 
Arcs and lines 
 1 - Run rhino before to strat the draw activate the snap to the grid with "S" + Enter. 
Just draw two 90° arcs joinned with two line. 

- Please follow the next instructions if you don't want to met trouble in the final rendering. 
 
 
Join and Elmo 
 2 - Select all the curves and join them with the "Join"  command. 

- Now we need to really join it, I mean it can't be exploded back into 4 curves. 
- On the other hand that will improve the shape a bit and make it more realist. 

To do this stuff we're goin to modify the curve construction,  
- so just select the joinned curves and Elmoize it with "Elmo" 
In this case this curve reparametrization propose you 10 points with degree 3 if not set it as this. 
The pic beside show the 4 curves and the final Elmoized curve.
 Curve rotation 
 3 - Now you just have to really build the chain. 

- Copy some parts with "Copy" and rotate them to make a not regulard organization, you must think about the final aspect of the chain. 
In reallity a chain organisation isn't regulard at all, but you can get nice result if you just rotate a few of them. 

Be sure to never intersect anypart and don't forget each curve will have a thickness. 

 
Finished chain
  4 - When you've made a few chain's links you can copy and rotate some group again, this way the whole chain won't be regular. 

Here is my chain in the pic beside. 

5 - Now export the file and import it in MAX.   

Export/Import  tutorial  here
Renaud DELCUZE ©Alliance Production 1999       Rhino/Max 3D House
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