object center orientation

[Eric Lampi]

I'm not sure how to accomplish this, I am drawing a blank at the moment...

A modeler build a globe and cut up the continents into little pieces, the orientation needs to point toward the center of the globe so they can animate out on a local y axis. Is there any way to globally make the center axis to point towards a null or to global 0 without moving the individual objects? The geo is properly oriented, but the center points are all at the same default rotation.

Eric

--
Freelance 3D and VFX animator

[Alan Fregtman]

Press "Center" in the top right, translate/rotate/scale as desired, then press "Object" again? Or did I miss something?

[Eric Lampi]

It's a globe, and all the rotations of these pieces are pointing towards global 0 x,y,z, the y axis needs to point outward in relation to the center, much like the normal of all of the polys on a sphere. There are 1000 pieces, so I'm looking for a repeatable function I can loop through at least.

[Sandy Sutherland]

You could try with spacer nulls for each geo - snap to their current POS - then direction constrain them to a null in the center of the globe - parent each geo to it's respective null and freeze transforms - you could do this once and use a quick hacky script to iterate through the remaining ones if they are named with a number.  Once frozen xforms you could unparent if you need to.

S.

_____________________________
Sandy Sutherland
Technical Supervisor
sandy.su...@triggerfish.co.za
_____________________________

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From: softimag...@listproc.autodesk.com [softimag...@listproc.autodesk.com] on behalf of Eric Lampi [eric...@gmail.com]
Sent: 10 September 2012 19:08
To: soft...@listproc.autodesk.com
Subject: object center orientation

[Eric Lampi]

OK cool, thanks for the tip.

I just wanted to make sure I wasn't missing a command or operator that might get me there.

I need some practice scripting anyway, so I'll try to do something using an OM instead.

Eric

[Scott Lange]

Just tried to find a quick solution myself , surprised there isn't an simpler solution.

 

Scott Lange

[Bradley Gabe]

Actually, there *is* a simpler solution. :-)

1. Create a single, target null at origin.
2. Select all the meshes.
3. Envelope to the target null (this locks all the vertices in place).
4. Direction constrain to the target null.
5. Set up vector to scene y.
6. Freeze the meshes.

Done.

[Bradley Gabe]

Apologies to Eric, because once again you can skip having to learn scripting. I should have just left things alone.

[Eric Lampi]

Check out the big brain on Brad...

[Eric Lampi]

Nah, it's actually something I am working on, baby steps. This was just the CG Gods giving me a nudge.

[Matt Lind]

What?  ICE doesn’t solve this out of the box?  

 

Try this:

 

1) Select all globe pieces.

2) MCP > Transform > Move Centers to Vertices

3) Create a null at the center of the globe.

4) Set select filter to “Center”.

5) Apply direction constraint to each globe piece picking null at center of globe as the target.  Choose desired axis, then remove constraint.

5) Make globe pieces child of this null.

 

Animate the null to rotate the globe pieces.

 

 

Matt

 

 

 

 

 

 

From: softimag...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimag...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Eric Lampi
Sent: Monday, September 10, 2012 11:06 AM
To: soft...@listproc.autodesk.com
Subject: Re: object center orientation

 

[Eric Lampi]

There are over 1685 objects with no null parent, they already had a center at vertices.

I was just making sure there wasn't an operation available before I ventured into scripting something, thanks anyway.

[Matt Lind]

I don’t see any reason why you need to script this.  You can do what you need in a couple of clicks in a multi-selection regardless of size.

[David Barosin]

so if I understand you want to have each geo's y-axis point at the origin without effecting the geometry.

You could throw an envelope on all the obects,  apply a direction constraint to a null at the origin then freeze the envelope.