Byron,
You’re interpreting this correctly. I’m guessing that you’ve moved the pivot
for a particular rotation behavior now you want that pivot to zero to another
object. But when you zero object translation its not moving the pivot (and
object) to align the pivot to its parent. This is normal. Maya pivots do not
have a 1:1 relationship to the way Softimage works.
Pivots in Maya are typically used for scale and rotation adjustment. Unlike
Soft which also includes position. However, it’s just easier to “ignore” the
pivot altogether and create a hierarchy from nulls. Use this hierarchy to
manage your articulations and respective locations. For example:
Make a new null for every position/pivot offset you need. Leave the actual
pivots alone. Rely on them to insure zero relativity.
Null_Position
Null_position_offset
Null_Rotate
Null_whatever
Null_geometry
Reposition the relevant nulls to accomplish the articulations that you require.
Place the geometry at the end of the cascade. If you need to make adjustment in
the middle, remove everything after the node you want to adjust, change its
translation, and then put the rest of the hierarchy back under that node.
Unparent becomes your friend. Working from a null hierarchy like this gives you
more control, but is more time consuming and structure intensive. It is also
more reliable upon export. But you will find it easier to work with.
Softimage spoiled us.
--
Joey Ponthieux
LaRC Information Technology Enhanced Services (LITES II)
Science Systems and Applications Inc. (SSAI)
NASA Langley Research Center
__________________________________________________
Opinions stated here-in are strictly those of the author and do not
represent the opinions of NASA or any other party.
From: [email protected]
[mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Byron Nash
Sent: Wednesday, November 04, 2015 9:34 AM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Please explain Maya pivot points to a Softimage thinker
I'm trying to get some objects zero-ed out in Maya but keep running into what I
assume is a paradigm difference between how Maya and Soft handle center points
and transforms. In Soft, I can move the center/pivot and it will change the
transform values. So, I can reset the center to be in the middle of the
geometry and then zero the position to get the object to snap back to the world
center or parent center. In Maya, moving the pivot does not seem to change the
transform of the object when you move the pivot. So I can't then zero the
values and get the objects to return to zero. Sometimes, the object and it's
center are clearly NOT at zero but that's what the values say. There are some
Local Space/World space values in the attribute editor, but I can't figure out
how to get things reset properly.
Any help from a Softimage perspective is appreciated.
