How do you preserve pivot points after merging multiple objects?

Turbopasta

Hey, pretty simple question for you guys. I currently have an object with 8 polygon planes inside which are set up to mimic the way a camera aperture functions. I can animate it as it is now, but I need to rotate the thing while preserving the pivot points of the 8 polygons inside. It's important that these things move flat on the object, so that they only move on the object's x-axis, but I don't know how to keep the pivot points intact when merging multiple objects together like this. I tried to manually reset them after merging and moving, but I can't get it precise enough by hand.

Right now the object is currently in separate pieces, so I still have the geometry and pivot information intact.

Actually I might have phrased the question wrong. I basically need these 8 objects to move on 8 unique axis' after merging them together.

Any help is appreciated, thanks!

Bartalon

You didn't specify what software you are using so I will give an answer relating to Maya:

An object can only have 1 pivot location for transformations, so merging eight pieces together will result in a single object and a single pivot point. If you want a single object and 8 moving pieces, you will need to rig the object with joints and animate those instead.

Turbopasta

yeah, its in maya, my bad. Thanks for the answer, I'm not very good at rigging yet so I guess I'll start scouring youtube for some good tutorials, thanks.

Harbinger

No need for a rig with joints, you just need a hierarchy of some type. Try simply grouping your aperture blades. Transform the group node (parent) to adjust the whole assembly, and use local space transformations on the individual blades.

Turbopasta

Harbinger wrote: »

No need for a rig with joints, you just need a hierarchy of some type. Try simply grouping your aperture blades. Transform the group node (parent) to adjust the whole assembly, and use local space transformations on the individual blades.

well, that was certainly a simple fix. Guess all I needed to do was parent it. Thanks man!