Maya - Duplicate around Object?

CreativeSheep

Typically when duplicating an object it's done in the world center of Maya, so as when you do a CTRL+D the duplicates align and a simple a merge will suffice.

What if you want to duplicate around an object perfectly as I'm trying to do in this scene.  Any suggestions how can this be accomplished ?

Eric Chadwick

This is Maya specific. I added "Maya" to your thread title. Hopefully you'll get more Maya eyeballs this way.
Also, I added a question mark since you're asking a question rather than providing a tip.

oglu

move the pivot of the object....
shortcut D+V+MB
D to activeate pivot moving
V will snap it to an vertex
MB will move the pivot
and than use duplicate special...

CreativeSheep

I have the pivot information, perfect.  

What is the calculations I need so it rotates perfectly around the cylinder ?

Simply going into Duplicate Special, choosing for example, Copy and changing Translation and Rotational values entering in the number of copies and hitting apply doesn't make for a successful duplicate clone around the cylinder

artquest

use quicksymm.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tCJB6WLJJyE

CreativeSheep

The script is beneficial but how do you do it with duplicate special and the right math ?  

seb3d

360 divided by (total) number of objects to be placed. dup. special: enter the result in the rotate field of your choice. number of duplicates = number of desired objects - 1.

kodde

Duplicate with Transform(Shift+D) is also really useful. You can usually get away with using it instead of Duplicate Special. Still with same accuracy and underlying math.

CreativeSheep

That is exactly what I was doing, 360/5 which gives 72 and entering that into one of the rotation fields in the duplicate special options.  I tried all three rotation fields and the results were far from what I wanted, in all cases, the geometry which is suppose to duplicate around the cylinder, duplicated,not around the cylinder but in all sorts of rotation in the scene ? Duplicate with transform has no options, all it does is duplicate the object in the original location as the geometry it is duplicating from, or so it did in my case.

seb3d

1. it works perfectly fine but for sure it rotates around the pivot and is not able to read your mind. so before any duplication set your pivot accordingly as oglu already said.
2. duplicate with transform aka shift+d as kodde mentioned works as well. place your first object and pivot > shift+d> enter 72 i.e. in the rotate y > shift+d again. the next duplicate will have added another 72 degree rotation to it´s transform.

CreativeSheep

I know about the pivot, I've done that already.  Forget the pivot step from things, you think I haven't done.

I want to calculate how many duplicates I need, based on the correct distance between each duplicate so it's aligned as I want, then and have those duplicates created all at once, not shift+d to create the duplicates one after another, if this is all even possible ?

seb3d

you got 3 solutions already:
1. duplicate special
2. duplicate with transform
3. quick symm

also i explained how to calculate the amount of rotation to create an even radial distribution  so yes obviously it´s something wrong on your side.

CreativeSheep

I forgot to freeze transformations, my apologies.