HELP: Need Help with Mirroring in Maya

AsherOS

I am making a vehicle model for my project at Gnomon, and I don't know how to mirror an object so that it is flipped and has the the opposite translations so that it is on the other side of the axis of my choosing. I hope this makes sense. If you need a picture/diagram, then tell me.

Any help is much appreciated.

Minos

If you are talking about Symmetry then this might help: http://www.google.com/search?q=symmetry+maya&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t

I thought they taught this at Gnomon? :poly111:

AsherOS

well, not in the Intro to Maya Class apparently. I'm not in the full 3 year program.

Spudnik

If I understand you correctly, you want to check out the "Duplicate Special" (Edit - Duplicate Special). If you go into the option box, you can chose between making the duplicate a real object or an Instance of the object that basically mirrors not only the geometry but also any changes done to the original. If you look a little bit further down in the option box for the "Duplicate Special" you can set transforms that are applied to the duplicate so you can model something and then put a negative scale in the duplicate options and it will be mirrored across whichever axis you put the negative scale.

Hope that's what you're looking for.

fade1

i didn't really get your problem. but i found mirroring objects quite complicted compared to 3dsmax. so i wrote a script to make it a little easier:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/132816/mirrorObjects.mel
source it and run mirrorObjects command and you have a bunch of options plus it solves some problems with flipped normals.

AsherOS

Thanks for the help guys. I'll try both of those out.

CheeseOnToast

It's pretty simple. Select your object, freeze transforms then move the pivot to the centre axis. Then hit Ctrl+D to duplicate it. With the duplicate selected, look in the channel box and change Scale X to -1.

Be warned, when you freeze transforms on this new object, it'll have flipped normals.

AsherOS

hmm, seems like there are many ways to do what I'm asking. I'll have to experiment to see what the advantages of each are. Thanks for the advice, CheeseOnToast.

nightshade

if its a mesh, why not use the mirror geo tool? its under the mesh menu all the way at the bottom. click the box for options.
if you do the duplicate with special make sure you make it an instance so that it mirrors any edits you do to one side the mesh.

AsherOS

That doesn't work, because by default, maya mirrors it on one end of the mesh, not by the axis.

claydough

cly_pivotReflectionModeling.mel "link"
is my mirroring solution for maya that along with Maya's transform tool reflection options allows for an auto-mirror workflow.

I was using instances as well @ first but there r a few issues ( distracting hard origin seam, freeze transforms may require additional hack to solve fer unpredictable results )

sirenblue

Edit: Craap. Basically, what nightshade and others said. I should start reading things through first!!!

Edit x2: Maybe a diagram of your problem would help, no matter how simple the problem might seem.

CheeseOnToast wrote: »

It's pretty simple. Select your object, freeze transforms then move the pivot to the centre axis. Then hit Ctrl+D to duplicate it. With the duplicate selected, look in the channel box and change Scale X to -1.

Be warned, when you freeze transforms on this new object, it'll have flipped normals.

Go Edit > Duplicate Special > (square box)

When the options come up, check instance, and scale to x = -1

There, instanced-mirrored modelling!

Two things to note for this alternative:

• Do not freeze transformations anymore after "Duplicating Special". If there is a need for that, delete the mirrored instance and freeze and re-duplicate.
• When you're finished with the model and want to combine both, just select both sides, go Mesh > Combine, and delete history. (Optional Edit Mesh > Merge).

nightshade

the problem is he wants to mirror from where the pivot is, not where the actual edge of the mesh is on a given axis. i think i did once but i cant remember how. i'll play around with it today

nightshade

use mirror cut, it does what you want.i gives you a gizmo of sorts that will mirror the mesh from a certain point.
mesh>mirror cut>(box)

AsherOS

HaHaHa! well, the thing is. I don't know how to use mirror cut. do you just hit enter? whenever I attempt to use that tool, I get the little plane (I assume that is where it will mirror from), and then I don't know what I'm doing or what I need to do. I realize this is probably kinda pathetic, but you gotta start somewhere

nightshade

drag the plane around and then delete history to make the plane to go away, or you can just leave it till your done modelling