Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
FIGURE 10.3
Detach the arms.
The arms are now free for you to work on. (Notice your bonus: The hands are now separ-
ated, too, ready for LOD work later.) Next we will look into the best approach for rotating
the arms.
Rotate the Arms
We want to rotate both the arms the same amount and from the same pivot on either side.
We could adjust the pivot as shown earlier in the topic, snapping it to a vertex close to
where our shoulder pivot would be. This wouldn't be very accurate, though, because the
arm would rotate around the wrong axis. What we want is for the axis to follow the orient-
ation of the arm.
For this purpose we will use a
locator
, which is a very simple dummy object that takes the
shape of a cross. Locators have many uses: They can pinpoint positions in space; they can
be used as a main controller; or, as in this case, they can be used to drive the rotation of a
series of objects.
We will position a locator where the shoulder pivot is, and parent the arm and hand to it.
When the locator is rotated, the arm will rotate correctly.
1.
Create a locator by going to Create > Locator. Then move it up to the correct posi-
tion over the shoulder's pivot point (
Figure 10.4a
).
