KeyShot Forum

Technical discussions => Animation => Topic started by: theAVator on August 25, 2017, 12:56:48 PM

Title: Translating along a custom axis? Updated in KS7?
Post by: theAVator on August 25, 2017, 12:56:48 PM
I need to translate a series of bolts along their axis' in an animation. Problem is, the bolts are at a skewed angle - not aligned with a primary axis.

Right now, I sorta have it done, but since there is no way to pick the axis of an object to translate along its a bit tedious. To get it right you have to take each object, translate it out using the position move tool until you're happy with its position, copy down those coordinates, translate it back to its original position, pick your translation animation, enter the values you copied from the prior move, and hopefully it looks the same.

It would be really nice if you had just the same picker tool as the rotation animation and then you would just need to enter a numerical distance from its position along the picked axis. 

Does anyone know if this has been added in KS7?
If not, can it? Seems like a great and easy tool to make animation setup easier, not to mention provide some consistency between the animation  tools.
Title: Re: Translating along a custom axis? Updated in KS7?
Post by: guest84672 on August 25, 2017, 02:02:07 PM
This can be done - and was always possible - by setting the "Axis Orientation" to "Original Local" for the part you are trying to animate.

Do this for one bolt, i.e. set up the translation animation. Then copy and paste the animation to the other bolt, selecting "paste and link animation".

This is what I did in the attached image. I hope this helps.
Title: Re: Translating along a custom axis? Updated in KS7?
Post by: Will Gibbons on September 05, 2017, 09:15:06 AM
It should be mentioned that the parts being translated along a local axis need to actually contain a set of local axis. In CAD terms, this means they need to be modeled as a part, then inserted into an assembly. If you model a multi-body part and bring it into KeyShot, it won't work.