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altruizine
03-14-2003, 05:19 AM
I recently created several instances of a group and placed them around the scene. I then wanted to alter that group and have that alteration propogate through the instances... Is there a way to do that?

I had a top node (gray) w/ several purple nodes below in the hypergraph... is it possible to add in a new object and have it be added to the instances? By dragging to the top node, it would not propogate thru. I eventually dragged it to one of the purple nodes where it got childed and propogated thru.

I feel that is rather gross fix to my problem tho. Is there something a bit more true/graceful to do what I'm asking?

Thanks.

JF
mark_wilkins
03-14-2003, 06:15 AM
when you instance an object with a transform at the top of the hierarchy (usually I do it using the duplicate command with the instance option set) it makes a second top transform node and places all of the children of the first transform node under the second transform node.

So, if you parent something directly to one of those two top transform nodes, you don't get a duplicate of that thing because there's only one path to that object through the hierarchy. If you parent it under one of the nodes that have been instanced (meaning parented to two transform nodes) then you DO get a duplicate, because there are two paths to that object through the hierarchy.

Make sense?

-- Mark
altruizine
03-14-2003, 04:04 PM
well, that's what had happened. I was just wondering if it was possible to "expand" the instanced object to include others w/out doing that (parenting to an object underneath)

Reading you book right now, by the way... Loving it! :buttrock:
mark_wilkins
03-14-2003, 04:57 PM
I guess the distinction (and it's a real one) is that it's the objects parented under the top node that are "instanced," and all that means is that they're parented under two different transforms at once. There's nothing special about that top node that would make Maya treat it any differently.

And thanks for the kind words on the book!!

-- Mark
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