Pivot Animator allows you to join figures together so that figures can be positioned as if they were a single figure. The figure joining feature can be used for many different reasons, such as letting a stickman hold an object or creating complex backgrounds that are easier to move as a single object.
Joining a stickman and horse figure so that they move together
The horse was first edited to add a new handle at the top of the back
Figures can be joined together recursively in chains or a tree structure, but not so that they form a loop. Multiple figures can be joined to a single handle.
Figures are joined together in a tree structure in a similar way to the segments in a figure. If two unjoined figures are joined, then the one that was selected and joined is above the other in the tree structure. The one it was joined to is not joined but has a figure joined to it and is therefore at the base of the tree.
Joining and Unjoining
The join button can be found in the
figure controls and is enabled only when a single figure is selected. If the figure is not currently joined then the button will display a white handle. To join the figure to another, click the button and all the handles that the figure is allowed to join to will turn white (static segments will also be shown). Click any of the white handles to join the figure such that its origin point joins to the clicked handle. The figure will then move to its joined position and the handle at the join will be white to indicate that it is joined.
To unjoin a figure, firstly select a joined figure. The join / unjoin button will then show a red and orange pair of handles. Click the button and the figures will no longer be joined and can then be moved independently.
Edit Mode or the R key can be used when selecting the handle to join to so that only the origin joint of the figure being joined will move. This means that the rest of the figure will stay where it was, which can be useful in certain situations.
Positioning Joined figures
Once joined, the segments of joined figures will move as if they were a single figure when rotated. A figure joined to a rotated segment will therefore also rotate and move such that its origin is positioned at the point it's joined to.
When using the Alt key to rotate and scale a figure, all figures joined to that figure, that are above it in the tree structure, will also rotate and scale. However, the opposite is not true - if a joined figure is rotated and scaled using the Alt key, then the figure it is joined to, which is below it in the tree, will not be scaled or rotated. If you want to scale and rotate a whole connected group of figures, then make sure you drag a red handle in the figure at the base of the tree structure that all other figures attach to.
The scale control in the
figure controls will scale only the selected figure or figures and not any figures joined to it.
Moving the Figure Origin
A join can only be made between the orange origin handle of the figure being joined and a segment or origin handle of another figure.
If you wish to join figures at two red segment handles then you must create a new figure type by editing one of the figures in the
figure builder and using the origin tool to move the origin point to a different handle.
Selecting Joined Figures
Joined figures can be selected in the normal way as described on the
Multi-Figure Selection section. However, you can also
double click a figure and all figures joined to it will become selected. Double click the figure at the base of the tree to select the whole group of joined figures. This can be useful if there are many other figures on the editing canvas.
Combining Joined Figures into a Single Figure
Joined figures can be combined into a single figure by clicking '
Edit Joined Figures' in the Edit menu after selecting at least one of the joined figures. All figures in that joined group will appear in the
Figure Builder in their current pose, from where they can be added to the animation or saved as a single
STK file. This is useful for converting multi-coloured figures made in Pivot v4 into a single easily sharable STK file
.
