Mesh duplication problem

Technical Support Basics & Interface
1

First off, I’m not quite sure wether to post this in general or animation, so I put it here.

I’m a fairly new user of blender, an I have (surprise, surprise) run into a problem. When I make duplicates of a mesh (using SHIFT-D) and give one duplicate a LOC keyframe, all of the copies move to that location. when I try to select one key/strip in the NLA window, all of the other duplicate’s keys get selected as well.

If people could reply to this soo, that would be great, as I have to get this scene done by the end of the weekend.

2

Shft-D in Object mode makes a new Object that is a copy of the other. In Edit mode you are copying geometry within the same object.

Not sure if this answers your NLA question or not.

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3

I understand that much, (I was in object mode when I made the duplicates).
Unfortunately, I’m not sure how to rephrase the problem, or explain it better.

4

Could you please upload the file or send it to me (dotdotdashh@yahoo.com) and I’ll take a look.

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5

Do you have the “ipo” button in the “duplicate with object” area of the user prefs on? If so this could be you problem.

GreyBeard

6

I just discovered that I don’t have to give any IPO data to my objects, but if I change the frame number, all of the duplicates move to where the original is. However, if I give a keyframe to a duplicate, all the copies move there instead. (did that make any sense?)

7

Here’s what I think happened:

  • You created your orginal object.
  • You (accidentally) added an IPO loc key to it.
  • You duplicated the object using SHIFT-D

Now you have several unique objects, but they all share the same IPO information. Once you change frame they read the IPO information and move to the correct place. Since they’re all reading the same IPO, they will all move to the same place.

If you now set a loc IPO for one of the duplicates, the following happens:

  • the duplicate already has a loc IPO
  • the values of the loc IPO will be altered
  • remember that the other objects are also reading information from this IPO
  • on a frame change, they will all move to location specified in the IPO

To solve this remove the IPOs from the duplicates:

  • select a duplicate
  • go to the Ipo Curve Editor
  • delete link to the IP datablock
  • repeat for the other duplicates

or:

  • delete all duplicates
  • select the original object
  • go to the Ipo Curve Editor
  • select all curves (A-key)
  • delete them (X-key)
  • duplicate your original object
8

I think that you are right, Ijust noticed that both spaceships share the same datablock in the IPO view. Thanks!