9

Wire Parameters 411
of influence that the world target has on the
constrained ob ject as you would any other target
object.
Delete Orientation Target—Remove targets. Once
removing the target, it will no longer influence the
constrained object.
Weigh t—Assigns and animates weight values for
each target.
K eep Initial Offset—Preserves the original
orientation of the constrained object. When you
turn off Keep Initial Offset, the object adjusts itself
to match the orientation of its target or targets.
Default=off.
Tra nsf orm Rule—When an orientation constraint
is applied to an object that is part of a hierarchy,
this determines whether the local node transform
or the parent transform will be used for the
orientation constraint.
Local —–>—Local —When selected, the local node
transform is used for the orientation constraint
World —–>—Wor ld —When selected, the parent or
world transform will be applied, rather than the
local node transform.
Wire Parameters
Select an object. > Animation me nu > Wire Parameters >
Wire Parameters
Select an object. > Right-click quad menu > Transform
(lower-right) qua drant > Wire Parameters
Wire Parameters lets you link parameters from
one object to another in the viewp ort, so that
adjusting one parameter changes the other
automatically. This enables you to set up one- and
two-way connections between specified object
parameters, or to control one or more objects
w ith a dummy object cont aining the desired
parameters. By wiring parameters, you c an set up
custom constraints directly without having to go
to Track View and assign controllers.
Parameter wiring is accessible from the Animation
menu and the quad menus (page 3–694) .The
Wire Parameters command is available only if
asinglenodeisselected. ChoosingtheWire
P arameters command displays a hierarchical
pop-up menu with levels and items corresponding
to the animatable tracks that would be visible for
that object in Track View.
When you make a parameter selection, a dashed
line, similar to that displayed in the Select and Link
mode (page 2–422),isdrawnfromtheselected
object to the mouse cursor . The cursor changes
from an arrow to a cross whenever it is over a valid
destination object. You can right-click at a ny time
to cancel the parameter wiring.
While the dashed line is displayed, you can click
a destination node or on empty space in the
viewport to customize the relationship between
two wired parameters. If you click empty space,
the Parameter Wiring dialog (page 2–412) opens
showing t he first parameter in the left Tree View
and the f u ll scene in the right tree. Clicking a
destinationnode(whichcanbethesameasthe
originating node) displays a hierarchical pop-up
menuforthedestinationobjectsoyoucanchoose
the destination parameter. After you choose a
second parameter, the Parameter Wiring dialog
opens.
You can wire one-way and two-way connections
between parameters. For one-way wires, one
parameter is effectively slaved to the other and
itsvaluechangesasthecontrollingparameter
changes, according to a user-defined transfer
expression. The cont rolling p arameter can
be animated and adjusted as needed using all
the anima tion tools in 3ds Max. This includes
making it a controlled parameter in another