Is it possible to change the axis location?

[tunghoy]

In X3D, objects seem to spin only around their center, like a top, regardless of which axis they're spinning on. Is there a way to change the location of an axis so that the object spins off-center? Think of a swinging door: the axis is on the side, so the door swings around one side only, it doesn't spin around its center.

[simsmj]

Welcome to the forum, Tunghoy. X3D does spin objects either around the centre of each object (Rotate2), or around the common centre of all the objects (Rotate1). But you can shift the axis of spin of an object by typing space characters to one side or the other, for example, Carriage Returns above or below it. The spin axis is still the centre of the line, but object is now off to one side.

Another trick that works in some circumstances is to create your object along with a tiny dot off to one side. You can hide the dot part by making it black against a black background, so only the main object is visible. Whether this works depends on what else you may be doing in X3D.

I frequently use sizing pixels in many of my animations. Essentially this means adding a pixel-sized dot at top left and bottom right of your main shape. The purpose of this is o keep all objects the same overall size in Xara3D, but you can use it here to ensure that the position of your shape is off the axis of the two dots. When you export your final image you can crop off the sizing pixels during the export.

Mike

[tunghoy]

Hi Mike, thanks for your response. I already tried using extra spacing to offset horizontal spin, but I didn't like the way it came out. The software also seemed to have a limit of how many extra space characters I could add. I'll try using your extra pixel trick, though. Thanks. Hopefully, true axis control will be added in a future version.