3D Max Animation / rotation help wanted

Hi, i'm messing around with this .max model and have managed to work out finally how to do some basic things to export to Flash. Problem is, is that i'm trying to animate the object to spin 360 degrees between frame 0-30.

The animation works, but some objects in the model just don't rotate like others. i.e. they don't seem to be considered part of the whole model/ scene, even though i've grouped them together! The model basically ends up looking like it's exploding apart during the animation!

Basically i'm just putting a keyframe at frame 15 to rotate 180 degrees and then another at frame 30 to rotate 360 degrees by right clicking on the rotate button and entering the values accordingly.

Could anyone give me a clue how i can get the model to act as one big model on the same axis, rather than individual objects on their own axis, that seem to be independent of each other?

Thanks in advance

SAM

I am a Maya user, I have Max but just started using it not more than a few months ago. It looks to me you need to select the parent object and that will serve as your center point. At least thats how it works in Maya, I just looked at the book for Max and it says you sould be able to just group and animate the group. Dont know dude, you might want to post this in the Max room at http://www.popedeflash.com I think you will get the answer your looking for Regards, Bill

delete all the animation in track view

link all objects to a dummy which should be at the centre of your required rotation

rotate dummy only as required

check the animation controller is "euler XYZ" (top left of track view)- this allows simple "degree" rotations - the default controller is smoother but does weird things if you just want a simple spin and return for instance

I may have the controller names wrong as I use max 2.5 and I believe something has been changed in 4 - check the manual

Is this animation to be imported into Swift?
If so make sure you don't have any mirrored objects (swift doesn't animate mirrored objects correctly.

If not:

In max just pay attention to pivot points. You can move the pivots to the position you want. By grouping all your objects, the pivot should simply place itself to the dead-center of the group. Once grouped, go into Track view and do all your animation from there. Locate the track for the group and place your keyframes accordingly. This should work just fine.

Hi, create keyframe 1 at 0 degrees

create keyframe 30 with a rotation of 360

no need for keyframe at frame 15

you can edit the centre point (the axis the object moves around) may be thats the problem??

is there a link to this??

good luck
b.p