dealing with arrays/groups/linked/parented objects

Hi,

I often need to repeat groups of identical objects (a table and 4 chairs for example).
What is the best way to do that and still be able to edit one group and have them all edited at the same time?

Like my post’s title says, I’m confused with all the various options:confused:

Thanks a lot for reading this!
Nicolas

For this, you’ll want to use either linked data or groups.

Arrays will repeatedly duplicate your mesh, based on a its location, rotation, and scale options. This is good for making things that follow a set pattern, but not for moving individual elements.

Groups allow you to instance an object (or group of objects) and have them follow the transformation of an empty object. You can move the empty to change where the instance will be, but you must go back to the original to make any changes.

You can use linked data to tell several objects that you want to use the same mesh between them. If you edit any one of these, they will all reflect the changes.

You could use the array modifier with a curve and duplifaces.

Attachments

T&C.blend (449 KB)

HI,

Thanks both for your help!

I’m still not getting where I want to though… Blender is really powerful but it takes some time to get used to it (I’m a Sketchup user initially…).

dan-r:

  • I understand the array modifier quite well. I understand that you can also add a curve modifier to have the array following a path for example. This is only valid for unique objects. And the array modifier cannot be applied to lamps.

  • I’m not sure to understand this however :“Groups allow you to instance an object (or group of objects) and have them follow the transformation of an empty object. You can move the empty to change where the instance will be, but you must go back to the original to make any changes.”:confused: Do you mean dupligroups?

  • I understand the notion of mesh data: when 2 objects share the same mesh data, they have the same shape.
    But this is only valid for unique objects.

When I want to duplicate a group of objects, I must
1- right-click on an object from the group,
2- SHIFT-G/select group,
3- ALT-D/position the group.

Is that correct?

DCBloodHound:
I can see the potential of this technique but it seems to apply to one object only.
How does it work exactly? You selected the chair and then the path, CTRL-P set parent to object and then… Then I think I’m lost… :o

I’m sorry to have you take so much time for this… It just doesn’t click for me right now…

It’s basically just dupliframes.

There are plenty of tutorials on how it works,you basically just parent one object to another and then enable dupliframes on the parent.It’s usually used with the array modifier and curves (since putting a normal object on a curve would deform it,the parent object acts like a kind of medium to prevent any deformation)

Here 2 examples on how it can be used.

Just ignore the empty,i wanted to do something else with it…

Attachments

Dumpliframes.blend (466 KB)

I recommend Group Instancies (Shift+A>Group instance>Group) with Follow path array addon.

For this you can use group instances, here’s the workflow:

-Select all the object you want to repeat.
-Press CTRL+G to create a group and name it
-Now, in another layer press ALT+A and the last option will be Group Instances, go there and select your group.

Now you can place and rotate the Instance of that group in any way you want, decreasing drastically the use of memory compared to normal duplication. If you edit the original group (not an instance) all the instances will be modified.

Another way to do this is by using ALT+D, that create an instance of the selected object:

-Select the object
-Press ALT+D
-Place it wherever you want

With this method on every instance you can go in edit mode and modify all the instances at the same time, but you will have an instance for every object selected.

If you need more help just ask :slight_smile:

I’m getting somewhere with dupliframes I think. Thanks for your help.

But still, I find it difficult to visualize the relationship between parent and children.
Apart from the dotted line in the 3d view and the outliner panel, is there another place where parenting and/or linking is mentioned?

The Follow path array addon seems to work with instance groups but Blender crashed every time I increased the number of instances. :frowning:

Follow path array panel version 0.2 works with official Blender 2.72b 64bit Win7 64bit.
You can see parenting, Properties >object > relations > parent.

Attachments