Solving the Pivot problem in Unity

Ever since I started using Unity, I’ve noticed people are frustrated that they can’t move around the pivot of their game objects from within the Unity Editor. Users have to use a 3d modeling application to change the pivot of their models and re-import them into Unity. Unity makes re-importing relatively pain-free but with a game engine so intuitive and easy-to-use, I sort of expected Unity Technologies to solve this problem a while ago.

Being able to extend the functionality of the Editor through Editor Scripts is one of the features I love the most about Unity. And now there is one more reason to adore it; it enabled me to fix this Pivot problem.

SetPivot.cs – view - download

If you want to give it a try, you’ll need to create an Editor folder under Assets (Project View) and place the script there. Once Unity is done compiling (should only take 2-3 seconds), you will see the Set Pivot menu item under the GameObject menu. If you have Unity 2.5+, you might want to dock the SetPivot window somewhere to keep it visible while playing with several objects.

There are a couple limitations with this initial version. As of now:

You can only move the pivot inside the bounds (aka bounding box) of the mesh. It should take little modification to change this though.
Pivot movement doesn’t work well with objects that have been rotated. Remember to move the pivot when the object has zero rotation on all three axes.

I intend to keep improving this script so if you have suggestions, send me a PM on the Unity forums. My forum name is VoxelBoy.

Unity Forum post – view

Unify Community Wiki page – view

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You’re currently reading “Solving the Pivot problem in Unity,” an entry on Solve the System

Published:: January 15, 2010 / 8:58 pm

Category:: Uncategorized

Tags:: Unity

About

Yilmaz Kiymaz is a Technical Artist with a passion for cinematic and colorful experiences in games. He likes teaching, experimentation, and referring to himself in third-person.

Here’s how you contact me: Take my full name, Yilmaz Kiymaz, take out all vowels and whitespace, slap a gmail at the end of it and compose away.

Chris 3.30.10 / 3pm

Thanks for posting such a useful script! It will save me a lot of headaches going back and forth.

VoxelBoy 4.6.10 / 5pm

You’re welcome Chris. I’m glad it helps.

iMugen 6.1.10 / 3pm

Hi Chris,

Could you provide clarify for this novice, how to setup the folder for the script? Under the project view, do I create a new folder somewhere? I don’t see “assets” in my project pane. (I do see Standard Assets) I tried just dragging the file into a folder I created in my projects Assets folder, but that didnt seem to work. Any help?

VoxelBoy 6.1.10 / 3pm

You’re right, there is no Assets folder in the Project Pane. But what you’re seeing in the Project Pane is the contents of the Assets folder inside your Project folder. Here is the easiest way to go about it. In Unity, in the Project Pane, create a new folder named Editor and place the script in that folder. That’ll do the trick.

iMugen 6.1.10 / 5pm

Ah. I did that- New Folder in project pane, named Editor, dragged file from downloads folder to newly created folder in project pane. The file is there but nothing new showed up under GameObject tab. I’m on a MAC, would that present a problem? Closed the editor- didnt help.
Thank you for your response be the way, it’s really appreciated.

VoxelBoy 6.2.10 / 5am

Make sure the file you put in the Editor folder was not the zip file but the extracted SetPivot.cs file. You should see a Set Pivot item appear at the end of the Game Object menu. If it still doesn’t work for you, let me know and we’ll set up a Skype video call to fix the problem.

iMugen 6.2.10 / 10am

Thanks VB. I don’t think its zipped, I can open the .cs file in unity and see the code fine. I don’t see what I am doing wrong. I am man0fwars on Skype, and I’ll be on
’til 2 pm today. Thanks again.

iMugen 6.3.10 / 9am

For anyone having the same problem as I, the problem seems to lie, as discovered by VB, in one of my scripts that was preventing the Pivot.cs script from working. Try setting it up in a new project folder. Good luck, and thanks again VB.

Achilles 6.21.10 / 3am

Thanks for posting such a useful script! It really helped me make a turret for my game pivot in the correct places!

Genus Loci #15 4.2.11 / 7am

[...] script that allows you to change the pivot point from within the editor in Unity here from Solve the [...]

Daniel 5.21.12 / 10pm

Many Thanks

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