From the course: 3ds Max 2026 Essential Training

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Understanding hierarchies

Understanding hierarchies - 3ds Max Tutorial

From the course: 3ds Max 2026 Essential Training

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Understanding hierarchies

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- [Instructor] Before diving into animation essentials, we'll first learn about setting up a transform hierarchy or a network of links whereby we can pose or animate a character or any mechanical system. In this example, I've got a friendly artist mannequin already set up with a hierarchy or a system of parent child links. And in this simple example, I'm linking the objects directly rather than using helper objects such as bones. If I select an individual object such as a shoulder and transform it, the other body parts of the arm will follow. I can go to the rotate tool and rotate that shoulder in any direction and the other part of the arm follow. There's a linkage or a hierarchy among the objects in the scene, and the shoulder object is the parent of the elbow object, and the elbow is in turn the parent of this wrist object. Okay, I'll undo those rotations with Ctrl+Z, just go back through the history. There are two basic rules about hierarchies. The first is that children inherit…

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