Imported assets lose pivot point

When I export an asset the pivot point is centered, but when imported into UE the pivot point is sometimes so far away it is difficult to move, scale, and rotate accurately. Is there something in UE to compensate for this.

thanks,

1 Like

UE4 does not use the pivots of the mesh itself from the FBX import. It will use the world origin (0,0,0) for itā€™s pivot. Itā€™s necessary, at the moment, to move the mesh to the world origin before exporting. The request has been entered for the FBX to honor the meshes original pivot on import, but there hasnā€™t been any word on when/if this will be implemented.

This a really anoying issue and cost a lot of time. We try to use Unreal as a simulation environment to visualize complex kinematic behaviour of the machines and plants we are building up in our company. So far we are using Unity coupled with the real PLCs and our logic simulation. Unity does not touch the pivot points so we can quite simple modify the pivots inside 3DS Max with high accuracy. This workflow also works for other Simulation environments we are using cause all of theses programs are never touching the pivot points.
Can you explain the necessity to put the pivot to the origin? I canā€™t image that someone is convinced this could be a useful feature of a production pipeline. This is rather a bugfix than a featurerequest.

btw
are there any news regarding the ā€œfeatureā€ one year later?

1 Like

This seems like a ā€˜no-brainerā€™, not some casual, arbitrary request. If Unity can technically leave an objectā€™s pivot points in-tack, why for heavenā€™s sake would this not be possible in UE4?

3 Likes

Hey together,

faced the same problem and found out that you can maintain the original pivot.

You just have to either use ā€œImport Into Levelā€ from the file menu or UNCHECK the ā€œTransform Vertex to Absoluteā€ checkbox in the import window. The first method will actually also place the objects into the level at the right positions. the second method is doing the ā€œzero-outā€ step which you would do in your 3D software but also keeps the pivot at the right position.

1 Like

Why hasnā€™t this been implemented yet!? 4 years laterā€¦

Some plugins exist (Datasmith : Installing the Datasmith Exporter Plugin for 3ds Max | Unreal Engine Documentation)

Thanks!

Has this been implemented yet? 7 years laterā€¦