Ik Handles Locks Rotation

[animayator]

Hy,

i created an roboterarm with 3 Joints. At the end of the arm, I placed a double shovel, which can grab for something.

like this:
.......................................
..................___................
................./ ....................
_______*......................
.................\ ___...............
.......................................
* : joint
. : dont care
_ : arm bone

But when i used Ik handles from the first to the third joint, I can not rotate my shovels Do anybody has an idea???
I have parented the arm parts, can it be due with the parenting?
Please help me...

[laz84]

Hey Aninmayator. Nice name by the way. I cant seem to replicate your problem. The joint your ik handle ends at, should indeed be able to rotate. But what you could try is a parent/child joint relationship. That is where two joints sit on top of each other. There is nothing wrong with this. Actually I use it quite frequently. Basically what you would do, is end the ik handle at the parent joint and rotate the rest of the chain with the child joint sitting on the same spot.

[animayator]

Thanks for the reply. Your are right I can rotate the Joint, but this do not lead to a satisfied result, because the geometry of the shovels change(the shovel became bigger and smaller). I only want rotate the shovels, but when I select them the rotate cursor is grey and I can not change rotation. Remember I binded the geometry of the robotarm with the skeleton. perhaps it can be due with this...

[laz84]

Can you just parent (or parent constrain) the geometry to the joints? that would be a much better way to do a robot arm. not only is it faster but you also wont have the pinching problem your getting. Ofcourse this would only work if your model was in seperate parts.