Pivot & Align Tools

Version 2.5

Pivot & Align Tools (PAT) are a set of macros bundled into a quad menu that allow you to perform various object alignment, pivot alignment and object snapping functions, among others. Most of the functions can operate on a multiple selection of objects at once, including grouped objects as part of the selection (open or closed).

The quad menu is automatically setup for you. It will handle the quad setup for 3ds Max 2025 and beyond, as well as the deprecated menu manager system found in earlier versions of Max.

NOTE: Assign a hotkey to "LBTools - PAT Quad".

Options

Display message boxes when picking objects
If checked, a message box will appear whenever a pick operation is required. This is fine when getting used to the tools, but can be annoying once you understand how they work.
Filter out the selection when picking objects
This option is used to filter out pick operations that don't require the current selection. Try turning this off to to get different effects if a selected object is allowed to be picked.
Use sorted name ordering for N objects alignment
For operations that apply to a series of objects in turn (up to N number), this option will ensure they use object name ordering instead of scene or pick order.
Allow drag placement
When using tools that utilize surfaces, activating this option will enable dragging the objects on the surface for each one in turn instead of just clicking to place them.
Orient to surface normal
When using tools that utilize surfaces, activating this option will make the selection orient to the surface normal of the picked object at the point of mouse click.

Align Tools

Align Axes

X: Aligns a selection to the same X-axis as the picked object.

Y: Aligns a selection to the same Y-axis as the picked object.

Z: Aligns a selection to the same Z-axis as the picked object.

XY: Aligns a selection to the same X-axis and Y-axis (2d plane) as the picked object.

XZ: Aligns a selection to the same X-axis and Z-axis (2d plane) as the picked object.

YZ: Aligns a selection to the same Y-axis and Z-axis (2d plane) as the picked object.

Align Centers

Aligns a selection to a picked object's center.

Align Pivots

Aligns a selection to a picked object for position only.

Align Pivots Orient

Aligns a selection to a picked object for both position and orientation.

Align Selection

These tools behave very similar to 2D vector alignment tools, except here in 3D for any selected axis.

Min: Aligns a selection along the negative chosen axis to the minimum bounding volume of the selection.

Center: Aligns a selection along the chosen axis towards the middle of the bounding volume of the selection.

Max: Aligns a selection along the positive chosen axis to the maximum bounding volume of the selection.

Even: Aligns a selection along the chosen axis so that the two most outer objects are fixed in place and the middle objects are evenly distributed.

Align To Surface

Aligns a selection to the surface of the same picked target object. Allows for placement of multiple selected objects in turn. To place selected objects on the surfaces of different target objects use the Align N Objects > Surface method below.

Options UI: Can use "Allow drag placement". Can use "Orient to surface normal".

Align Max Z

Aligns a selection to a picked object to match its maximum bounding box Z position.

Align Min Z

Aligns a selection to a picked object to match its minimum bounding box Z position.

Align N Objects

These tools allow a selection of objects to be placed one after another using the same or different picked target.

Pivot: Aligns a selection of objects in turn to separately picked object’s position.

Pivot Orient: Aligns a selection of objects in turn to separately picked objects position and orients them to the object's pivot.

Surface: Aligns a selection of objects in turn to the surface of separately picked target objects, or the same object. Options UI: Can use "Allow drag placement". Can use "Orient to surface normal".

Pivot Snap: Enables 3D snaps with pivot mode and aligns a selection of objects in turn to separately picked pivot positions.

Vertex Snap: Enables 3D snaps with vertex mode and aligns a selection of objects in turn to separately picked vertices.

All Tools... Options UI: Can use "Use sorted name ordering for N objects alignment". If this setting is off, the order in the scene (if box selected) or the order picked (if individually selected) will be used.

Align Average Centers

Aligns a selection to the average center position between two other picked objects.

Align Average Pivots

Aligns a selection to the average pivot position between two other picked objects.

Align Pivot Snap

Enables 3D snap with pivot mode and aligns the selection to the first picked object pivot.

Align Vertex Snap

Enables 3D snap with vertex mode and aligns the selection to the first picked vertex.

Align World

For each object in a selection reset the alignment of both the object and its pivot to the world, but does not actually move the pivot.

Pivot Tools

Pivot Toggle

Enables/disables the pivot toggle mode as found in the hierarchy panel.

Pivot Base

Moves the selection pivots to the center of each object and their minimum bounding box Z position.

Pivot Center

Moves the selection pivots to their object centers.

Pivot Move

Min: Moves the selection pivots to their minimum bounding volume along the chosen axis.

Max: Moves the selection pivots to their maximum bounding volume along the chosen axis.

Pivot Origin

Moves the selection pivots to the origin.

Pivot Align To Object

Same as... Hierarchy panel > Pivot tab > Affect Pivot Only > Align To Object.

Pivot Align To Polygon

Aligns the pivot of a single selected object to the surface normal of a single picked polygon along the local Z-axis.

Requires entering sub-object polygon mode of an Editable Poly.

Pivot Align To Surface

Aligns the pivots of a selection to the position of a picked surface point.

Options UI: Can use "Orient to surface normal".

Pivot Align To Target

Aligns the pivots of a selection to a picked target object's pivot.

Pivot Align Pivot Snap

Enables 3D snap with pivot mode and aligns the selection pivots to the first picked object.

Pivot Align Vertex Snap

Enables 3D snap with vertex mode and aligns the selection pivots to the first picked vertex.

Pivot Snap To Nearest

Moves the pivots of the selection to that of their nearest neighbor while ignoring other objects in the selection.

Pivot Orient

LookAt: Orient the pivots of the selection to look at a picked target object along their local x-axes.

LookAt Up: Orient the pivots of the selection to look at a picked target object along their local x-axes and another picked object as an up node along their local z-axes.

Nearest: Orients the pivots of the selection to that of their nearest neighbor while ignoring other objects in the selection.

Surface: Orients the pivots of the selection to the surface normal of a picked object at the point of clicking.

Target: Orients the pivots of the selection to a picked target object's pivot.

World: Orients the pivots of the selection to the world axis.

2 Objects: Aligns one axis of each pivot of the selection along the vector of two picked objects.

3 Objects: Aligns two axes of each pivot of the selection along the vectors of three picked objects.

2 Vertices: Aligns one axis of each pivot of the selection along the vector of two picked vertices.

3 Vertices: Aligns two axes of each pivot of the selection along the vectors of three picked vertices. Useful for getting an arbitrary surface normal where there's no surface to pick from.

Orient Tools

Orient Average

Aligns the orientation of a selection to the in-between (averaged) vector of two picked target objects.

Orient LookAt

Aligns the orientation of a selection to look at a picked target object along their local x-axes.

Orient LookAt Up

Aligns the orientation of a selection to look at a picked target object along their local x-axes and another picked object as an up node along their local z-axes.

Orient To Nearest

Re-orients each object in the selection to the orientation of their closest objects.

Orient To Surface

Aligns the selection to the surface normal of a picked object at the point of mouse click.

Orient With Slerp

Orients the selection between two picked objects using spherical linear interpolation (SLERP) of even angular displacement.

Orient To Target

Aligns the orientation of a selection to that of a picked target object.

Orient To World

The selection will be re-oriented to the world based on their pivots. If the object's orientation is offset from its pivot it will not change (unlike the Align World function).

Snap Tools

Snap Origin

Moves the selection to the origin.

Snap Origin Base

Moves the selection to the origin and their pivots to the minimum bounding box Z position.

Snap To Nearest

Moves each object in the selection to the position of their closest objects.

Snap Z

Moves a selection to position Z=0.

Snap Z Base

For each object in the selection, it moves the pivot to the base of the object and the object to Z=0.

Snap To Surface

Snaps a selection to a picked surface along a chosen axis in either the positive or negative direction.

Options UI: Can use "Orient to surface normal".

Misc Tools

The following three are the same as... Hierarchy panel > Pivot tab > Affect Object Only > Alignment functions.

Object Align To World

Object Align To Pivot

Object Center To Pivot

Clone To Surface

A single selected object can be instance cloned to the surface of any other object. The operation will continue until the Escape key is pressed to cancel.

Options UI: Can use "Allow drag placement".

Drag On Surface

Experimental

A togglable mode which continuously snaps each object in the selection to the surface of any object found in the scene, by ray-casting from the negative Z-axis of each selected object until an intersection is hit. The objects will be initially moved to the surface then they can be dragged around on that surface. They can also be dragged from one surface to another between different objects. Also note that target surface objects can also be frozen and will still receive a ray hit.

Dragging can be done using any coordinate system, however I've found World & Screen for multiple objects, or Local for single objects seem to work best.

Additionally, each draggable object will have a "drag" label added to them in the viewport while the mode is active. The quad menu item will also have a tick mark next to it when active. To deactivate the drag mode and remove the text markers simply toggle the quad menu item again. As long as the mode remains active, objects can be re-selected at any time to drag them again.

Tip:

Some surfaces can be difficult to drag over resulting in the dragged objects either penetrating or leaving the surface. The most reliable method of dragging seems to involve using the World coordinate system with the Z-axis along with either X or Y-axis while dragging slightly away from the surface, as though there's a rubber band creating constant tension between the mouse pointer and the dragged objects. This method should improve how the objects are able to find the surface. Also, slower mouse movements along with occasionally releasing and dragging again can help when going around tight curves.

Swap Two Objects

Two pre-selected objects have their respective positions and orientations swapped.

Reset XForm

Resets the transform of a selection. Same as the Reset XForm utility, but also collapses the stack and handles negative scaling.

Reset Pivot

Resets the pivot of a selected object to its original position and orientation when first created. Same as the hierarchy panel version.

Reset Scale

Resets the scale transforms for selected objects. Same as reset scale in the hierarchy panel, but also works on selected hierarchies - unlike the standard version.

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