How to generate ridge shingle

[kevinmGFYPQ]

I am trying to find a way to generate a set of shingle caps along hip ridges.  I thought this would be pretty easy by creating a ridge cap from a copy of the roof surface after I detached it but the resulting object's pivot is all out of sorts.  I thought I would create a path form the roof ridge after creating the object and then use the array (spacing) along a path tool.  The problem is that I cannot take this objects that have the wacky pivot orientation and rotate them slightly so they overlap one another as shown in the pic.  Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[10DSpace]

@kevinmGFYPQ 

Simplest solution is for you to correctly align the pivot of the roof cap shingle to begin with, otherwise you will be fighting the strange orientation of the pivot that you currently have.  Depending on the steps you took to model the roofcap shingle, you might be able to zero out the pivot to be aligned with the object.  Give this a try by selecting  "View" as the reference coordinate system and then go to Heirarchy tab> Pivot > Affect Pivot only.  Then with the "Select and Rotate" transform selected, right click on the  x, y, and z spinners at the bottom of Max interface.  That should zero out the angles and may restore the orientation you are looking for for the pivot.

If that does not work or only partially works, then you can align the pivot manually with "Affect pivot only" active using the move and rotate transforms so that say the y axis is aligned with the ridge line peak of the other axis are aligned properly as shown below.  "Center to Object" can also help but won't align the axes.

Once the pivot is properly aligned, the rest should be easy.  Remember to deactivate "Affect Pivot Only when done.  Hope this helps.

[kevinmGFYPQ]

Hello 10D Space and thank you for responding.

So originally, I created the cap shingle by detaching a clone of the roof face surface, adding some loops in appropriate places to create the poly of the cap shingle then adding a shell modifier for thickness.  It works perfect except for the fact the resulting pivot was a mess and I could not get it reoriented correctly.  I tried using local grid objects, align, etc on the dam pivot but nothing worked.

What I could try is to create 1/2 of the cap shingle with a grid object aligned with one roof face, array it as instances and then poly edit the thing after aligned.  The instances would then respond in kind.

This should not be so difficult.  In sketchup, which I do not like to bring up, I could simply do as I described and then simply copy the object up along the roof hip edge.  It seems to be easier to manipulate the pivot in sketchup.  Frustrating since I prefer to work in 3dsmax since I do all of my materials/ lighting in there.

When I attempt what I am talking about, I will post some screen captures.

[10DSpace]

@kevinmGFYPQ 

It doesn't make sense to me that you cannot orient the pivot correctly.  There are certainly some tricks to it sometimes ("Select and Place" tool, "Place Pivot Surface") but I have never found a situation where I couldn't change the pivot orientation to what I wanted.   If you want to post the mesh you have here in Max 2020 format I would be happy to give it a try, but if you prefer to work this out yourself, that's fine.  

[kevinmGFYPQ]

Oh trust me when I tell you, there could be a lack of me knowing the right "trick" to get this to work.  I have learned along time ago to check my ego at the door and to accept whatever help someone is willing to provide.  There is something ALWAYS new to be learned.  I cannot overstate that enough.

I will recreate the shingle the way I previously did it and gladly send it to you.  I will also try another way and we can compare results.  Really appreciate it.

[leeminardi]

You might try using the script in post #6 I reference here to align the z axis of the pivot using object snap and two vertices of the shingle model.