Many Objects vs Many Bones...is there a difference?

Scavenger

So..is there a difference..performance wise..memory, rendering..technical stuff..between something made up of a lot of paranted objects, vs  one object with a lot of bones.

The case in question:

The Every Day Car, a freebie by Tru Form/Inlite Studio

It's a very nice model.. It's made up, however, of an object that's the shell of a car, and a freaking ton of child and subchildren objects for...pretty much every concievble part of the car. (seriously.. the steering wheel is 4 objects pic 3...it's REALLY detailed.)

When I first loaded it, I was surprised it was made the way it is, rather than a single object with all the parts as "bones". But then I wondered... does it make a difference, program wise?

jestmart

For mechanical things that don't need to bend or flex when a part is moved this is a perfectly acceptable way to assemble the model, plus it makes it easier to completely remove any details you don't need.

WendyLuvsCatz

You can always export and reimport an obj to cut down rendertimes

the boned bits are very handy though for posing  and animation

SpottedKitty

I've got quite a few models built like that. What I'd like to know is, can I save it as a proper D|S native-format Asset without having to save each individual bit as its own Prop Asset, then assemble them back together again?

TangoAlpha

Is it easier to animate a steering wheel with bones for turning the whele and flipping the indicator stalks, compared to changing a limited rotate parameter on parented wheel and stalk objects?

(serious question - I know very little when it comes to animation)

And how easy is it to rig something like that? (again, I know that putting a limit on (say) X-rotate, and renaming it "Steer" is dead simple. But I've never really played with setting up bones, and especially not on props)

Jus' curious . . .

Jonstark

I don't think bones make any difference on render times, but will add to the memory used by a scene (though I don't think they will add that much).  In other words, probably not much downside.  Got lots of TruForm sets, they do very good work for contemporary modern homes and rooms (and because they render their promos in Cycles it all looks excellent in the promo pics).

mjc1016

One thing to keep in mind...a rigged (with many bones) figure is pretty much only rigged in Poser/Studio, use it in other things and the rigging isn't worth much.  A group of objects that are set up in a parent/child relationship that don't depend on rigging are going to work in just about anything.  So, 'many objects' is actually more compatible than a fully rigged item.