How to move a complex object to the origin without destroying it?

Question

I have a complex object far away from the origin of the scene itself.

If I mark all parts and use the Geometry to Origin function, the complex object gets crumbled, because all parts are set at the origin and the relations are destroyed.

Is there a way to move the object as a whole?

The object was an import from an STL file.

score 5 · Accepted Answer · edited Mar 01 '15 at 13:17

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Go into edit mode, select all and press Shift-S and Cursor to selected.

Then go back to object mode, press Ctrl-Alt-Shift-C, Origin to cursor, and then press Alt-G (clear location).

edited Mar 01 '15 at 13:17

stacker

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answered Mar 01 '15 at 12:47

Christy James

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J Sargent · Answer 2 · 2015-03-01T14:51:04.240

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If you need to keep the origin in the same place, you can select the object, press Shift+S > Cursor to Selected. Now press Ctrl+Shift+Alt+C > Origin to Geometry and then press Shift+S > Selection to cursor. You do not need to be in edit mode at any time to do this, and the origin will end up in the same place, just with the mesh centered around it.

Also you can just press Ctrl+Shift+Alt+C > Origin to Geometry or any of the other options, just this one command has the same result as Christy James process.

edited Mar 01 '15 at 14:51

answered Mar 01 '15 at 14:27

J Sargent

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I do not have the option Origin to Center of Geometry – Wandang Mar 01 '15 at 14:38
@Wandang It is just plain Origin to Geometry then, does the same thing – J Sargent Mar 01 '15 at 14:50
This is better than my answer actually, I thought that 'origin to geometry' and 'geometry to origin' did the same thing but backwards, but evidently not! – Christy James Mar 01 '15 at 18:36

score 3 · Answer 3 · edited Apr 13 '17 at 12:57

Add an empty ShiftA > Empty > Plain Axes, then position it at the proper position to your object with G.
Select all the pieces of your object, then select the empty last.
Parent the object(s) to the empty with CtrlP > Object.
Select just the empty and press AltG to clear the location, which moves it to the scene origin.

*Optional step* if you do not want your object(s) parented to a empty

Again select both the empty and your object(s), then press AltP > Clear and Keep Transformation. If you want to, you can now delete the empty.

animated gif of moving objects to the origin process

score 2 · Answer 4 · answered Mar 01 '15 at 14:43

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Or, in edit mode, select all A
Shift+s > cursor to center
Shift+s > selection to cursor (offset)

answered Mar 01 '15 at 14:43

Bithur

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How to move a complex object to the origin without destroying it?

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