pick something up?
 

okay. I have a character that who's body is modelled in a single mesh, and I want him to pick up a ball and then throw it. Pretty straight forward, right? Wow what an issue though. Do I parent the ball to itself and point/orient the group node to a bone in the hand and then turn the ball with the shape node into a rigid body and key frame between passive and active? That part doesn't seem to be the difficulty. I seem to have problems with the whole parenting issue though. Does anyone have a solution for what is otherwise a very basic animation issue? Maybe others will benefit from your response. Thanks very much!

When Mike sees this he should be able to help you more on this. I get a bit messed up wiht the whole parent thing some times too.

I more of key frame it all type of person

Check out the Animation Constraints video we have. The way I'd go about is to create locators at the points that the ball is planned on being located, such as in the hand and on the table or whatever. Point Constrain the ball to these locators and then animate the weight of the contraint so that the ball will switch from one to another as you want it.

thank you so much Kurt and Mike! This is why I really like this site. You guys rock. You're very helpful. TKU again.