Uploaded May 2013 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
In this Unity Cookie quick tip, we'll take a look at creating custom pivots. You can't directly manipulate pivots in Unity. You can either choose to transform an object using it's center or pivot, but you can't change the pivot. Most of the time this is not an issue as you'll be working with 3D content from your 3D application and Unity will respect the pivot position as imported from the 3D object. However, there are times when you are working with native Unity objects where you need to adjust or create a new pivot.
Using a parent pivot object will allow you to not only create a custom pivot, but will also allow you to place a transformation at a higher level such as when you might need to separate the rotation and position transformations. This is common in camera follow scripts.
In this Unity Cookie quick tip, we'll take a look at creating custom pivots. You can't directly manipulate pivots in Unity. You can either choose to transform an object using it's center or pivot, but you can't change the pivot. Most of the time this is not an issue as you'll be working with 3D content from your 3D application and Unity will respect the pivot position as imported from the 3D object. However, there are times when you are working with native Unity objects where you need to adjust or create a new pivot.
Using a parent pivot object will allow you to not only create a custom pivot, but will also allow you to place a transformation at a higher level such as when you might need to separate the rotation and position transformations. This is common in camera follow scripts.
