WhereHas on multiple request variables

Hi there, I am new to Laravel and trying some stuff. I have three Models all with belongsToMany relationships (2 pivot tables). I want to filter the results using the pivot tables if an optional additional parameter is passed to the request.

The code below is doing exactly what I want, but it is quite verbose and when an additional parameter is added, it grows rapidly.

$object = request('object');
$thing = request('thing');

if($object && $thing)
{
     $users = User::whereHas('objects',function($query) use($object){
            $query->where('objects.id',$object);
        })->whereHas('things',function($query) use($thing) {
           $query->where('things.id',$thing);
        })->get();
}
else if($object)
{
      $users = User::whereHas('objects',function($query) use($object){
            $query->where('objects.id',$object);
        })->get();
}
else if($thing)
{
     $users = User::whereHas('things',function($query) use($thing) {
           $query->where('things.id',$thing);
        })->get();
}
else
{
    $users = User::all();
}

Does Eloquent provide a better solution where I can build the query step by step, depending on the parameter being set? Something like:

$builder = ???
if($object)
{
    $builder = $builder->whereHas('objects',...);
}
if($thing)
{
    $builder = $builder->whereHas('things',...);
}
$builder->get();