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Would anyone else like to link keyframes on different layers?
I just found myself wishing for a feature I’m PRETTY sure doesn’t exist (although maybe there’s a complex scripting workaround). A lot of the time in an animation, you want a bunch of things to happen at the same time. I’d love to be able to link all these keframes to a trigger (maybe a marker?) so that if I move the marker, all those keyframes will move too. The same way you can group objects in Illustrator or Photoshop, I’d like to group keyframes and move them together easily.
I’ll give you a specific example. I’m working on a glorified slideshow, and every transition involves a bunch of different things (lens flares, camera moves, etc). The client may very well want me to insert an image, change the music and the timing, etc. It’s usually pretty easy to move all the related keyframes because they all happen at the same time. I just start on the first layer and drag down to select all the keyframes that happen at that time. But I’ve definitely accidentally moved keyframes that I shouldn’t have, or forgot some I needed. Wouldn’t it be nice to have 10 markers representing my ten photos in the slideshow, and all I had to do to retime was move these 10?
I know Time Remap can do this, sort of, but it’s not always an option. Sometimes there are elements in the comp that can’t be slowed down or sped up – you just want the animation to hit earlier. Anyway, I don’t think After Effects has this feature, but if it did I’d use it. I come back to old projects all the time, and the more I can simplify what’s going on, the better.
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6 Replies
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It’s funny, I was just talking about this with another user yesterday. It’s a great idea, and the more people who ask for it, the more likely we are to get it.
Here’s where to file your feature request:
https://www.adobe.com/go/wishWalter Soyka
Principal & Designer at Keen Live
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
RenderBreak Blog – What I’m thinking when my workstation’s thinking
Creative Cow Forum Host: Live & Stage Events -
That would indeed make life easier – it’s possible now to work on a very large second screen with your layer properties revealed and select and move a bunch of keyframes at the same time, but if you have more than a dozen layers it’s not a good solution.
Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist -
I came across this thread looking for exactly this behavior. Can’t quite understand why this isn’t already implemented in Adobe After Effects CC since it’s a hassle to have to move keyframes when retiming on different layers because their timing behavior can be considered “linked together”. (i.e. fading out when another layer fades in)
You can simplify many things by using null objects and linking properties (and layers), but linking multiple behaviors using markers would be a great way forward.
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[Stefan Verbakel] “I came across this thread looking for exactly this behavior. Can’t quite understand why this isn’t already implemented in Adobe After Effects CC since it’s a hassle to have to move keyframes when retiming on different layers because their timing behavior can be considered “linked together”. (i.e. fading out when another layer fades in)”
If you want to see it implemented, please file a feature request at https://www.adobe.com/go/wish [link]. Every feature request (or bug report) that you file for After Effects is sent via email to a specific Adobe employee and is tracked in a database. The more people asking for a specific feature, the more likely it is to be developed.
Walter Soyka
Principal & Designer at Keen Live
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
RenderBreak Blog – What I’m thinking when my workstation’s thinking
Creative Cow Forum Host: Live & Stage Events -
Thanks for this info, I will be posting a few feature requests as there’s some workflow enhancements that can be made (mainly due to inconsistencies) to a few packages from adobe. If only I were a software-tester 🙂
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Just when I posted there’s a “We’re sorry, we encountered an error processing your request.” on the feature request page 🙁 Thank god I always copy my text before submitting a form. Will try later.
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