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Does anyone like the Active Auto Repositioning of timeline?
I’m trying to get Adobe to remove the “active repositioning” of the timeline or at least allow this horrible feature to be turned off. What I’m talking about, if you haven’t noticed, is that the timeline will not allow you to reposition it with vacant space at the bottom. With blank space in the timeline, click a layer and the stack is immediately repositioned (vertically) and the layer you clicked gets inadvertently moved from it’s original position.
Example: A comp with 18 layers or so; Timeline window – all layers cannot be seen. Select bottom layer (#18 or so), hit x key, click it again and suddenly it’s layer #4 or somewhere near the top. Isn’t that fun!
Prior to the unified GUI (AE7) this didn’t happen. You could select a layer, hit the x key and your working layer snapped to the top of the timeline window and stay there. Everyone I knew did this as soon as they selected a new layer to work on. It was great. Your working layer was always at the top.
I know many people, as well as myself, who hated the unified GUI but didn’t know why. Active auto repo is why!
When I click a widget I don’t want to have to go find it to click it again. It should be exactly where it was when I clicked it the first time.
No other software does this. The stacking of the timeline layers is just as important as the position of the layer in the comp window. Why not auto center the comp window while I’m moving a layer? Why not horizontally reposition the timeline while I’m dragging keyframes or a layer in time? Why not, because it’s ridiculous, that’s why!The only time this any good is when moving a layer in the timeline stack to a position that’s outside the visible window. That is the only time it should ever be activated – only when a dragged layer reaches the edge of the window!
This feature has wasted a lot of time for a lot of people. Many times renders will be a disaster because a track matte or similar will have gotten accidentally moved in the layer stack. The artist didn’t do this, the software did it and now we have to go through the comp layer by layer and see where it went wrong. Surely, if you’ve worked with heavy comps this has happend to you. “How the $#%& did that layer get up there?” Auto-repo is how.
Please join me in telling Adobe to kill this horribly feature.
Thank you.
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9 Replies
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Hmm, havent noticed this myself, but ya, sounds annoying.
It’s not really a problem for me because I use Zorro the Layer tagger – it’s a bit more work in the forefront of setting up the comps, but the benefits are worth it I think. You have finer control of soloing layers in the timeline and the comp window. If you haven’t tried it out, I would recommend looking in to it.
“|_ (°_0) _|”
Sincerely,
George
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Yes, I used Zorro when I have a really heavy comp. It’s great.
I just have a hard time thinking that anyone thought auto repositioning of the timeline was a good idea. -
If you want to be heard on this, you should make sure you’re sending your feedback to the right place.
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 -
I have, several times throughout the years. I’m hoping that the more people realize just how annoying and lame this feature is they’ll also ask Adobe to nix it.
Adobe came in to our shop one day to talk about features and problems but they weren’t really interested in what we had to say. They said, print out your list … then quickly left. -
[G. Scott Scribner] “I have, several times throughout the years. I’m hoping that the more people realize just how annoying and lame this feature is they’ll also ask Adobe to nix it”
They should use the feature request form, too. The more, the merrier!
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 -
> Adobe came in to our shop one day to talk about features and problems but they weren’t really interested in what we had to say. They said, print out your list … then quickly left.
Who from Adobe? When, exactly? What shop?
This does not sound like the behavior of anyone on my team.
Regarding your specific complaint: This is the first time that I’ve seen anyone mention it (other than the request that I saw from you that you submitted through the feature-request form).
That’s not to say that it isn’t a valid complaint; it just isn’t something that we’ve been hearing much, so it hasn’t risen to the level of something to focus our attention on.
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Todd Kopriva, Adobe Systems Incorporated
After Effects quality engineering
After Effects team blog
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I got someone’s attention!
I have requested the auto repo of the timeline be removed many times. I don’t know why you’d get one but not the others.I don’t know the names of the people from Adobe that visited. I’m not looking to get anyone in trouble. Let’s just say the shop was on Boccaccio in Venice. (I’m not there any more.) Your team asked if I had any feature request or bug reports. I said, I have a big list. They said, Print it out so we can take it. They continued their tour, I printed the list, looked around for them, asked where they were, … They just left, I was told. I don’t think it’d been 10 minutes.
If you have an email address I’ll send you the list.
Anyway, this auto-repo is a nightmare. It’s always moving and shifting layers. I have to be super careful that I don’t accidentally move a layer. Many people are unaware of how annoying this is because they’ve never known AE without it.
The X key was so great prior to AE7 and then it became useless.
Thanks for listening.
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> If you have an email address I’ll send you the list.
Submit feature requests here:
https://adobe.ly/feature_requestThat goes straight to my email inbox.
> I have requested the auto repo of the timeline be removed many times. I don’t know why you’d get one but not the others.
I’ve seen your requests many times. What I meant is that I’ve seen no requests from anyone but you about this.
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Todd Kopriva, Adobe Systems Incorporated
After Effects quality engineering
After Effects team blog
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I got a “page not available” error upon submission.
Here’s a link to the doc: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1U6rdxn8F4z_d1jcuV2uN6VoH88YFmjZL-GvOXujTN7Y/pub
Please excuse me if the doc sounds rude or curt. When something perturbs me enough I’ll add it to the list.
AE does so many things well the list would be just about endless. I do appreciate AE and the work that you and your team have done.
Thanks
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