User Guide

CHAPTER 5
170
Animating Layers
• If you change a value graphically in the Composition or Layer window, all selected
keyframes change using the difference between the old and new values, not the values
themselves. In other words, you make a relative change. For example, if you select several
Position keyframes on a motion path and then drag one of them 10 pixels to the left, they
all move 10 pixels to the left of their original positions.
You can also change the value of several layers at once by parenting them. For information
on parenting layers, see“Understanding parent layers” on page 184.
To set multiple keyframes to the same value:
1 Select the keyframes you want to change. See “Navigating and selecting keyframes” on
page 164. All keyframes you select must be for the same property.
2 Change the value of any selected keyframe.
Determining where to set and modify keyframes
You can freely change any keyframe attribute. Because After Effects provides more than
one view of a keyframe, where you modify it depends on what you want to do as well as
the type of keyframe and layer property. All layer properties are temporal—they can
change the layer over time. Some layer properties, such as Position, are also spatial—they
can move the layer across composition space. You modify some attributes of a spatial layer
property in different windows than you do temporal properties. See “Comparing interpo-
lation methods” on page 201.
Before you make any changes to a keyframe, make sure that the current-time marker is
positioned at an existing keyframe. If you change a property value when the current-time
marker is not at an existing keyframe, After Effects adds a new keyframe. However, if you
double-click a keyframe to modify it, the current-time marker location is not relevant, nor
is it relevant when you change a keyframe’s interpolation method. See “Comparing inter-
polation methods” on page 201.
Note: You can also copy and paste keyframes into a tab-delimited spreadsheet application,
such as Microsoft Excel, and modify the values. This method works for all keyframe types
except masks and some effects properties.
UG.book Page 170 Wednesday, February 21, 2001 12:05 PM