Timeline Views

Timeline Views

After Effects has a great keyframe workfl ow. These shortcuts
will help you work with timing more quickly, accurately,
and confi dently:
. The ; key toggles all the way in and out on the Timeline:
single frame to all frames. The slider at the bottom
of the Timeline zooms in and out
more selectively.
. The scroll wheel moves you up and down the layer
stack.
. Shift+scroll-wheel moves left and right in a zoomed
Timeline view.
. Alt/Option+scroll zooms dynamically in and out of
the Timeline, remaining focused around the cursor
location.
. The \ key toggles between a Timeline and its Composition
viewer, even if previously closed.
. The Comp Marker Bin contains markers you can
draw out into the Timeline ruler. You can replace their
sequential numbers with names.

Keyframes and the Graph Editor

Transform controls live under every layer’s twirly arrow.
There are keyboard shortcuts to each Transform property.
For a standard 2D layer these are

. A for Anchor Point, the center pivot of the layer
. P for Position, by default the center of the comp
. S for Scale (in percent of source)
. R for Rotation (in revolutions and degrees)
. T for Opacity, or if it helps, Opaci-“T” (which is not
technically spatial transform data but is grouped here
anyhow because it’s so essential)
Once you’ve revealed one of these, hold down the Shift
key to toggle another (or to hide another one already displayed).
This keeps only what you need in front of you. A
3D layer reveals four individual properties under Rotation
to allow full animation on all axes.
The Alt/Option key can be used with each of these oneletter
shortcuts to add the fi rst keyframe; once there’s one
keyframe, any adjustments to that property at any other
frame generate another keyframe automatically.
There are selection tools to correspond to Transforms:
. V activates the Selection tool, which also moves and
scales in a view panel.
. Y switches to the Pan-Behind tool, which moves the
anchor point.
. W stands for “wotate”—it adjusts Rotation.
Once you adjust with any of these tools, an Add Keyframe
option for the corresponding Property appears under the
Animation menu, so you can set the fi rst keyframe without
touching the Timeline at all.