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Copy existing keyframes into action
Posted: Sun Mar 30, 2014 2:34 pm
by luckynth
Is there a way to copy existing keyframes from the main timeline into an action?
Re: Copy existing keyframes into action
Posted: Sun Mar 30, 2014 2:45 pm
by heyvern
With an action activated, right click on the "mainline" in the action palette, and select "insert copy" into the action (or use the action palette buttons). This will insert ALL the keys from the main timeline starting at the key frame you are on in the timeline.
Just be aware that this can "erase" keys that are already in the action. If your action has keys starting at frame 1, and you are on frame 1 in the action and you insert copy from the mainline, it will "erase" the keys in the action.
You can avoid this by moving the time line to a frame AFTER the keys in your action that you may want to keep. Then when you insert the mainline copy, it will place them starting from that frame and leave other keys before it intact.
Hope that makes sense.
Re: Copy existing keyframes into action
Posted: Sun Mar 30, 2014 3:50 pm
by luckynth
heyvern wrote:With an action activated, right click on the "mainline" in the action palette, and select "insert copy" into the action (or use the action palette buttons). This will insert ALL the keys from the main timeline starting at the key frame you are on in the timeline.
Just be aware that this can "erase" keys that are already in the action. If your action has keys starting at frame 1, and you are on frame 1 in the action and you insert copy from the mainline, it will "erase" the keys in the action.
You can avoid this by moving the time line to a frame AFTER the keys in your action that you may want to keep. Then when you insert the mainline copy, it will place them starting from that frame and leave other keys before it intact.
Hope that makes sense.
It does and, as usual, you've helped a lot!
Re: Copy existing keyframes into action
Posted: Wed Apr 02, 2014 12:24 pm
by luckynth
luckynth wrote:heyvern wrote:With an action activated, right click on the "mainline" in the action palette, and select "insert copy" into the action (or use the action palette buttons). This will insert ALL the keys from the main timeline starting at the key frame you are on in the timeline.
Just be aware that this can "erase" keys that are already in the action. If your action has keys starting at frame 1, and you are on frame 1 in the action and you insert copy from the mainline, it will "erase" the keys in the action.
You can avoid this by moving the time line to a frame AFTER the keys in your action that you may want to keep. Then when you insert the mainline copy, it will place them starting from that frame and leave other keys before it intact.
Hope that makes sense.
It does and, as usual, you've helped a lot!
Wow. Just tried this and its' phenomenally useful. Thanks again.
Re: Copy existing keyframes into action
Posted: Wed Apr 02, 2014 10:03 pm
by dreeko13
Can keyframes be copied from one object to another though?
Example - Say I have a bouncing beach ball animation and I wish to transfer the keyframes of the object moving across the screen to a tennis ball object.
Re: Copy existing keyframes into action
Posted: Wed Apr 02, 2014 11:44 pm
by heyvern
dreeko13 wrote:Can keyframes be copied from one object to another though?
Example - Say I have a bouncing beach ball animation and I wish to transfer the keyframes of the object moving across the screen to a tennis ball object.
No, direct copy/paste of key frames isn't possible.
However, in your example depending on how you animated the object you could workaround this.
If you animated with bones, then you can copy and paste the bone that moves the object.When you copy/paste a bone the keys are copied as well.
If you animated the layer, you could duplicate the layer and paste your "new" object on that layer.