Playback and Options

To play the animation, you can either press the buttons at the bottom of the Viewer, or use the keyboard shortcuts.

Viewer Buttons and Time Controller

At the bottom of the Viewer there is a selector for connecting a Timeline, as described in the Mutiple Timelines and Viewers section on the previous page.

Next to it, there is a time controller consisting of a timecode and its frame equivalent:

• Click on the timecode or frame number to modify one of the values
• Click and drag frames to move forward or backward in time

To the left of the Time Controller there is a stopwatch icon that displays a Mini-Timeline at the bottom of the Viewer. Its zoom ratio and positioning are the same as that of the Timeline connected to the Viewer. The keyboard shortcuts for navigating these Mini-Timelines are the same.

This is especially useful when working in full-screen mode with a maximized Viewer.

Then there are six buttons for various controls:

• Jump to the beginning of the composition (Ctrl/Cmd + Left)
• Go back one frame (Left)
• Play the animation backwards (J)
• Move forward one frame (Right)
• Play the animation forward (Space or L)
• Jump to the end of the composition (Ctrl/Cmd + Right)

Three shortcuts recall editing software workflows:

• Play the animation in reverse: J
• Stop playback: K
• Play the animation forward: L

Playback Options

In the Timeline header on the right there is a button that shows a gear in a stopwatch.

This button shows:

• Playing mode:

  • Loop: plays the animation in a loop
  • Once: will stop after reaching the end of the composition or the last Work Area
  • Bounce: also known as Ping-Pong; will play the animation forward and backward without stopping

• Frame mode:

  • All Frames: computes all images one after another, possibly slower than the FPS defined by the composition. The animation will be played back at the correct speed once all images have been cached.
  • Drop Frames: respects the FPS defined by the composition. If an image requires more processing time, it is ignored and Autograph moves on to the next one. This option allows an Audio Mix connected to the composition to be played back smoothly, so you can check that graphic elements are in sync with the music.

• Play Visible Range: when this option is enabled, the Work Areas are ignored in order to read the visible area in the Timeline (usually in a loop). This is very useful when you need to adjust a Motion Path by focusing on a very specific part of the animation.

• Plaback Autoscroll: moves the view on the Timeline automatically when the playhead moves and reaches the end of dope sheet.

The video below shows how the Play Visible Range option allows you to play only the visible part of the Timeline.

Selection Options

Then there are two options for selecting:

• Meta Keyframes
• Visibility Keyframes

By default, these two types of keyframes can be selected by clicking directly on them, but not with a selection rectangle.

Meta Keyframes

If you set up the screen to only display the layer's Position parameter by pressing the P key, the Meta Keys will also be displayed on the Transform parameter. There may be more Meta Keys than Position keys, as they represent other keyframes created on other parameters, such as Rotation and Scale.

Creating a large selection rectangle to select Position keys before deleting them would select Meta Keys from other parameters and could also delete other non-visible keys. This is why this option is OFF by default.

However, if your goal is to delete all Transform keys at once, enabling it allows you to select all the keys on a single line before deleting them.

Visibility Keyframes

The same logic applies to Visibility Keys. Selecting them accidentally by drawing a selection rectangle around the Position parameter could cause several layers to disappear. That's why this option is OFF by default.

Here again, if your goal is to remove a large number of Visibility keys by working directly with block handles located in the dope sheet, this option can be very useful.