Motion paths



When you animate spatial properties—including Position, Anchor Point, and effect control point properties—the motion is shown as a motion path. A motion path appears as a sequence of dots, where each dot marks the position of the layer at each frame. A box in the path marks the position of a keyframe.

Motion paths are simply an alternative visual, spatial way of viewing and working with spatial properties and their keyframes, in addition to the ways that you work with properties in the Timeline panel. You can modify a motion path by changing an existing keyframe or adding a new keyframe. You can modify the shape of a motion path by changing the spatial interpolation methods for its keyframes. (See About spatial and temporal keyframe interpolation.)

The density of dots between the boxes in a motion path indicates the relative speed of the layer or effect control point. Dots close together indicate a lower speed; dots farther apart indicate a greater speed.

Note: Right-click (Windows) or Command-click (Mac OS) a keyframe to open its context menu.

Using the Pen tool or Selection tool to edit keyframes for a spatial property in the Composition or Layer panel is like modifying a Bezier path for a mask or for a shape on a shape layer. (See About paths.)

A motion path is less complex and generally easier to modify when you use fewer keyframes to describe the path. You can use the Smoother to remove extraneous keyframes from a motion path.

Jonas Hummelstrand and Dan Ebberts provide an animation preset and instructions on the General Specialist website for scaling and rotating a motion path.

Show motion path controls

Position motion paths appear in the Composition panel. Anchor Point and effect control point motion paths appear in the Layer panel.

  • To show motion path controls in the Composition panel, choose View > View Options, and select Effect Controls, Keyframes, Motion Paths, and Motion Handles. To see a Position motion path in the Composition panel, the Position property must be selected.
  • To show motion path controls in the Layer panel, choose the property or effect from the View menu at the bottom of the Layer panel.
  • To specify how many keyframes to show for a motion path, choose Edit > Preferences > Display (Windows) or After Effects > Preferences > Display (Mac OS), and select an option in the Motion Path section.

Move motion path keyframes

  1. In the Timeline panel, select the layer for which to modify the motion path.
  2. If you cannot see the keyframe you want to modify in the Composition panel or Layer panel, move the current-time indicator to the keyframe.
  3. In the Composition panel or Layer panel, use the Selection tool to drag a keyframe or its handles.
    Note: The current-time indicator does not need to be located on a keyframe before you drag it.
    Drag a keyframe in the Composition panel to move one Position keyframe.

    You can move multiple keyframes at one time by selecting them in the Timeline panel before you drag them in the Composition panel or Layer panel. To move the entire motion path, select all keyframes by clicking the property name in the Timeline panel before dragging a keyframe in the Composition panel.

    Dragging all keyframes on a motion path by one keyframe

Add a keyframe to a motion path using the Pen tool

  1. Display the motion path that you want to modify in the Composition panel or Layer panel.
  2. Select the Pen tool  or Add Vertex tool  from the Tools panel.
  3. In the Composition panel, place the Pen tool over the motion path where you want to add the new keyframe and click to add the keyframe.
    A new keyframe appears at the frame you clicked, on the motion path and in the Timeline panel. To move the keyframe, use the Selection tool.
    Note: Though the results are different, the techniques for manipulating motion-path curves with the Pen tool work in much the same way as the techniques used to create and modify other Bezier paths, such as mask and shape paths.

Sketch a motion path with Motion Sketch

You can draw a path for the motion of a selected layer using Motion Sketch, which records the position of the layer and the speed at which you draw. As you draw, a Position keyframe is generated at each frame.

Motion Sketch does not affect keyframes that you have set for other properties. For example, if you set Rotation keyframes for an image of a ball, you can use Motion Sketch to generate Position keyframes, so that the ball appears to roll along the path you created.

John Dickinson provides a demonstration of Motion Sketch in a video tutorial on his Motionworks website.

  1. In the Composition or Timeline panel, select the layer for which you want to sketch a motion path.
  2. In the Timeline panel, set the work-area markers to the duration in which you want to sketch motion.
  3. If you want to hear the audio in your composition as you sketch, make sure that the Mute Audio button is not selected in the Preview panel.
  4. Choose Window > Motion Sketch.
  5. Select the appropriate Motion Sketch options:
    Show Wireframe
    Displays a wireframe view of the layer as you sketch the motion path.

    Show Background
    Displays the static contents of the frame at which you started sketching in the Composition panel while you sketch. This option is useful if you want to sketch motion relative to other images in your composition.

    Smoothing
    Eliminates unnecessary keyframes from the motion path. This setting has the same result as using the Tolerance setting with the Smoother. Higher values produce smoother curves, but too high a value may not preserve the shape of the curve that you draw.
    Note: You can smooth a motion path after it has been created by using the smooth expression or the Smoother.

    Capture Speed At
    The ratio of the speed of the recorded motion to the speed of playback. If Capture Speed At is 100%, the motion is played back at the speed at which it was recorded. If Capture Speed At is greater than 100%, the motion plays back slower than it was recorded.

  6. Click Start Capture and then drag in the Composition panel to create the motion path. Release the mouse button to stop capturing.
    Note: After Effects automatically ends capturing when the capture time reaches the end of the work area (which, by default, is the composition duration).

Create a motion path from a mask, shape, or paint path

You can create a motion path from any of several types of paths:

  • A Mask Path property

  • A shape Path property on a shape layer

  • A Path property for a paint stroke

  • A path copied from Illustrator or Photoshop

You can paste any of these paths into the Position or Anchor Point property for a layer, or into the position property of an effect control point. The pasted keyframes are set to rove in time, except for the first and last ones, to create a constant velocity along the path.

By default, the duration of the pasted motion path is 2 seconds. You can adjust the duration by dragging the first or last keyframe in the Timeline panel.

  1. Copy a path to the clipboard:

    • Select a Path property in the Timeline panel, and choose Edit > Copy.

    • Select a path in Illustrator or Photoshop, and choose Edit > Copy.

  2. In the Timeline panel, select the property into which to paste the path.
  3. Place the current-time indicator at the time for the first keyframe of the motion path.
  4. Choose Edit > Paste.