Keyframes, Motion Paths and Camera Moves

When a ready-made effect isn’t enough, animate an item yourself with keyframes: poses at moments in time that Glintia moves the item between. The same idea drives the camera, which can zoom, pan and turn across a scene. This article covers both, plus motion paths and 3D layout effects. All of it is on every plan and uses no AI credits.

Create a keyframe animation

Select the item and move the playhead to where the motion should start
Click Animations in the item’s toolbar (Ctrl+Shift+A, or Cmd+Shift+A on a Mac)
Click custom for a straight path, or custom curve for a path that starts out curved
The animation appears on the item’s Animations row and the editor switches to Animation mode. A banner above the canvas says “Moving the item writes into the selected keyframe on the timeline”, and the top of the Animations panel shows the Animation mode controls
A new animation has two keyframes, at its start and end, and the first is selected. Click Next to select the end keyframe
Move, resize or rotate the item on the canvas. The change is recorded into the selected keyframe
Press Space to play it. Press Esc, or click Done on the banner or Exit in the panel, to leave Animation mode

Every animation has a length you can change on the timeline (see below). Presets such as Pulse or Wiggle are keyframe animations too, so you can open and edit them the same way: click the animation’s bar on the Animations row.

The Animation mode controls

While you are in Animation mode, the top of the Animations panel shows the animation’s name and length, and:

Keyframes: “Key 2 of 3” when a keyframe is selected, or “Between keys” when the playhead is between them
- Previous / Next step through the keyframes and move the playhead to each one
- Add key adds a keyframe at the playhead (“There is already a keyframe at the playhead” if one is there)
- Delete removes the selected keyframe. An animation needs at least two
- Record path records a path with your mouse (see below)
Motion: the easing between keyframes: Linear, Ease in, Ease out, Ease in & out, Overshoot, Bounce or Elastic
Repeat: Play once, 2 times to 10 times, or Until the end, plus Back and forth once it repeats
Onion skins: shows a faint ghost of the item at every keyframe, so you can see the whole motion at once
Advanced keyframe timeline: opens the detailed editor described below

Below these, the preset grid is headed Replace animation. With one of the animation’s keyframes selected, clicking a preset swaps it in for the animation you are editing.

Edit keyframes on the timeline

Each animation is a bar on the item’s Animations row, with a diamond for each keyframe.

Select a keyframe: click its diamond. The playhead jumps to it
Retime it: drag the diamond. It can’t pass its neighbours, and with the grid on it snaps to the grid lines; hold Alt (Option on a Mac) while dragging to place it freely
Add one: double-click the bar where you want it, or right-click and choose Add keyframe here. When paused in Animation mode, the playhead also shows a small add-keyframe button
Delete one: Alt-click the diamond, or right-click it and choose Delete keyframe
Select several: Shift-click or Ctrl-click (Cmd-click on a Mac) diamonds, or in the Scene view drag a box over empty track. Drag any selected diamond to move them all; press Delete to remove them, or Esc to clear the selection
Change when the animation starts or ends: drag the first or last diamond. The keyframes in between are spaced to fit
Move the whole animation: drag the bar along the row

Two buttons sit on each animation bar: the layers icon turns onion skins on and off for that animation, and the pencil (Edit animation keyframes) opens the advanced keyframe timeline.

Shape the motion path on the canvas

In Animation mode, any animation that moves the item draws its path on the canvas:

A white dot marks each keyframe. Drag a dot to move the item’s position at that keyframe
An orange handle sits between each pair of dots. Drag it to bend that part of the path into a curve
The path is drawn in dashes spaced by time: long, spread-out dashes where the item moves fast, short, close dashes where it moves slowly. Rest the mouse on the path to see its speed in pixels per second
A dot on the path shows where the item is at the playhead

Record a path with your mouse

Instead of placing keyframes one by one, you can steer the item around the canvas and let Glintia record the route.

Select the item and move the playhead to where the motion should start
Click Record path in the Animation mode controls, or open More Tools in the item’s toolbar and click Record path
Move the mouse to steer the item. The playhead runs in real time, so the motion keeps your timing
Click the mouse wheel, or left-click, to drop a keyframe. Hold Shift and roll the wheel to scale the item, or Alt and roll to rotate it
Press Enter (or click Done on the banner) to finish, or Esc to throw the recording away

The recording becomes a new animation. If you started from a path you made earlier (custom, custom curve or a previous recording), it replaces that path instead. If the new animation would overlap another one on the item, it is placed right after it. Record path isn’t available while playing, on locked items or on backgrounds.

Use the advanced keyframe timeline

For per-property control, click Advanced keyframe timeline in the Animation mode controls, or the pencil on an animation bar. The timeline switches to an Animation tab with one track per property:

Transform: Position X, Position Y, Rotation, Scale X and Scale Y
Opacity
Shape, for items with a morph sequence (see Morph, Draw-On and Vector Animation)

Each track shows the property’s value at the playhead. On a track you can:

Click + to add a keyframe for just that property at the playhead
Double-click a keyframe to type an exact value
Right-click a keyframe and choose Delete Keyframe
Click the line between two keyframes to choose the easing for that stretch only. This lets each property ease differently
Click the graph icon (Open graph editor) to see how the value changes over the animation
Drag a keyframe in a group’s header row to move every keyframe at that moment together

Drag the handle at the right end of the ruler to change the animation’s length. If the item has several animations, choose which one to edit from the list at the top left. To go back, click the Scene tab or leave Animation mode.

Animate the camera

Each new scene comes with a camera that shows the whole scene and doesn’t move. You can make it zoom in, pan, turn, follow an item, cut between shots and glide from one shot to the next.

Click the Camera tab on the timeline. The Camera panel opens and the camera frame appears on the canvas
Drag the frame to pan, drag its corner handles to zoom in or out, or drag its rotate handle to turn it. Hold Shift while rotating to snap to 15°, and double-click the handle to level it
Choose a Camera look and a Frame shape in the panel if you want them
Play the scene to see it through the camera

If the panel says “No camera at the playhead”, click Add camera. Click the reset button at the top of the panel (Reset camera) to go back to the full scene.

Fixed shot or Custom animation

Under Motion, pick how the camera behaves within its shot:

Fixed shot: one framing for the whole shot. Set Rotation with the slider (double-click it to level). Open Follow subject to keep an item or group centred while it moves; choose No subject to turn following off
Custom animation: the camera moves between keyframes. Move the playhead, then drag, resize or turn the frame on the canvas; each change sets a keyframe and the camera moves between them

With Custom animation you also get:

Start from a move: one-click moves that replace the camera’s keyframes: Push in, Pull out, Pan left, Pan right, Rise and Roll
Keyframes: a card for each keyframe with its time (at … s), X, Y, Zoom and Turn, plus Then to choose how it moves to the next key: Smooth, Linear, Ease in, Ease out, Snappy, Overshoot or Hold, then cut. Click Add at playhead to add one, or the bin to delete one
Smooth path: curves the camera through its keyframes instead of moving in straight lines

On the camera’s bar in the timeline, an animated camera shows its keyframes as diamonds: click one to go there, or drag it to retime it.

Handheld shake adds a gentle wobble to either kind of shot, as if the camera were hand-held. It plays in the preview and in your export.

Camera look and frame

Camera look: Clean, Cinema (letterbox and film grading), Vintage (warm film texture and vignette) or Social blur (the shot on a blurred copy of itself, with a Blur amount slider)
Frame: Slide, 16:9, 9:16, 1:1, 4:5, 4:3, 3:4 or 21:9. The scene’s background (or the blurred copy, with Social blur) fills the space the shape leaves

Several shots in one scene

A scene can be split into camera shots, each with its own framing, for example a wide shot followed by a close-up.

In the Camera view, move the playhead to where the new shot should start
Click the camera icon that appears on the playhead. A new shot starts there, shown as Camera 2 in the timeline
Select a shot’s bar and frame it on the canvas. The panel header shows which shot you are editing (Shot 1, Shot 2 and so on)
Drag a shot bar’s edges to change where it starts and ends, or click its X to remove it

Camera transitions

Between two shots the camera cuts by default. To glide instead, click the + on the first shot’s bar (Add Camera Transition). During the end of that shot the camera moves from its framing to the next shot’s framing. A new camera transition lasts half a second; drag its left edge to make it longer or shorter (Camera Transition Duration), or click its X (Remove Camera Animation) to go back to a cut.

Add 3D depth with layout effects

3D Layout Effects tilt, turn and fold an item so it looks like it sits in 3D space, such as a picture leaning back or a page lying on a floor. It is a pose, not a motion: combine it with effects or keyframes to animate the item.

Select an image, video, text or other item (characters can’t be warped)
Open More Tools in its toolbar and click 3D effects, or open the Properties panel and click 3D Layout Effects
Click a preset: Tilt Up, Tilt Down, Left, Right, Page, Book, Billboard, Floor, Ceiling, Wedge, Lean Right, Lean Left or Isometric
Use Strength (5% to 100%) to make it subtler or stronger

Click Adjust corners to drag each corner yourself, and Done adjusting corners when finished. Picking a preset afterwards replaces corners you dragged. Click Reset or None to flatten the item again.

Troubleshooting

“Move the cursor to an empty spot”. The playhead is over another animation on this item. Move it past that animation before adding a new one.

Moving the item doesn’t change the animation. No keyframe is selected; the playhead is between keys. Select a keyframe or click Add key.

Dragging the item changes the animation when I don’t want it to. You are still in Animation mode. Press Esc to leave it.

I can’t delete a keyframe. An animation needs at least two keyframes. To remove the whole animation, click X on its bar.

The camera frame isn’t on the canvas. Switch to the Camera tab on the timeline.