Animation Tracks
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To make working with scene objects more convenient, the Timeline can be separated into several Animation Tracks. A scene always includes the main track called Scene, which contains every object. However, it is possible to create additional tracks and move scene objects to them.
Animation Tracks can be viewed at the left side of the Timeline, on the Tracks panel.
There, Tracks are represented by gray vertical bars.
There are also Folders that are used to store Tracks and organize them into hierarchical structures. Folders are represented by blue vertical bars:
Note
When a Folder is closed and tracks inside of it are not visible, frames with Mixed interpolation type are colored magenta.
Selecting Tracks
To select a Track, simply click it on the Tracks panel.
To select objects contained on a track, double-click it:
And if you select an object, the track containing it will be selected as well.
Note
Double-clicking a Track would only select objects that could be selected under the current Edit Mode.To select all objects on the Track, hold Alt while double-clicking it.
If you click a Track while holding Ctrl, this Track will be added to selection.
And if you click a Track while holding Shift, this will add to selection every Track between this and the currently selected one.
If you have an interval selected on one Track, clicking another Track while holding Ctrl would select the same interval on that track.
Objects on different tracks can be animated independently, i.e. each track can contain different sets of key frames and different interpolation settings.
Moving and Rearranging
To move an Animation Track:
1. Point it on the Tracks panel.
2. Hold the Left Mouse Button.
3. Drag the Track to a new position:
Note
Dragging one Track on top of the other will create a Folder (see below) on this other track; the Track you’ve been dragging will be placed inside this folder.
Renaming
To rename a Track:
1. Click its title with the Right Mouse Button.
2. Enter a new title.
3. Press Enter.
Working with Tracks
To work with Animation Tracks, there is a dedicated set of buttons on the Timeline:
1. Add Folder
Creates a new Folder - an entity that is attached to an Animation Track and can store other Tracks in it. Folders are used to organize Tracks into hierarchical structures.
Also creates a new Track placed inside the Folder.
2. Add Track
Creates a new Animation Track. All currently selected objects are placed on this Track.
3. Remove Track
Deletes the currently selected Animation Track.
Tracks that have objects on them cannot be deleted.
4. Merge Tracks
Combines all the currently selected Tracks into one Track; this new Track would contain all objects from the merged Tracks.
This way you can remove Tracks without losing their content.
5. Add Objects to Track
Adds the currently selected scene objects to the currently selected Track.
The last two buttons control how the Tracks panel is scaled:
6. Automatically adjust tracks width
If this is enabled, the length of the Track panel is automatically scaled to fit the titles of the Tracks.
Enabled by default.
As shown in the example above, the option is automatically disabled if you scale the panel manually.
7. Automatically adjust tracks height
Same as above, but for the vertical size of the panel.
Disabled by default.
Locking and Hiding
You can also hide (1) and lock (2) Tracks by clicking checkboxes near their names.
If a track is hidden, objects it contains will not be visible in the scene.
If a track is locked, you won’t be able to select objects in it in the Viewport.
If you double-click a locked track, you’ll get this error message:
