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Nellie25549498lchj
Participant
August 6, 2022
Question

my graph editor is acting really strange..

  • August 6, 2022
  • 1 reply
  • 7106 views

hello! so i was working on an edit and wanted to move a picture to the side. so i did the usual, easy ease, all that stuff, but then my graph editor looked completely different and weird... i don't know if i messed with the setting by accident but this is really confusing me... it also won't allow me to move the line next to the dot to the side, only downwards or upwards. sorry if this is confusing i don't know what the exact words for all of these things are

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1 reply

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Community Expert
Rick GerardCommunity Expert
Community Expert
August 7, 2022

You are looking at the Speed Graph. That's the white one. The display options are set to Edit Speed Graph and Show Reference Graph. The reference graph shows X and Y values, X is red, and Y is green. Value graphs are pretty useless for editing Position properties. You are better off using the Pen tool in the Composition panel to control the motion path of layers when animation Transform/Position. 

 

The speed graph controls the timing. 

 

You can change the display options by right-clicking inside the Graph Editor or by using the first two icons at the bottom starting from the left.

 

Here's a tutorial I did showing how to use the Graph Editor to fine-tune position animations.

 

 

I have a lot of Quick Tips on my Chanel. Some of them may be helpful. Quick Tips For After Effects

N
Nellie25549498lchjAuthor
Participant
August 9, 2022

this is what i mean 😞 the line just stays horizontal

R
Community Expert
Rick GerardCommunity Expert
Community Expert
August 10, 2022

You have created acceleration curves for the speed of the change in Scale. X and Y are locked, so you only get one line in the Speed graph. Before you start moving anything, the layer starts off changing Scale very quickly, then the rate of change slows down before it abruptly stops. You have enabled Show Reference Graph. That's where the second line comes from. There is no speed before the first keyframe or after the last keyframe because there are no other keyframes. There is no speed because there is no value change before the first keyframe or after the last. Everything is normal. 

 

The Scale value starts changing at about 200% per second. The rate of change is very fast after the first keyframe. That does not mean your Scale will be 200% higher in one second. It means that the total change in Scale is 200%, a little more than 200% faster at the start than at the end. You also have an abrupt stop to the change in value. There is no easing to the second keyframes scale value. 

 

Everything is correct. You have changed the rate of change for Scale, and moving the bezier handles only changes the acceleration curve. 

 

I'm not sure what you are trying to achieve. Right now, you have a layer that starts at about 278% scale and ends significantly larger. If you fiddle with the acceleration curve enough, you will get an overshoot to the last value. 

 

It takes a while to understand and properly work with the Speed Graph. Please tell us what you want to achieve, and we can point you in the right direction. You may be better off editing the Value graph and just getting rid of the reference graph. The Speed graph is much better for fixing the timing on anything that moves. The value graph is much better for single values like Rotation or Scale. 

 

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