individual, identical key frames >into> one key frame with instances

[thomasteraoka]

Hi! I'm importing a PNG sequence of a held image. The image is exactly the same for 15 frames or so. Each of the 15 frames is its own key frame.

My question -- is there a way to convert 15 key frames (of the same exact image) into one key frame with 14 instances?

If you are familiar, TVPaint has command "recompute instances" that does what I'm looking for.

[Colin Holgate]

If in the timeline you select the second frame and shift-click select the last frame, so that only the first frame is not selected, you can right-click and select Clear Keyframe. That should make the first copy of the image last for 15 frames.

[thomasteraoka]

Thanks Colin, that works for the example I provided...

What if...

you had 2000 frames, duplicate frames scattered across 8 layers, and clearing all keyframes means individually scrolling back and forth through the time line, 8 times, to remove unnecessary keyframes? Is there a better way?

[Colin Holgate]

If you had 8 layers of images that were key frames from frame 1 to 2000, and hopefully 2000 is the last frame, you could click on the layers. Once all 8 layers are selected you would then command-click on each of the 8 first frames, to deselect them (control-click in Windows I guess). You now have frame 2 to 2000 selected in 8 layers without having done any scrolling. Then do the right-click Clear Keyframe.

[thomasteraoka]

Thanks Colin, I should have emphasized *scattered*, which would mean all layers have random clusters of unique key frames. No layer is the same, and no layers unique key frames occur on the same frame number.

[Colin Holgate · Accepted solution]

I'm sure there's a way to automate it, but I'm more sure you could do it manually faster than finding the automated way!

If it really is the same image, they're only costing you some keyframes. If they are different images that happen to look the same, you could Edit/Find & Replace, and do a find for the first image you no longer want. Do a Find All, to make sure there is something to find, then use the Replace All option to replace them with the image that you do want to use.

In the library you can view by Usage, to see if an image is no longer used anywhere, so you can then delete it.

[thomasteraoka]

Yes, I am looking for the way to automate it!

[ClayUUID]

You need to specify whether the "duplicate" PNGs are literal duplicates or different PNGs that just happen to look the same.

If the former, a script could do it. If the latter... yikes.