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Multiple Timelines in Photoshop ArtBoard?

New Here ,
Feb 04, 2025 Feb 04, 2025

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I'm working with a project in Photoshop ArtBoard which contains several Artboards.  I have several separate animations in the project each located in a separate ArtBoard.  I want to activate each animation separatekyI've successfully loaded the animations.  However, what has become apparent is that all of the animations in the project share the same timeline.  So, you play one animation, and all animations need to play.

 

My question is - is it possible to have multimple timelines in an ArtBoard project so each separte animation on each separate ArtBoard has its own timeline?  If that is possible, how is it done?

 

Thanks!

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Adobe
Community Expert ,
Feb 04, 2025 Feb 04, 2025

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I don't know 100% for sure, but I very much doubt it.  Are these video or frame animations?  Frame animations are a nightmare if you are moving multiple objects.  It's much easier with video.  How complex are the animations?  Animate might be a better bet, but maybe even Adobe Express depending on the content.  I have little experience with those apps though.

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New Here ,
Feb 04, 2025 Feb 04, 2025

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These are .mov videos.  I'm attempting to use ArtBoard for creating storyboards that would support video, animation, and audio and not just stills.  The limitation I'm running into though is having  to use a single timeline across a whole project with multiple ArtBoards.  When you're using video, animation, or audio in a project you want to be able to have a separate timeline for each page or scene.  

 

With Photoshop ArtBoard being such a robust product you would think there would be way to have separate timelines to accomodate each media playback, rather than having to share one timeline for an entire project of separate scenes, video, animation, audio.  You would think there would be a workaround for such a need and that Adobe would have addressed ths by now.  You would think there would be a way to even use the single timeline with different keyframes for different locations on the timeline for each media playback.  But that does not seem to be available.

 

Is there another Adobe product that would meet this need better?  Any suggestions?  Thanks!

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Community Expert ,
Feb 04, 2025 Feb 04, 2025

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What is your intended end product?  Do you intend outputting four separate videos?  Or a single video with four windows playing simultaneously?  Is it for a specialist web site where the user can select each video?  

 

Right now, I am struggling to understand why you need to edit the videos on the same screen?  You could share graphics between them no problem.

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New Here ,
Feb 04, 2025 Feb 04, 2025

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My intended end product is a storyboard.  But what would make this storyboard unique is that it would not comprise just still images.  But would also comprise video, animation, and audio clips.  I do not intend to edit the videos on the same screen.  I would use a video edtor for that.  But, what I want to do is place different assets such as video, animation, and audio on different ArtBoards and play them independently.  Right now I can't do that becuase I'm restricted to them all using the same singular timeline.  I was just wondering if there was any way to play these assets on different ArtBoards with their own timeline rather than playing all of the assets at once from the one timeline.  But that appears to not be possible, unless I am overlooking something.  Thanks!

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Community Expert ,
Feb 05, 2025 Feb 05, 2025

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How would the separate videos play in the storyboard?  Copuld you arrange stills and video sequentially, and allow enough time for the stills to be seen before the next still or video played?  You could highlight the frame you want the focus on with maybe an outline, or you could dim all frames that do not have the focus by placing a 25% opacity layer above them in the timeline.  It's the method of playback or how the viewer will experience the storyboard I am asking about.  Making it work is actually very easy.

image.png

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New Here ,
Feb 05, 2025 Feb 05, 2025

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Thank you for your suggestion and graphic.   Let me start by saying the viewer at this point is me - the developer.  The purpose of a storyboard is for a developer to lay out suggested assets in the devlopment of a story - the storyboard becomes a sketch pad for the final product.  Hopefully, in this process the devloper will have a chance to try out ideas before putting them all together in a final product.  What is somewhat uniue in the approach I am using is that I am interested in using timeline based dynamic assets - video, animation, audio - instead of just still images more typically used in storyboards.

 

You suggest "Making it work is actually very easy."  Ideally all of the assets would appear on an ArtBoard page at once.  The dynamic assets would appear as stills until clicked and then each would come to life individually.  The part I don't see as easy is how to do this using the constraints of ArtBoard and using a single Timeline per project as is shown in your graphic.  My understanding of the above graphic is that the only way that would work is to press Play in the timeline and it would play through each element - not only on this Artboard, but through each element used in the entire project.  This is why I originally titled this post multiple timelines in Artboard - whether it was possible, and if so how is it done.  At this point, I'm still seeing a single timeline for the entire project - which will comprise approxiimately 25 ArtBoards - one timeline supporting multiple assets for 25 ArtBoards.  Ideally, on each ArtBoard page you would want the constant availability of each asset until the next page was selected with at least a separate timeline per page if not a separate timeline for each dynamic asset.  And I'm not seeing that.  Perhaps it is not available in ArtBoard, but it would be of help as a suggestion in future upgrades.  Thanks again for your help!

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Community Expert ,
Feb 12, 2025 Feb 12, 2025

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quote

With Photoshop ArtBoard being such a robust product

By @pacificm

 

This is debatable. Artboards were a relatively recent addition in the history of Photoshop, added in response to web/mobile design to an application that was originally designed for print graphics. There are a number of ways that the “bolted-on” nature of artboards can be observed, such as the confusing way artboards interact with document size (Crop tool, Image Size, Canvas Size…), and how only the newer Export commands can export artboards properly. 

 

The way I interpret this problem is that not being able to have a different timeline for each artboard is another symptom of artboards still not being fully integrated with Photoshop.

 

Animation is a secondary feature in Photoshop. It’s great that it has it, but again the video and animation features of the Timeline are quite limited compared to software designed around motion.

 

Many animators (and special effects teams for cinema and TV) use Adobe After Effects. Some people even call it Photoshop for animation. For projects with multiple components, the Adobe video apps (Premiere Pro and After Effects) offer nested timelines, so for example you can have a parent timeline for the entire project, and nest sub-timelines that animate components. For example you could create a timeline that animates a wheel that rotates once per second, then drop two of those into another timeline of a car (so that the car now has two rotating wheels), and then animate the car across the project timeline. 

 

After Effects also provides far more control over keyframes than Photoshop, such as what kind of interpolation between keyframes you want, and acceleration/deceleration in and out of keyframes. 

 

P.S. I just read your reply that you’ve moved on to Apple Keynote. After Effects has a steep learning curve, so if Keynote is doing the job, that’s great. I have seen many impressive demos of the animation possibilities in Keynote, and need to learn a little more about those myself. (Apple also has an application called Motion that’s like After Effects but not quite as deep.)

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Community Expert ,
Feb 04, 2025 Feb 04, 2025

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I'm not an expert in video, but artboards were designed to do graphic layouts, not really for video. So I'm not surprised that you're having this problem. I would think Premier Pro or After Effects would bea better choice.

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New Here ,
Feb 12, 2025 Feb 12, 2025

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After much consideration I've decided that ArtBoard is not an appropriate software for the storyboard project with separate timelines specification.  ArtBoards just doesn't support that.  I've decided to use a rather simple software solution that supports separate timelines - Apple Keynote.  Since I'm working with Apple, I went with Keynote.  I can import virtually anything into Keynote and play back each slide.  Nothing will be created in Keynote.  It will just act as a container for anything in a particular scene.  I also realized that aside from the actual storyboard I needed a related document - an Asset Manager.  The purpose of this document is to contain all of the related files and their location for any particular scene.  Here again, Keynote is serving this need.  I needed a document where I could locate all of the assets for each scene and their location on my system.  Thanks to all who helped in my exploring this question.  The best to you all!

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