custom scripted actions for frame-by-frame animation

[David BK]

Hello,

I'm looking into creating some custom actions for navigating Photoshop's timeline for 2D animation. My goal is to create two hot-keys (F1/F2) that move forward/backward on the timeline, and snap to the start of each layer whilst selecting the layer at the same time (see the image).

Using the Alt + ] shortcut allows you to select the next layer, but unfortunately the play-head does not follow. Conversely, the left/right arrows allow you to move the play-head one frame at a time, but it does not select the layers while doing so. My goal is to combine the two functions so that I don't need to perform any mouse actions.

The tricky part is that each layer will have a different length, so I need to move the play-head to the next LAYER (not the next FRAME). Here's how I think the script/action should operate: select the layer above, determine the start time of that layer, go to that time. I have no idea how to obtain the start time of a layer through script though...

Any advice or links would help.

Cheers!

[skilled_thinking15A8]

Hi David,

Could you post your feature request here: http://feedback.photoshop.com/photoshop_family please?

So that, everybody could vote on it and we could follow the evolution and the status of the thread!

And I will be the first to vote and add comments

Cheers

[David BK]

Thanks Stéphane,

I just posted it request here:

http://feedback.photoshop.com/photoshop_family/topics/custom_scripted_actions_for_frame_by_frame_ani...

[Samelot]

Have you experimented with the Script Listener - observing what is produced when fiddling with the timeline? I was going to eventually want to learn how to script certain things in the timeline myself, but haven't yet got around to it. When I looked into it not too long ago, I saw pretty much nothing about the timeline in the photoshop js scripting guide.