5 // Animation Assistance
A Wiggly World
The Wiggler keyframe assistant has several options that determine how a keyframe’s parameters are randomized.
GOTCHA
Simply Spatial A common problem in getting The Wiggler to work is selecting keyframes that have position values and wiggling with the Temporal option selected – try Spatial Path instead.
TIP
Wiggle Expression The preferred alternative to The Wiggler is the wiggle expression discussed in Chapter 35. It allows you to wiggle any parameter without altering or creating keyframes.
The Wiggler is a nifty keyframe assistant that can impart a nervous – or, when used more subtly, a randomized or less-perfect – quality to animations. It is most often used to automate the creation of jumpy titles by randomizing their position values, but it’s also useful for creating random values or deviations for any property or effect. The Wiggler keyframe assistant creates new keyframes between the first and last selected keyframes, randomly offset in value from where a parameter would normally be at each keyframe’s point in time. You could say it adds “bumps in the road” as a value interpolates from one location to the next. Open Window > The Wiggler or choose Workspace > Animation. To use The Wiggler, make sure you select at least two keyframes (they can even be the same value). The Wiggler is not affected by the work area. Options include: Apply To: The choices are Temporal Graph and Spatial Path. Spatial is available only for properties that have XY or XYZ axes, such as Position, Anchor Point, and Effects Point. Most properties are Temporal – in other words, values that change over time. Noise Type: Choices are Smooth or Jagged. There is little noticeable difference for many parameters. The biggest change occurs with Position keyframes, where Jagged has “broken” linear path handles in and out of the spatial keyframes, compared with the more rounded motion of the tangential handles you get with Smooth. (We’ll see in a moment how to change the keyframes interpolation type after the fact, so don’t sweat this option.) Dimension: Some properties – such as Opacity and Rotation – have only one parameter to change. If this is the case, the Dimension options are ignored. However, many properties – such as Position and Scale – have two dimensions. You can choose if only one of them gets wiggled, if all get wiggled the same (offset by the same amount), or if they get wiggled independently. All Independently is a good default for Position, but for properties such as Scale, All The Same is a better choice as it maintains the layer’s aspect ratio. Frequency: This is how often new keyframes are created, starting from the first selected keyframe. It can be thought of as the frame rate of the inserted keyframes. Note that if The Wiggler happens to encounter a keyframe between the first and last keyframes you selected (because it happened to be exactly where a new one would be created by the Frequency’s timing), it will overwrite that keyframe’s value. Only the values of the first and last keyframes remain unchanged. Magnitude: How much do you want a parameter randomized by? The amount of change will fall within the range set here, with larger values resulting in bigger changes. If a property has natural limits (such as 0%
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