- Only show the objects/layers which exist during the time interval currently shown in the timeline viewport. This means that if you're zoomed in on the end of the scene, a bunch of objects which only exist at the beginning of the scene won't result in a bunch of empty rows you have to scroll past.
- Don't use separate rows for objects that don't overlap in time; always show an object on the lowest possible row that respects the stacking order of overlapping objects. This mitigates the "stairway to heaven" effect where a series of sequentially appearing objects are shown on higher and higher rows in the timeline.
- Dynamically divide the space available for the timeline into rows based on how many rows are actually needed. When few rows are needed, this entirely eliminates the need to scroll, though scrolling will still be necessary if there are enough rows that they hit the minimum allowable height.
July 21, 2007
Stacking on the Timeline
One of my big frustrations with timelines in animation and NLE software is that, for a complex animation, you can end up with a whole bunch of distinct objects or layers so that you very quickly lose the ability to see what's going on in the timeline without lots of vertical scrolling. There are three remedies for this which I'd like to implement in moing:
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I'd like to suggest a fourth, relating to my stream of events idea (which, was originally, if not always, a UI idea):
Collapse objects with few, and mostly disjoint events into one row. This row can still have a stacking effect, though much more compact.
Perhaps I can make a mock and post it.
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