Scene blocking is putting your characters in the correct place at the correct time throughout your scene. A character can move through the scene or interact with other characters or objects.

Before moving characters around in a scene, you must add them into the scene. Once that’s completed, you may add keyframes to move and rotate them.

Setting Keyframes

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The basic task of creating Scene Blocking is to set keyframes.

Keyframe = the location on a timeline that marks the beginning or ending of a transition. More simply stated, a marker in a moment of time.

Keyframes are how Filmatick understands where your actors or props must be a moments in time, determined by the user. This includes movement, rotation, and scaling.

Before Setting a Key

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Objects need to be labeled that they are able to be keyed. This allows Filmatick to know which characters will be animated or not. Anything in Filmatick can be animated: actors, props, walls, doors, any object.

1. To make an object animatable, RIGHT CLICK on the object.

2. A Pop-up window will show.

3. Click on Animate Prop

Once this is complete, the object name will appear in the Dopesheet and a Key will be added at the very first frame. The Key is a diamond shape. The top and bottom of the diamond, are placed on the frame where the key is.

In the case of Lisa (in the image to the right), the first key is placed on frame 1.

Setting a Keyframe

When setting keys, it’s best to remember the process so you can create keys quickly. The user will go to the time in the timeline where they want to set a key, select and move the object they want to key, and set the key. Once the object is selected, the user can change time in the dopesheet and add multiple keys.

The easiest way to set keys is to think of a simple 4 step process:

1. Move the Scrubber (the blue timeline marker) to the frame you want to add a key.

2. Select the object you want to key.

3. Move/rotate that object in either the topdown or perspective view.

4. Hit the letter “s”. This is the hotkey for setting a keyframe. You can also click on the Key Button on the dopesheet.

Making a character Stay in Place (Hold)

Sometimes, we want a character to stay in the same place for a fixed amount of time before moving to another place. This is called Placing a Hold on the character. In Filmatick, it’s as easy as setting a key frame, without moving the character.

To make the character stay in the same place:

1. Move the Scrubber (the blue timeline marker) to the frame for how long you want the character to stay.

   1. IE - If the character is going to stay from 10 seconds to 12 seconds (stay in place for 2 seconds), the first key would be at 10 seconds and the second would be at 12 seconds)

2. Select the object you want to stay.

3. Hit the letter “s”, or click on the Key Button to set a keyframe.

Using AutoKey

AutoKey is a toggle that allows the user to set keyframes by simply moving or rotating an object. Once the object has been manipulated, Filmatick will automatically put either a new key or overwrite the key that was there. Read a little more on AutoKey here.

Colors for the Keyframes

When adding keyframes, the keys may be in different colors. These are only to show where the keys are in relation to each other.

Teal - normal keyframe

Translucent Teal - two keys are very close to each other

Yellow - two keys are exactly on the same frame - it’s best to delete one of the keys.