Timeline is the animation engine built directly into the Artivive editor. Before Timeline existed, every layer in an Artivive artwork was static — it appeared when scanned and stayed in place. Video layers could play their own content, but the layers themselves could not move.

Timeline changes that. It lets you define, moment by moment, how each layer behaves over time — where it moves, how it rotates, when it appears or disappears, how it scales. The result is an AR experience where elements can drift, fly in, pulse, spin, synchronize with music, and choreograph together into a unified composition.

When to use Timeline:

• When you want layers to animate in sequence (a title fades in, then an image slides in below it)
• When you want elements to move continuously in a loop (a floating 3D object slowly rotating)
• When you want to synchronize animations to music or a narration
• When you want complex multi-layer choreography (a cinematic reveal)

When you might not need Timeline:

• When a looping video layer already carries all the motion you need
• When a static overlay is the right aesthetic choice

Timeline is a Pro Plus feature. If your account is on the free or Pro plan, upgrade before working through lessons 4.2 onward.

Open the Timeline panel by clicking the button at the bottom center of the editor. You will see the timeline interface — a horizontal sequence of tracks, one per layer, with a panel on the right showing available actions.

Every animation in Timeline is built from five core actions. Each action is added by clicking it or dragging it onto the timeline track for a specific layer.

Move To: Moves a layer from its current position to a new position over the duration of the action bar. The dotted line and blue preview in the editor show the layer's final position. Drag the blue preview to set where the layer will end up.

Rotate To: Rotates a layer by a specified number of degrees. You set the rotation amount in the action's settings. Useful for spinning elements, tilting objects, or adding subtle swaying motion.

Scale By: Resizes a layer by a multiplier. A Scale By value of 2 doubles the layer's size. 0.5 shrinks it to half. Use this for zoom effects, pulsing, or growing reveals.

Transform To: Combines Move To, Rotate To, and Scale By into a single action. Use this when you want a layer to simultaneously translate, rotate, and scale — which creates much more natural, organic movement than applying the three actions separately.

Show / Hide: Controls visibility at a specific moment. Unlike the other actions, Show/Hide has no duration — it is a point-in-time trigger. Place a Hide action at second 3 on a layer's track to make it vanish at exactly that moment. Use multiple Show/Hide actions on the same layer to create flickering, sequential reveals, or synchronized appearances.

Connecting actions to layers: When you add an action to the timeline, it appears with an orange icon, indicating it is not yet connected to a layer. Select the action, then use the "Layer to Affect" dropdown on the left to connect it to the layer you want to animate. Name your layers in advance — navigating a list of unnamed layers in a complex project is frustrating.

Adjusting speed: The length of an action bar on the timeline directly controls the duration of that action. Drag the right edge of a bar to make it longer (slower) or shorter (faster).

Speed curves define how an animation's velocity changes over its duration. They are the difference between movement that feels mechanical and movement that feels alive.

The speed curve is set per action in the action settings panel. Common curve types include:

• Linear: Constant speed from start to finish. Good for mechanical, precise movements. Can feel robotic when overused.
• Ease In: Starts slowly and accelerates toward the end. Good for objects gaining momentum.
• Ease Out: Starts fast and decelerates. Good for objects coming to rest naturally.
• Ease In/Out: Starts slow, peaks at full speed in the middle, then decelerates. This is the most natural-feeling curve for most animations.
• Elastic: Overshoots the target position and bounces back before settling. Good for playful, bouncy effects.
• Bounce: Similar to elastic but specifically simulates a physical bounce against a surface.

Experiment freely. There is no right or wrong curve for a given movement — it depends entirely on the feeling you want to create. A slow reveal with an Ease Out curve feels cinematic. The same reveal with Elastic feels playful.

Timeline duration is set at the top of the Timeline panel. This controls the total length of your animation loop. When the timeline reaches its end, it loops back to the beginning. If you set duration to 10 seconds, your animation plays every 10 seconds.

An important nuance: layers that are not connected to any Timeline action — like a video layer playing its own content — ignore the timeline duration entirely and loop on their own schedule. This means a 20-second video layer and a 10-second timeline can coexist, playing at their own rates independently.

As your compositions become more complex, you will often want groups of elements to move together — a heading and its subtitle, a set of icons, or a cluster of decorative elements.

Creating groups: Click the "Create Group" option in the editor, then drag and drop the layers you want to group into it. Once grouped, you can apply Timeline actions to the group as a unit. All elements inside the group inherit the same motion and timing. Any new layers you add to the group later automatically adopt the group's animations.

Combining multiple actions on a single layer: A layer can have multiple Timeline actions applied to it simultaneously. For example, you can have a Move To and a Rotate To running at the same time on the same layer, creating a spinning drift effect. When two actions of the same type (like two Move To actions) overlap on the same layer, the one that ends later or sits on top in the timeline takes priority.

Transform To for natural motion: In the real world, objects rarely move in just one dimension. A falling leaf rotates and scales as it falls. A character reaching for something translates and rotates simultaneously. The Transform To action captures this multi-axis movement in a single step, giving you combined control over position, rotation, and scale with one unified speed curve. Use it whenever you want movement to feel organic rather than constructed.

Layering the Show action: The Show/Hide action is useful beyond simple appearance control. You can trigger sound layers at precise moments, cause visual elements to flash in sync with music, or build a sequential reveal where elements appear one after another. Time your Show actions carefully and use Preview Mode to verify the synchronization.