Animation & Playback

Play and Pause

• Press the play button (in the timeline strip) or Space to play from the playhead.
• Press it again or Space to pause.
• Pressing play again resumes from where you are — it never rewinds unless there is genuinely nothing left to play (you are sitting at the end of the last branch of the walk).
• Space is ignored while you are typing in a field, so it never interrupts a name or number you are editing.

What Plays When You Press Play

Play starts in the branch you are in. When that branch's timeline reaches the end, playback does not stop — it continues into the child branch you chose as that split's continuation (or, where you have not chosen, the default branch, the one with priority order 1), and keeps going from branch to branch to the end of the walk.

In other words, play follows your picks: the branches you selected at each split, falling back to the default order-1 continuation wherever you have not chosen one. A single-branch scenario just plays its one timeline.

▶ Master Play vs Play

• Play (▶ / Space) plays the same walk from where you are and leaves the view alone. If the scenario tree is showing, it stays showing and follows the walk branch by branch, highlighting each branch as it plays.
• ▶ Master Play (in the branch panel) does the same thing but switches to the timeline view first, so you watch the walk with the ruler, tracks and playhead in front of you.

Resuming from Where You Are

Pause and press play again and you carry on from the exact time the playhead is on. During a walk the selection stays where you left it, so when the walk ends (or you stop it), play resumes from your branch and playhead, not from the branch the walk happened to be showing.

Speed Slider

The speed slider sits under the branch navigation buttons and runs from 0.1× to 3×. Pull it down for slow-motion analysis of a fast move, or up to review a long passage quickly. It scales the whole playback, and the playhead and animations stay in step.

Scrubbing the Master Bar

The master timeline above the bottom panel is one equal segment per branch. Drag its handle and the scenario walks across branches — the branch under the handle loads, the tree follows, and the playhead lands at the matching fraction of that branch's own length. Scrubbing the bar also stops any playback or walk in progress, because taking the handle means you are driving time yourself. See The Master Timeline.

Path Arrows and the 🎬 Viz Toggle

The glowing tube arrows show planned movement paths. An arrow is drawn for a window of time when the item's Graphic track is ON:

1. Select the item, place the playhead where the arrow should start, click Key Graphic (ON).
2. Move the playhead to where the arrow should end, click Key Graphic again (OFF).
3. The arrow shows between the two keys and follows the exact interpolated path (curves included).
4. Click the coloured bar between the keys to change that window's arrow colour — or reset to the item default.

The 🎬 viz toggle in the viewport turns these arrows off and on. Turning it off hides the arrows only — the animation itself still plays exactly as before, so you can watch a clean pitch, or record an image without path overlays.

The Playhead

The playhead is the orange vertical line in the branch's timeline, and it is the single source of "now": playback advances it, scrubbing moves it, and everything you place, move or key uses its time. During a walk the master bar's handle is derived from it, so the bar and the ruler always agree.

What Stops Playback

• Editing anything — dragging a key, moving an item, adding a key — pauses playback automatically.
• Selecting a branch — choosing a branch takes over and stops any walk or playback.
• Scrubbing the ruler or pulling the master handle — taking control of time stops the play button.
• Reaching the end of the last branch of the walk.

How Movement Plays Back

Between two movement keys the item travels along the segment's style — straight, curve left or curve right — with its curve amount and (for the ball) arch and arch height. The motion is always eased along a single smooth curve; there is no ease-in / ease-out setting. Players automatically face the direction of travel, and attached items (ball, zones) follow their target and inherit its motion.

An attached ball rides just in front of its player and is released at a detach key, continuing along its own movement path. Zones animate through their visual windows, morphing shape, radius and colour as the playhead crosses each visual key.