Level Sequence/UMG: Pasting a keyframe is not accurate when clicking and creates duplicate keyframes instead

General Issues and Bug Reporting
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Summary

So I had this issue since UEFN released and I never quite figure out what causes my animations not to behave as wanted inside level sequences and UMG. I would have a key that I clicked, then Ctrl + C, click another key, Ctrl+V and the key information would not paste. But today I found what really happens and I think its unintended behavior.

So when you click on a key that is very close to a snap point time. For example, lets say your key is close to 1.5 seconds, and the key position is precisely at 1.49. When you click on that key with Snap ON, the snap point doesn’t go to 1.49, but to 1.5, even though you cannot see it on the timeline. So when you paste thinking you have selected the key, you are instead pasting next to it and creating two keys, which then messes up your animation. Regardless of snap, selecting a key should snap to that key, to avoid cases like these (like all animation and timeline software do).

Please select what you are reporting on:

Unreal Editor for Fortnite

What Type of Bug are you experiencing?

UI/Tools

Steps to Reproduce

Open a level sequence
Turn off snap
Add and animate something obvious using two keys. First key is placed at the beginning of the animation (0 seconds), and the other at 0.99 seconds (zoom in to precisely place)
Now turn on snap
Check to see how your animation plays
Click on first key and press Ctrl+C to copy it
Click on the second key and press Ctrl+V to paste it
Check your animation again

Expected Result

There is no animation because both keys are the same

Observed Result

The animation plays as like before the paste happened, but the animation target will snap to the first key at the end

Platform(s)

PC

2

Hello, thanks for the repro. I think what is happening is that the setting Snap to the Interval is forcing the key you paste at 0.99 to be pasted at a whole integer frame (ie. 1.0).

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We’ve been looking separating Snap to the Interval from Snapping altogether so that Snapping deals with snapping keys and sections to other keys and sections and not so much about keeping things on whole frames. We will be removing Snap to the Interval from this menu and adding a separate button Force Whole Frames which will allow you to toggle that behavior. With these proposed changes and your repro, if I turn OFF Force Whole Frames, I can successfully paste the key to 0.99 without having it jump to 1.0.

Hope this makes sense and is an improvement. I will try to revisit this thread once the changes are in.

2 Likes
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Thank you for this! This makes total sense. Then agreed its a UX issue, I never expected this behavior to actually have a setting, let alone been turned on by default (as this seems like a more niche case)

Also, partly why this was an issue as well is because there is no indication on the timeline that there are two keyframes close together, if there was a change in the key icon when two are close (happens in other cases, but not in this one), that would be a great tell that something is up, and will hint it better to the user on how it happened.

Hope this helps, thanks for clarifying!