Advanced: Per-Property Modes

Toggle ▶ Advanced to reveal a second family of buttons. Where marker mode applies a curve to every property on a layer at once, these buttons work per property. They come in two flavours — Per-Segment and Default + Exceptions — and the same button can do different things depending on which flavour is already active on the property.

Check the modifiers first

Both Velocity Match (Animate tab) and Direct to Keys (Advanced section) silently change how every button below behaves. A forgotten setting is the most common source of "wait, why did it do that?" results.

Per-Segment mode

Apply a curve to specific keyframe pair(s) on a property. Everything else on that property uses After Effects' native interpolation. Best for fine, surgical control — e.g. a motion path where one specific move needs a curve while the rest drifts naturally.

Button	What it does	Selection
Apply to Selected Keys	Applies the active curve to each selected keyframe pair.	2+ keyframes
Span Selection with Curve	Stretches one curve evaluation across the whole selected range; intermediate keys are ignored. Ideal for motion-path arcs.	3+ keyframes
Remove Curve from Selected Keys	Strips the curve so the selected segments drift with native interpolation.	2+ keyframes
Create Curve from Selection	Samples the easing of the selected keys and saves it as a new reusable curve, normalized 0–100 with straightened handles.	2+ keyframes

Default + Exceptions mode

Set one curve as the property's default — every consecutive key pair uses it — and a master blend control governs how the curves overlap. Best when the property is mostly uniform and only a few pairs need to differ.

• Apply to All Keys on Selected Property — establishes the property's default curve and creates a paired blend slider on the control layer.

The per-segment buttons become exceptions

Once a property is in Default + Exceptions mode, clicking Apply to Selected Keys, Span Selection with Curve, or Remove Curve from Selected Keys on that property adds an exception to the default — overriding the default curve on those keys only. It does not switch the property to Per-Segment mode.

To go back to Per-Segment mode, remove the default first (e.g. Remove Curve from Selected Keys over the whole property, or strip the expression manually).

Worked mix-and-match

A typical sequence on one property: apply Smooth Ease to all keys (default + blend); then on a single pair override with Anticipate + Overshoot via Apply to Selected Keys; then on a quiet section run Remove Curve from Selected Keys so it drifts natively. The rest of the property keeps the default Smooth Ease.

The keyframe-index gotcha

Per-property expressions track keyframes by index (1, 2, 3, …). Adding or removing a keyframe with native tools before existing curve calls in the expression shifts those indices and throws the mapping off.

• Safe: adding or removing keyframes after all the keys the expression already references. The earlier indices are untouched.
• Breaks the expression: inserting or deleting keyframes earlier than existing curve calls. Every index after the change shifts by one.

Add & remove keys the safe way

Use the ＋ Add Keyframe and − Remove Keyframe buttons in the Advanced section whenever you're editing inside or before an existing curve range. They insert or delete a key and update the expression's indices, so nothing breaks. If you've already edited keys natively and the expression has gone wonky, reselect the range and re-apply the curve.

Direct to Keys

Check Direct to Keys before applying to bake the curve straight into keyframe easing — no expression, no control-layer link. CurveConductor inserts the needed keyframes and writes the timing into their handles. The result is permanent: edit it and you'll re-apply.

Turn on Start/End velocity matching before baking to match the incoming and outgoing speed at the segment edges while preserving the curve's interior shape — handy when a baked segment meets hand-tuned drift.

Choose Direct to Keys when…

…you want a clean file with native keyframes, or you're handing work to someone who doesn't have CurveConductor. For procedural, editable timing, leave it unchecked.

Performance: turn off the expression graph

The Expression Graph Editor recalculates in the background even when you're not looking at it, which makes dragging laggy. Toggle it off and scrubbing/dragging gets snappy again.