Behaviors versus keyframes

When you apply a behavior to an object (or to a specific object parameter) in your project, no keyframes are added. Rather, behaviors automatically generate a range of values that are then applied to an object’s parameters, creating animation over the duration of the behavior. Changing the parameters of a behavior alters the animation.

Traditional keyframes, on the other hand, apply specific values to a parameter. When you apply two or more keyframes with different values to a parameter, you animate that parameter from the first keyframed value to the last.

By design, behaviors are most useful for creating generalized, ongoing motion effects. They’re also extremely useful for creating animated effects that might be too complex or time-consuming to keyframe manually. Keyframing, in turn, might be more useful for creating specific animated effects where the parameter you’re adjusting is required to hit a specific value at a specific time. For more information about using keyframes in Motion, see Keyframing overview.

The animation created by behaviors can be converted into keyframes. See Convert behaviors to keyframes.