Adding unwanted keyframes

REMMedia wrote:

Whenever I attempt to change the parameter of a group that has an enabled animation already programed, Motion responds as if I have the record button activated even if I don't.

What you are seeing is expected. In Motion, if a parameter has any keyframes and you make a change that affects that parameter, the animation will update as if recording is enabled (it will auto keyframe at the current time). This behavior was introduced several years ago. In your case you should be able to reposition the entire animation path, with a keyboard shortcut. It's covered in the documentation here: http://help.apple.com/motion/mac/5.2/#/motn14748beb. See the section "Reposition the entire animation path".

Basically, to move an entire animation path without adding keyframes you select the layer, you should see the animation path. Then hold the command & option and click on the path or a keyframe in the path. You can now drag the entire path to a new location, maintain the animation and not add keyframes. FWIW, if you have applied the animation to a group, another option is you could also nest that group in another group and move the new parent group.

For the most part... 99.9% of the time, having Motion automatically add keyframes as you animate parameters is very convenient. You've run into the 0.1% case where it can be a real PITA.

There are a number of different ways to do this kind of thing in Motion... and none of them are any more right than any of the others. They basically come down to workflow preferences. You should try out every suggested method.

You may or may not like dealing with behaviors, but here's my 2¢ worth:

Another way to go would be to duplicate your animated group and position it in the canvas. Clear all keyframes (select the dropdown menu on the right edge of the parameter column to the right of the keyframe icon and Reset Parameter—and/or remove all behaviors). Since you're animating Rotation around an axis, right click on the Rotation parameter of the duplicated group and Add Parameter Behavior > Link (if you're animating *other* parameters as well, like Position, add Links to those as well). Into the source well drag the original Group "layer". You can use the Link > Scale parameter to adjust the relative speed and/or direction (by applying a negative value) of the object. It won't matter what changes you make to the original animation - rekeyframe, use behaviors, motion paths, whatever, the duplicate group will always "reflect" the original with the Linked behavior(s).