Auto-Orient
Turn the layer to face the direction it is travelling.
Auto-Orient reads where the layer was a moment ago, works out which way it is heading, and points it that way. An arrow follows its own path; a paper plane banks into a turn; a fish faces where it is swimming.
It reads the layer's actual motion, whatever produced it — keyframes, a motion path, another driver. Point a Random driver at X and Y and Auto-Orient will follow the wander.
When to reach for it#
- Arrows, planes, rockets, fish, cars — anything with a front.
- A layer riding a motion path that needs to lean into the corners.
- Instanced clones following a force field, so each one faces its own direction of travel.
How it works#
The heading is the angle between the layer's position now and its position Smooth seconds ago. A short window reacts instantly and jitters on a noisy path; a long one behaves like a vehicle with a turning circle.
A stationary layer has no heading. Rather than snapping to 0° every time the motion pauses — which makes an arrow flick east on every hold — the driver widens its look-back window up to eight times searching for real movement, and failing that leaves the rotation exactly where it was.
Parameters#
Degrees added to the heading. Set this to whichever direction your artwork actually points at rest: 0 if it points right, −90 if it points up.
The look-back window in seconds. 0.05 is twitchy and exact. 0.3 lags into turns and reads as weight. On a wobbly path, raise this before you touch anything else.
Blends between the layer's own rotation and the heading. Below 1 the layer only partly turns, which is how you get a lean rather than a full point.
Things that catch people out#
A layer that never changes position has no direction to face and keeps whatever rotation it has. This is the intended behaviour, not a failure.
See also#
Something here wrong or missing? Tell us in the community.