The fact that CSS3 was released in 1999 and such an app in 2023 is a cool HN-worthy post shows how easy, accessible/programmable/inspectable keyframe based animation got stuck with not much relief in sight. Flash dropped dead like a decade ago leaving a void, what remains is its husk as Adobe Animate, and droves of so-so frameworks and communities around them. Robust CSS/SVG based animation remained mostly an empty promise. You can find nice examples, sure, but it remains a niche craft.
Worth mentioning that After Effects can export CSS/SVG/canvas animations with the free bodymovin/Lottie plugin. This is my personal go to for creating web key frame animations and elements.
Not every after effects feature is exportable, but it’s the best and most reliable solution I’ve found for this type of workflow, maybe due in part though to my previous experience with AE.
I squarely blame Adobe for this stagnation, because I remember many people predicting that exactly this would happen when they bought Macromedia. Adobe just kills things, on purpose. Steve Jobs gets a side-order of blame.
So happy I don't give those shits money any more. Thanks Serif!
Transitions and Transforms weren't available in 1999. Proper CSS animation with keyframes was first available in 2009 and even then browser support wasn't great -- lots of polyfills like 'moz-' and 'webkit-' were required.
jQueryUI was miles ahead in terms of delivering cross-browser compatible UI animation, so why bother with CSS3 animation which wouldn't work on IE8?
I have no problem with this. Animation on the web improves a page 5% of the time and makes it worse 95% of the time.
I don’t need to see any more Flash “Loading…” screens in my lifetime, especially just to see nav menus.
Even with instant broadband loading, the nav menu is better when it’s not animated. The post-masthead features section is better when it’s not animated.
I feel like Flash was a technology that served to bridge the gap until faster cheaper internet and video streaming / hosting became mainstream.
These days, the demand is still there, but too niche, with people primarily using mobile device for content consumptions, and plenty of rich media content available in form of videos.
I've ended up using GSAP in this vacuum for sequencing.
It's a weird heir for all things animation on the web these days, it works great but something about the keyframing/sequencing process seems like it should be supported natively.
CSS as an animation spec is simply inferior so we failed to create an open community of people who cared enough about it - and people kept using other solutions
Are there any goodways of doing tool tips or hint what icons do on mobile? I do not understand what some icons do, I can test but as is said above no undo!
What a great tool! Got me inspired to play with CSS animations for a bit. I would suggest adding some animation timing functions to the animation presets. Without them, they look a little stale.
I was able to instantly edit an animation and add a “squishy” feel - by stretching the element at the keyframes, according to its motion; very satisfying.
One thing I couldn’t find is undo/redo. Is it there on mobile (or desktop for that matter)?
More feedback: I'd like for undo/redo to move me to the keyframe with the change; similar to how a cursor jumps in a text editor during undo/redo. It's a detail though and perhaps you have other features to work on.
