Features

The whole panel, page by page.

Hextion has twelve pages, and each one has its own letter key. Here is every page and what it holds.

Wide or narrow. Light or dark.

Dock it as a strip beside the timeline or give it a whole screen. The layout rearranges itself to fit, and the light and dark themes were each designed on their own.

`H`Home

Create layers, the inspector, the align dock and 28+ quick tools.

Create row: a null, an adjustment layer trimmed to your selection, a solid in your colour, text, shape or camera in one click, with an anchor-point pad.
Inspector: the selected layer's position, scale, rotation, opacity and anchor, live; drag a number to scrub it.
Align dock: align, centre, fit or fill, to the comp, the selection or a group.
28+ quick tools in four groups: layers (precompose each, true duplicate, split, flip, offset, trim to below, split masks, text exploder, paste image), keyframes (eases, elastic, bounce, reverse, keys to playhead, loop, echo trail, bake and clear expressions), comp and look (resize comp, comp cutter, fill, gradient lock, subtitles from .srt, purge) and reel tools (text on path, cursor and clicks, 3D sticker text, put behind subject).
Blend modes: eight modes, each with a preview that shows what it does.
Autosave: saves your project every few minutes and keeps dated backups beside it. Off until you switch it on.
Today: a focus timer, a task list with priorities, a weekly activity chart and system status, all stored on your computer.

Home: the create row, inspector and quick tools.

`F`Favourites

Everything you starred, from every page.

Star anything with its star, or Alt+click it. Every page has its own Favourites tab, and this page collects them all.

Favourites: everything starred, from every page.

`T`Text

Animations, text effects, auto captions, character and type on a path.

40+ text animations in six groups. They work on any text layer and never change its font, colour or position. In, In and Out or Out; by letters, words or lines; speed, stagger and order. Timing sliders appear in Effect Controls.
20+ text effects: typewriter, decode, slot machine, number, percent and currency counters, countdowns, stopwatch, live clock, date roll, text cycle, blinking and more.
Auto captions in 92+ looks: 52+ caption lockups on six shelves and 41+ classic styles. Six simple controls on every lockup, and a custom studio for fonts, colour, outline, glow, shadow and how words come in.
Getting the words: transcription with your own key for the supported speech-to-text service, or import an SRT or VTT file for free, in any language.
One layer per word, each with markers you can drag to retime, under a null with size and pop sliders.
Character: fonts shown in their own face, size, tracking, fill and stroke, a highlighter and a font replacer.
On the path: type that flows along a path you draw, with a 3D tilt.

`M`Motion

Entrances, expressions, a graph editor, shakes, proximity and carousels.

20+ entrances in four groups with a fine-tune panel: direction, distance, ease, fade, scale, spin, blur, length, stagger and order. Real keyframes.
22+ motion expressions: wiggles, handheld camera, jitter, drift, wind sway, pendulum, inertia and more, with Amount and Speed sliders.
Graph editor with 38+ curves: drag the handles or type values, apply to selected keyframes, and feel it in the preview.
18+ cut shakes in four groups, placed at the playhead or on every cut in a selection. Each is a short adjustment layer you can move or trim.
Proximity: a null effector and 10+ templates where layers react to how close the null is: move, scale, tilt, fade, blur and more.
12+ 3D carousel layouts driven by one null with sliders. Spin by keys or speed, bake to keyframes, or remove it and get your layers back.

Motion: entrances with a keyframe timeline.

`S`Shapes

Shapes, trim paths, modifiers, liquid glass, morph and UI templates.

13+ shapes sized to your comp, in your fill and stroke colours.
Trim paths: seven draw-on patterns with length, ease, stagger and direction.
Stroke and style: dotted and dashed lines with marching ants, tapers, caps and corner roundness.
12+ modifiers, each shown on an animated card.
30+ UI templates: comment and chat threads, post cards, a login form, a code input, a cookie banner, a review card, a poll, a payment form, a weekly calendar, a revenue card and more. Texts stay editable, and they animate by rows, words or the whole template.
Liquid glass in 8+ shapes and 4+ styles, with frost, bend, rim light, shadow and motion. Two layers per glass, fully editable.
Morph: select two or more shapes and get one layer that morphs between them, including one glass into another.
Framing grid: five guide layouts that never render.

`E`Effects

Your effects, the ones in this comp, presets and expressions.

My effects: find any effect in your After Effects, save effect stacks with their settings, and apply them in one click.
In this comp: every effect in the open comp, grouped, with switches, and one switch that turns heavy effects off for smooth playback.
Many layers: set, add to or multiply one effect value across every selected layer.
Presets: your own .ffx presets from After Effects' User Presets folder, with previews.
Expressions: twelve starters plus your own library, saved from any property.

`L`Templates

330+ text templates, including 16+ title lockups.

330+ text templates, built in your comp as normal editable layers. Type your words, press Add, and timing sliders appear in Effect Controls.
Half sorted by look into 14 shelves, from captions, glow and stacks to big words, highlights, calls to action and kinetic type.
Half in topic packs such as sport, food, podcast and real estate.
Options on every template: in, in and out, or out; by words, letters or lines; four lengths; accent colours.
A big live preview plays the picked template with your own words before you add it.

`I`Icons

190,000+ icons and emoji, as vector layers.

91+ open-source icon and emoji sets, searched all at once or browsed by kind. The library downloads once (about 900 MB) and works offline after.
Hextion's own 130+ icons work before the download.
Dropped in as vector shape layers, with size, colour, weight, six looks and five entrances.
Licences shown per set on the Icons page.

`V`Media

Your own folders, plus 300+ Hextion sounds.

A browser for your own folders of footage, music, sound effects, images, LUTs and presets. Search everything, hover to scrub, preview with in and out points, then drag into After Effects.
Hextion Sounds: 300+ original sound effects in 19+ folders, from UI, whooshes and paper to risers, hits, typing and money.
Favourites and recents for files you use often.

`C`Color

Palettes, gradients, 21+ grades and a contrast check.

Palettes and moods: seven palettes and 26 moods, plus colour harmonies from any base colour.
Colour window: a hue wheel, sliders, hex and an eyedropper that picks from your comp.
Gradients: press Random until you like one, in five styles with grain, blur, warp and flow; add it as one editable layer.
21+ colour grades, previewed on a sample photo or your own frame, applied as an adjustment layer, with 21+ matching .cube LUTs for Lumetri.
Check: WCAG contrast and how your colours look to people with colour blindness.

`P`Project

Relink, beat markers, organise, rename and fonts.

Relink: find missing footage by name and see every match before relinking.
Beat markers: a marker on every hit, kicks only, or a steady grid. Needs the free ffmpeg.
Organise: sorts a project into folders, shows the plan first and deletes nothing.
Rename: batch rename and number layers with a live before and after.
Fonts: every font a comp uses.