Timeline animation for video: company history in cut paper
A company history, a project roadmap or a biography is usually a timeline: a line, dates, a short caption and something to look at for each step. Animating one by hand means placing every card, timing each reveal and moving the camera so the viewer can read along.
In this example everything is cut paper on kraft paper. A red pin travels along a teal band, the camera follows it, and at each year a small photo card is pasted on with the year on yellow tape and a caption. At the end the camera pulls back to show all five milestones together, and the last one gets a starburst. The title «Наша история» ("Our story") and the pictures on the cards were not in the prompt: the plugin chose them to fit each event.
The prompt behind this clip
This exact text produced the clip above, word for word. It is in Russian, and the plugin reads English prompts the same way:
📝
Таймлайн истории компании: 2015 основание, 2017 первый офис, 2020 выход онлайн, 2023 тысяча клиентов, 2025 новый продукт, события появляются по очереди вдоль линии
Translation for reference (the clip was made from the Russian text above): a company history timeline: 2015 founded, 2017 first office, 2020 went online, 2023 a thousand clients, 2025 new product, the events appear one by one along the line.
Settings: Animation tier, style left on Auto (it picked Collage), 16:9, 1080p, 60 fps, 10 seconds. The page plays a smaller copy of the render.
How to make it in Premiere
Open your project and go to Window → Extensions → Butter Motion. The panel docks next to your other windows, so you never leave the edit.
Set the chips under the prompt to match your sequence: 16:9 and your sequence frame rate, 10 seconds, the longest an Animation scene runs, for five milestones. Matching aspect, resolution and frame rate means the clip lands on the timeline with nothing to conform.
Background: a full scene like this one stays With background. Animation can also render Transparent if you want the drawing over your own footage.
Switch the tier to Animation and pick Collage in the style dropdown at the top left of the composer. Auto also works: it picks the style from your prompt.
Paste the prompt, put in your own text and numbers, and press ↑ (or Cmd+Enter / Ctrl+Enter). The card goes through queued, generating, checking layout and rendering. It takes a few minutes, and you can keep cutting while it works. An Animation scene takes about 2 to 4 minutes and runs up to 10 seconds.
An Animation scene arrives with its sliders already open (for subscribers): main colours, the texts on screen, overall speed and optional elements. Anything they do not cover, type into the Tweak bar ("hold the full timeline longer at the end"). The style stays the same.
Press To timeline. The clip is rendered on your computer, imported into the «ButterMotion» bin and placed at the playhead.
What to change for your timeline
Years and events. Write them as pairs in order: "2015 founded, 2017 first office". In this clip every year and every caption is its own text control afterwards, and so is the title.
How many steps. Five fit in 10 seconds with room for the final overview. For more, split the history into two scenes.
The look. Collage suits a playful history. In the style dropdown, pick Flat for a clean corporate version or Blueprint for an engineering roadmap.
Motion and extras. The stars and the paper scraps switch off, the camera move and the speed are sliders, and the colours of the page, band, pin and cards are colour pickers in the controls.
Sound. The render comes with its own sound track, and the Sound switch turns it off. This page plays the video without sound.
Why not a timeline template
A timeline template has a fixed number of slots, and five events in a six-slot template means hiding one and re-timing the rest. A generated timeline is built for your dates and captions, draws its own picture for each event, and renders at the resolution and frame rate of your sequence.
What it costs
One generation at the tier you picked: Flash 7 credits, Ultra 10, Animation 15. Transparency, resolution, frame rate and length do not change the price. For subscribers the controls and the first tweak on each generation are free, and each tweak after that is 5 credits. Rendering and dropping the clip on the timeline cost nothing, and there is no watermark. Plans and credit packs are in the pricing section, the details in How credits work.