What is a simple technique to pause an animation in After Effects?

When aiming to pause an animation in After Effects, copying and pasting keyframes with the same values further down the timeline is an effective and straightforward technique. By doing so, you create a duplicate keyframe that holds the same properties as the preceding one, effectively freezing the animation at that point for as long as desired. This allows for precise control over the duration of the pause, as you can determine how long you want the animation to remain static by adjusting the spacing between the original and duplicated keyframes on the timeline.

The other methods, while they may seem plausible, do not directly provide the same efficiency or control as this approach. For example, inserting a pause keyframe is not an actual feature in After Effects—there is no dedicated keyframe type that serves simply to pause an animation. Changing the animation speed to zero would halt the entire animation but wouldn't necessarily create a seamless transition before or after the pause. Utilizing the Stop Time Effect might not provide the same level of clarity and precision that adjusting keyframes offers, making the copy-and-paste technique a preferable choice for stopping motion effectively.