How do you filter Maya’s animation timelines so you can focus on a smaller group of animated objects? I’m trying to do character animation, and I either get a huge list of seemingly everything in the rig, or I can only adjust and view controls one at a time.

I'm doing character animation work where I need to use with a small group of controls (typically the hips, head, arms, legs, wrists and feet) in the various outliners. I’d like to set up my blocking pass, adjust timing in the dopesheet, before moving on to fingers, or finessing the curves in the graph editor.

I think this is a pretty classic approach to character animation, but google searches don’t turn up any tutorials on how to filter selected controls in the graph editor or dope sheet. Just general overviews on how to use the editor. Can somebody point me to some tutes or information sources?

I’m new to Maya, but have done lots of character animation in Cinema 4D. C4D has a hide selected/unselected objects command on their timeline that does this trick nicely (see attached images). They also have a bookmark option to save filtered objects in the timeline. Is there a Maya equivalent? The best I can come up with is to search by name, but not all rigs name their main controls consistently.

I realize that character rigs vary widely, but the ability to limit what Character Animation controls you see in the timelines should be in Maya someplace. Maya is a deep program so its easy for a newcomer like me to miss something. Apologies if I'm posting a newbie question in the wrong forum.