PowerPoint Animations
Date Created:
Last Updated: September 3rd 2011
02/04/2013 10:57 PM
Learn PowerPoint 2010 for Windows: Twin Trigger Animation
The other day a friend asked me how she could add a trigger animation to a slide object – but with a difference! She inserted a picture on a slide (let’s call this Picture 1) and then placed another picture of the exact same size over the first one (let’s call this Picture 2). She then wanted to click Picture 2 to cause a trigger animation on Picture 1 – this caused Picture 1 to be revealed, almost like the example explained in our Trigger Animations in PowerPoint 2010 tutorial. However, what she wanted next was to click on Picture 1 to reveal Picture 2. So to put this in a few words, this is what she wanted: Click on Picture 2 to reveal Picture 1 (and hide Picture 2); and Click on Picture 1 to reveal Picture 2 (and hide Picture 1).
10/01/2012 01:12 AM
By default all versions of PowerPoint show you a preview when you add an animation to any slide object. While this is a great option for those who are new to PowerPoint animation, you will certainly not like this automatic preview feature if you are an advanced user. Yes, these previews can be irritating, especially if you add timed animations of longer duration -- maybe a 20 second animation. You will then have to wait until PowerPoint shows you the preview you did not ask for. Make a small change and you get another 20 second preview. If you are creating a slide with ten animations, the wait for each preview to happen can become quite frustrating! Fortunately, it is easy to turn off these previews in PowerPoint 2010 and 2013 for Windows.
09/30/2012 09:42 PM
Animation is movement – and nothing captures attention of the human eye like a “little” movement. More movement does not get more attention – in fact too much animation results in distraction. Even if you decide to use just a wee bit of animation, that can still be an approach that will go astray if your animation is not relevant to your slide content. Also animation needs to be part of your story – something that you plan from the moment you develop your slide content – and not something that you add at the last moment to bring in some pizzazz! Clearly there are a few guidelines that you must be aware of before using any animation in your slides – here are some thoughts to get you started.
09/15/2012 09:56 PM
PowerPoint Animation: Alarm Clock
This sample presentation includes 3 animated clocks that are equipped with old-fashioned alarm bells that ring after either 1, 2, or 5 minutes – depending upon the clock you choose! Use these in a quiz session, a quick break, or adapt them to run a longer time and use for an assignment time – or even a lunch or tea break! These clocks have been created using basic PowerPoint shapes and are made Theme aware so that when you copy them to your presentation, they appear in harmony with the overall appearance of your slide content.
08/30/2012 10:01 PM
Learn PowerPoint 2010 for Windows: Add Trigger for Sound and Movie Actions
An interactive PowerPoint presentation always interests audiences since it gets them involved actively navigating the slides. However, the audiences for whom these interactive slides are intended must be aware that some interactivity has been included so that they can click a slide object to cause an action to happen. With trigger animations, you click on a PowerPoint shape (or even an Action Button or any other slide object) to cause an audio or video clip on the same slide to play, pause, resume, or even stop.
08/27/2012 09:16 PM
Learn PowerPoint 2011 for Mac: Add Sound to Animation
The main purpose of adding animation to any slide object is to draw the attention of the audience to some concept. After adding animation, you can set the animation event, and also the speed of the animation. To make it more interesting, you may also want some sound to play along with the animation. One aspect that you should always remember is that although you can add sound to an animation, it is not always necessary to do so -- we suggest you only add sound sparingly -- and even then, you must make sure that the sound adds some value to the animation. In addition, it is important that you use the perfect sound type for any animation -- using clapping or roaring sounds is very cliché. Now that we have made you aware about the caveats, let us go ahead and explore the actual procedure.
08/23/2012 09:31 PM
Learn PowerPoint 2011 for Mac: Build and Sequence Animations
In PowerPoint, you can effectively illustrate a concept, a process, or anything else using animation. But the fact that you should be aware of is, even though animation is movement and a fine art at the same time, there's a thin dividing line between mere movement and utter confusion. Imagine a training session where the presenter moves around the room explaining a concept -- as he or she moves, the eyes of the audience members follow him or her. There is a clear focus in the room, and the subject of that focus is the presenter. Now imagine another situation where the presenter and all the audience members in the room start moving in disparate directions just for the sake of movement -- at this point of time, the movement has given way to chaos. Thus movement needs to have focus and direction, and more importantly, a reason to move!
08/19/2012 10:17 PM
Learn PowerPoint 2011 for Mac: Change Animations
Once you have an animation applied to a particular slide object, the need to change that animation may arise for several reasons: You realize that another animation effect would work better, or you want to make all animations across the entire presentation consistent. You may also want to use a more subtle or exciting animation effect. Typically, in the situations like these, users can just remove the animation and apply another animation to the slide object. But, PowerPoint's Change Animation option makes this a one-click step.
08/15/2012 09:43 PM
Learn PowerPoint 2011 for Mac: Animate Text
You animate text just the way you animate any slide object in PowerPoint. Additionally, there's more you can do to text animation, as we shall explore in this tutorial. By default, when you animate a text placeholder or text box, all the text contained animates at one go unless your text content is within a bulleted or numbered list -- in that case, all text animates as sequenced bulleted lists. Even then, the animation is sequenced to first level paragraphs (first level bullets) only -- and any sub-bullet levels contained in your text placeholders or text boxes animate along with its parent level. In this tutorial you will learn how you can access some specialized options for animating paragraphs and bulleted text sequentially by words, by letters, and by paragraph levels.
08/13/2012 10:34 PM
Learn PowerPoint 2011 for Mac: Animate Charts
In this series on using animation in PowerPoint 2011, you have already explored how you can apply animation to any slide object, and then tweak the animation speed and animation events. Charts can also be animated in a similar way -- however PowerPoint provides some extra animation options that are applicable only to charts. For example, you can animate series and categories individually as required -- and, you can also decide whether you want to animate the plot area or not. In this tutorial you'll learn how to apply animation to chart and also explore the various chart animation options in PowerPoint 2011.