If you want to create movie-credits style animations in PowerPoint, you will miss the Crawl Entrance
animation option that was available in older versions of PowerPoint. You can substitute Crawl with
Fly In, and change the animation speed to something slower such as 15 seconds, and also set
the direction of the Fly In animation to From Bottom.
The Star Wars credits style is a variant of the Crawl animation. In this style, the text crawls from bottom to
the top, as it also does with Crawl. Additionally, the text diminishes in size all the time until it fades into
oblivion. It is a real neat effect, and it is possible to accomplish it in
PowerPoint 2010 if you combine multiple animations.
To get started, download our ready to use Starfield PowerPoint template that
already has a night sky background image. In the download, you will find the Starfield template available in both Standard and
Widescreen resolutions. You can use the one that you prefer. Before we proceed further, do remember to save your presentation after
each step!
- Open the Starfield PowerPoint template file in PowerPoint 2010. To create a new
PowerPoint presentation based on this template, save the file with a new name. Your saved presentation may now have two slides.
Delete one of the slides so that there is only one slide left. Then
change the Slide Layout of the remaining slide to
Blank, as shown in Figure 1, below.

Figure 1: New PowerPoint Presentation based on Starfield template
- Now insert a Text Box on your slide and
type one or two lines of the credits text. With the Text Box selected,
align text to the center of the Text Box, and
align the Text Box to the center of the
slide as shown in Figure 2. Since the background is dark, the text needs to be in white or any lighter color.
You might also want to make the text bold and/or increase the size of the font (see Figure 2 again).
Figure 2: Text added
- Now drag the Text Box to the bottom center of the slide and choose the Animations tab on the
Ribbon, highlighted in red within
Figure 3. With the Text Box selected, click the Add Animation button, as shown highlighted in
blue within Figure 3.
Figure 3: Add Animation button
- This brings up the Add Animation drop-down gallery. Scroll down to the bottom of this drop-down gallery and
select the Lines animation within the Motion Paths section, highlighted in
red within Figure 4.
Figure 4: Lines animation
- You will now find that the selected Text Box on the slide has a Motion Path animation applied, as shown in
Figure 5, below. This is indicated by the Line you see which has a reversed green arrowhead on one side, and a red
arrowhead on the other, as shown in Figure 5, below. This actually indicates that this Motion Path
animation plays towards the Down direction.

Figure 5: Motion Path animation applied
- We need to change the direction of the Motion Path to Up. To do that, select the Text Box and
access the Animations tab on the Ribbon. Then click the Effect Options button
(highlighted in red within Figure 6). From the drop-down menu that appears, choose
the Up option, as shown highlighted in blue within Figure 6.
Figure 6: Up option
- Within the Animations tab on the Ribbon, click the Animation Pane button to
bring up the Animation Pane, as shown in Figure 7, below. Within the Animation Pane,
double-click the Motion Path animation (highlighted in red within
Figure 7).
Figure 7: Motion Path animation within the Animation Pane
- This will bring up the Up dialog box, as shown in Figure 8. Within this dialog box, access the
Effect tab, and match your values to the ones shown in Figure 8, below.

Figure 8: Effect tab within Up dialog box
- Next access the Timing tab in the same dialog box and match your values to the ones shown in
Figure 9, below.
Figure 9: Timing tab within Up dialog box
- Now select the Motion Path on your slide. This is the path that has a green and a red arrowhead on either side.
If you see two white handles on either side of the Motion Path, you then know that the path is selected.
- Drag the white handle on the top of your Motion Path to the top of the slide. Ensure that the top of the
Motion Path is somewhere close to the top of your slide, as shown in Figure 10. You might want to
preview the animation to fine-tune the placements of the top and bottom ends of your Motion Path.

Figure 10: Motion Path resized
- With your Text Box still selected, add another animation. The animation you need to add now is Emphasis |
Grow/Shrink. Next, double-click the Grow/Shrink animation in the Animation Pane,
as previously explained in Step 7. Within the Effect tab of the Grow/Shrink
dialog box, match your values to the ones you see in Figure 11, below.
Figure 11: Effect tab within Grow/Shrink dialog box
- Similarly, access the Timing tab of the same dialog box, and match your values to those shown in
Figure 12, below. Do note that we changed the Start value to With Previous. This
ensures that the selected animation will happen along with our previous animation, simultaneously.
Figure 12: Timing tab within Grow/Shrink dialog box
- Let us now explore what we have achieved so far. The first animation we added was a Motion Path that moved
the Text Box from the bottom of the slide upwards. The second animation was an Emphasis animation that reduced
the size of the Text Box. Moreover, the second animation happened at the same time as the first one. We still need to add a third
animation so that our Text Box fades into oblivion as it exits upwards from the slide.
To do so, make sure that your Text Box is selected. Then add an Exit | Fade animation. Next,
double-click the Fade animation in the Animation Pane, as previously explained in
Step 7. Within the Timing tab of the Fade dialog box, match your values to the ones
you see in Figure 13, below.
Figure 13: Timing tab within Fade dialog box
Since we require all the three animations to happen simultaneously, we chose the same speed for all three. Notice that the
Duration value is set to 3 seconds (Slow) in Figure 13, above. You will notice the
same durations for the other two animations in Figures 9 and 12. If you want to choose a different
speed, you’ll need to change the Duration value in all three animations.
- Next, drag the Text Box downwards to outside the
Slide Area. This will ensure that the text is not seen in a non-animated state while viewing in
Slide Show view. Preview and fine-tune again as
required. You might want to extend the Motion Path upwards to compensate for the added downward distance of the
Text Box, as shown in Figure 14, below.
Figure 14: Text re-arranged
- Duplicate the Text Box by copying and pasting as many Text Boxes you need. Change the text credits as required by typing over the
existing text, and then place the new Text Boxes immediately over the earlier Text Box. You will repeat to create as many Text Boxes
as required. Since all the Text Boxes overlap each other, it might be a little difficult to edit the text within them later. Use the
Tab key to select each of these Text Boxes one at a time so that you don’t make changes inadvertently in a Text Box
that you did not intend to edit!
- Preview your slide. You might also want to
download a copy of the
presentation we created to check the settings used.
More Ideas
- We just duplicated an animated Text Box within the same slide. You can carry this concept forward to duplicate Text
Boxes across slides and even presentations, thus making short work of an otherwise tedious job.
- Experiment with adding a Star Wars style sound track to the credits slide. You can search the internet for a Star Wars
theme sound in WAV or MP3 format. Whatever you do, make sure you are respecting copyright implications.
See Also:
Star Wars Style
Credits Animation in PowerPoint 2013 for Windows
Star Wars
Style Credits Animation in PowerPoint 2011 for Mac