Animation effects and path drawing for Office PowerPoint

Typically, you can use the view buttons in the lower-left corner of the PowerPoint screen to quickly switch between several different view states (normal view, slide sorter view, slide show). But I'm afraid you don't know. Using the keyboard to match the View button can also achieve a completely different effect.

For example, if you press the SHIFT key when you click the Normal View button, you can switch to slide master view, and then click the Normal View button (without pressing the SHIFT key) to switch back. If you press the SHIFT key while clicking the Slide Sorter view button, you can switch to handout master view.

In addition, you can have PowerPoint display thumbnails of slides in the upper-left corner of the screen so that you can preview the results when you edit them. To achieve this, you need to go to "normal view" and select the first slide you want to show. Hold down the CTRL key and tap the slide Show button. You can click on the slide thumbnail to change the slice, just as you would for a Full-screen slide show.

If you want more options, you can hold down the Ctrl-shift key and then press the various view buttons: ctrl-shift-The Normal view button closes the tag area and notes pages on the left and expands the slides to the available space. ctrl-shift-the Slide Sorter view button to display the presentation as outline mode; ctrl-shift-the Slide Show button opens a set Up Show dialog box.

Use animation effects

Using animated slide objects can make your presentation more lively, control the presentation process and focus on the most critical data. There are usually two ways to achieve animation effects: Display objects in a certain order or use motion pictures.

You can animate an entire slide, a screen, or a slide object (including text boxes, charts, WordArt, and pictures). However, you should remember the principle that the animation effect can not be used too much, but should let it play a finishing touch, too much flicker and motion screen will distract the audience and even feel irritable.

If you want to animate one or more slides, select slide Show animation scheme from the menu. You can see a series of predefined animations that can be applied to the selected slides, and if you've already checked the auto preview check box, just click on each effect name to see a preview of the animation effect.

If you want to apply an animation effect to a Slide object, select the object and choose Slide Show Custom Animation from the menu. In the Custom Animation task pane, click the Add Effect button, and then select the effect you want from the pop-up entry submenu. If you want to get more options, you can click on the "Other effects" item in the submenu, which opens a "Add to effect" dialog box. Check the "Preview effect" checkbox, and then click on a variety of effects to see its specific form. If you find a desired effect, click the "OK" button to close the dialog box.

Repeat these steps until all the slide objects you want to use for animation are animated. When you do this, you'll notice that there are a few more digital markers next to the slide object, which are used to indicate the order of the animation. In addition, these slide objects appear in the animated list of the Custom Animation task pane. If you want to change the order in which the animation is displayed, select an animation and click the arrow on either side of the "reorder"; You can also select an animation in the list and press the "delete" button to remove it.

Draw Path

PowerPoint also provides a wonderful animation feature that allows you to specify a moving route for an object in a slide, which is called an "action path" in PowerPoint. Using motion paths can add a very interesting effect to your presentation. For example, you can have a slide object bounce to focus the viewer's attention on the highlighted point.

For your convenience, PowerPoint contains quite a few predefined action paths. If you want to specify an action path, select an object, and then choose Slide Show Custom Animation from the menu. Click the Add Effect button in the Custom Animation task pane. Select motion path in the Drop-down list and then select a predefined action path, such as diagonal right or diagonal down. If you don't like the six preset paths listed in the submenu, you can also select more action paths to open the Add Action Path dialog box. Make sure the preview effect check box is selected, and then click a different path effect to preview. When you find a satisfactory solution, select it and press the "OK" button.

PowerPoint also allows you to design your own motion path. Select an object and select Add Effects Action path from the menu to draw a custom path, and then select a drawing method (such as a freeform curve) from the list. Then use the mouse to accurately map out the moving route.

After you add an action path, a numeric marker appears next to the object to display its animation order (as shown in Figure 2). An arrow also appears to indicate the start and end of the action path (in green and red, respectively). You can also select the object in the animation list, and then adjust the options in the start, path, and speed submenus (in the Custom Animation task pane).