Working with Transitions and Animations

By now, you should have a better idea of the visuals you can create and multimedia elements you can use to create better presentations. If you started creating a new presentation or modifying an existing one while reading through the previous chapters, now is the time to learn how to create a better visual flow during delivery. Using transitions and animations will make complex topics easier to comprehend.

I should add that you will learn to create movement with purpose, not just make your content move around and fly all over the screen just because you learned how to use new features! It is all about helping you tell a better story and make your content easier for the audience to remember.

In this chapter, we will discuss the following topics:

• Using slide transitions wisely
• Leveraging the Morph transition
• Using advanced animation sequences
• Using triggers for on-demand animations

Technical requirements

Most of the topics discussed in this chapter don’t require having a Microsoft 365 (M365) subscription, as the tools and features have been introduced in previous versions of PowerPoint. I will identify when a feature is in M365 or newer versions only. Also, be aware that since the subscription version of PowerPoint is updated on an ongoing basis, it is possible that some features don’t appear exactly the same in your version of the application.

Using slide transitions wisely

Using slide transitions in a meaningful way can help you create a movement that helps the audience follow along. The important thing to remember is to avoid using a transition just because you can, and to use it because it adds value to your content. In regular business settings, you can use just a few of the available transitions and your presentations will always look professional. Let’s start by discussing how transitions work in the next section.

Understanding transition basics

To access the transitions gallery, you simply need to click on the Transitions tab (1). In the Transition to This Slide group (2), click on the More button (3) to open the transitions gallery (4) (Figure 8.1):

Figure 8.1 – PowerPoint’s slide transition gallery

You have many transitions available, and they are sorted into three categories: Subtle, Exciting, and Dynamic Content. Whether you feel overwhelmed or excited about...

Leveraging the Morph transition

When Microsoft introduced the Morph transition, it was an amazing game-changer for presentation creators! It was finally possible to create real movement during a transition to another slide without having to spend hours tweaking animation effects or using automatic transitions. In short, Morph allows you to smoothly move objects from one slide to the other.

Let’s see the steps to help you create your first Morph transition with the help of Figure 8.4:

Figure 8.4 – Creating a movement effect with the Morph transition

1. Create a slide similar to slide 31 in the previous example, using four squares of different colors. Then duplicate the slide – using Ctrl + D (1) on your keyboard. This step is essential to make the transition work because PowerPoint needs to have the same object names to calculate where the shapes start and where they finish. You can also copy and paste objects from one slide to...

Using advanced animation sequences

Even though the goal of this section is to discuss more advanced animations, let’s start with a short review of the Animations tab (1) (Figure 8.11):

Figure 8.11 – Review of the Animations tab

Just as we have seen for Transitions in the first section of this chapter, you can preview animations on a slide by using the Preview button (2) on the ribbon or by clicking on the star icon beside a slide thumbnail. Clicking on the More arrow (3) opens the animation gallery where you will find four categories of animations:

• Entrance (4): This applies an effect when an object appears on the slide
• Emphasis (5): This applies an effect to an object already on the slide
• Exit (6): This applies an effect to an object we want to make disappear from the slide
• Motion Paths (7): This moves an object already on the slide

At the bottom of the list, you have access to the complete list of effects and...

Using triggers for on-demand animations

Using triggers in your presentations allows you to have full control over what you show, and when you show it. As an example, I am using triggers to discuss the meaning of colors in one of my presentations where I can show the meanings one at a time, in no particular order. I simply need to click on one of the shapes while in slideshow mode to either display or hide a definition (Figure 8.17):

Figure 8.17 – Example of how triggers can be used to show a list of color meanings

Since discussing colors in a black-and-white book would not be convenient, we will be creating a simple example with shapes in the following section.

Using triggers with shapes and images

To help you follow along with this technique, you should create a slide that has three shapes labeled Event 1, Event 2, and Event 3 (1), and add three images that will be used to depict each of the events (2). Then, make sure you open the Selection...

Summary

In this chapter, we have seen how to use slide transitions wisely, discussed how to leverage the Morph transition to create various types of movements between slides, and learned how to use the advanced animation timeline to create complex animation sequences or use triggers to control our animations.

Using animations can be extremely time-consuming if you don’t plan what you want to achieve before trying to create complex sequences. Just like most of the topics we have covered so far in this book, it will take more time the first few times you decide to create animations, unless you are only creating simple ones. Remember that there is nothing wrong with using simple animations, or no animations at all if you don’t need them.

I hope that the topics in this chapter will open up new possibilities for your next presentations, helping you decide whether they can help tell your story more efficiently while helping your audience remember your content for longer...

Further reading

• Microsoft Support article on using the Morph transition: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/use-the-morph-transition-in-powerpoint-8dd1c7b2-b935-44f5-a74c-741d8d9244ea
• Microsoft Support article on tips and tricks for Morph: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/morph-transition-tips-and-tricks-bc7f48ff-f152-4ee8-9081-d3121788024f
• Microsoft Support article on motion paths: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/add-a-motion-path-animation-effect-f3174300-0d24-4671-a1c2-e286b41efba6