Every presenter wants to engage their audience and make an impact. There are so many ways to do this, but the general agreement is one needs to bring novelty and change into a presentation. We’ve discussed various techniques in our previous blog posts, but for the purpose of this article, let’s focus on movement.
Movement and dynamics in general are an effective way to keep your audience focused, that’s why many people resort to animating their slides to emphasise their key points.
However, be very cautious with animation. If you overdo it, it might ruin your performance. It should only be applied when you think it will make your message stand out.
Let’s see what are the basic steps to add animation in PowerPoint.
What elements can be animated
In PowerPoint you can animate images, text and graphs. However, choose your animation effects according to the type of audience you’re presenting to, as some may appear too gimmicky and others – too distracting. Another thing you should bear in mind is that if you’re presenting virtually, animations and transitions are dependent on the connection speed, so if it’s not reliable enough, the whole slideshow can lag.
Pro tip: Save your presentation slideshow from lagging by using one Microsoft Teams’s latest features, PowerPoint Live. It will give your audience a butter smooth experience, even if they’ve joined the meeting from thousands of miles away.
How to animate objects in Powerpoint
To add animation to a PowerPoint element, follow these simple steps:
1. Navigate to the slide where you want to add animation.
2. Select the element you want to animate.
3. Click on the Animation panel.
4. Choose an animation effect. We went for the very subtle Fade effect as it doesn’t distract you from the content.
To see how it works, click on the Preview button on the Animation pane.
You can also add animation to multiple elements, you only need to group them. In this case press Ctrl A and then Format > Group. Now you can apply a given effect to all of them.
How to edit animated objects in PowerPoint
Once you’ve applied the animation, you can also make changes. You can choose when you want it to start – On click, With or After previous. (We’ve opted for With Previous here).
From the Duration and Delay options you can choose when you want the animation to start and how long you want it last.
If you want to remove the animation effect, read our article about removing PowerPoint animations.
In conclusion, if you think you need to spice up your slides, you can add animation to some elements. We only recommend playing animated elements on a single slide one by one to make things easier to follow and more engaging for the viewers. And of course, make sure the effects support your message or don’t distract the audience from it.
Working with PowerPoint daily? Follow our blog where you’ll find extensive information on anything related to the Microsoft presentation tool. We also want to challenge your knowledge with our very accessible and absolutely free PowerPoint Tips and Tricks e-book. Read it and share your thoughts in the comments.
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