December 6, 2003
How To Best Use Transitions and Effects Inside Presentations
Presenters are greatly attracted by facilities in their presentation program providing the ability to add visual effects, transitions and animations to their slides.
The heritage of such transitions comes from the movie and television industry who have first conceived and built inside their visual language an effective and appropriate use for them.
Visual transitions have been born out of the need to create smooth transitions for the opening and closing of movies and cartoons, as well as for blending the passage from a scene to the next in a way that would add a new layer of communication.
Cross-fades, dissolves and wipes were never conceived to attract people's attention but were indeed designed to create an extra layer of narrative inside the visual language of film and television images.
In this light, it is your responsibility as a presenter to use transitions and effects to serve your communication needs and not to provide further visual pizzaz to your presentation.
Think of the traditional metaphors to select most appropriate visual transitions for every situation. For example, think of how theatre curtains open and close, or how Hanna Barbera or Walt Disney used to start or end. Think of how you turn pages in a magazine, or how information is revealed when you go through loose printed pages sitting on your lap.
Here are my general recommendations to you for making an intelligent and effective use of transitions inside your presentations:
1) Scope - Use your effects or transitions to help clarify
content and not to try to emphasize it. Reveal rather push, subtly uncover rather than open abruptly, turn on a candle rather than the headlights.
2) Communication - Consistency among transitions leads to easier readability and will facilitate your audience in understanding your content. Once you establish a mode of changing from one slide to the next, keep that one consistently throughout the presentation.
3) Speed - In general, transitions tend to be effective when they are not intrusive. In this light, slow transitions tend to be smoother and more pleasing to different audiences. Fast transitions, unless very subtle and affecting only a small part of the screen tend to be too abrupt and to attract too much attention to themselves.
4) Culture - Transition need to take into consideration cultural habits, traditions and reading habits which may vary greatly from one country to another.
5) Results - Best transitions and effects are the ones that go completely unnoticed relative to the content being displayed by them. Like when you don't notice the turning of pages of the book in front of you, or the glass from which you are drinking, so transitions should serve the purpose of bridging or smoothing out the possible visual jump required to go from one slide to the next.
6) Attention - Use the power of your transitions to reveal information gradually. That focuses audience attention and improves the integration between your presentation and the supporting visuals.
These are my simple rules for an effectively utilizing all of those visual ammunitions you have at your disposal when preparing a presentation.
If you can master this lesson in restrain, chastity and zen-design you will see that when it comes to transitions and visual effects, less is always more.
posted by
Robin Good
on Saturday, December 6 2003
Thursday, December 1 2005
URL of this article:
http://masterview.ikonosnewmedia.com/2003/12/06/how_to_best_use_transitions.htm
Recent Articles
December 16, 2008
PowerPoint Tools And Presentation Design News - December 15th, 2008
Photo credit: Rubinho1... read more
December 11, 2008
PowerPoint Tools And Presentation Design News - December 11th, 2008
Photo credit: Yuriy Lupol... read more
October 29, 2008
Photo Albums, Fonts: Visual Communication Tools From MasterViews n.113
Photo credit: Rob Owen-Wahl Jalbum: Create and share photo albums with skins and music Microsoft Image Composite Editor: Mix a set of images together to make a full panorama DaFont: Browse a database hosting more than 8000 free fonts... read more
October 22, 2008
Image Editing, Picture Sharing: Visual Communication Tools From MasterViews n.112
Photo credit: Robert Owen-Wahl Image Analyzer: Edit images easily with basic editing features Photie: Share all of your pictures with no size limit and search for other users' images FotoSketcher: Turn any image into a hand-drawn painting with no... read more
October 21, 2008
PowerPoint Tools And Presentation Design News - October 21st, 2008
Photo credit: Marmit... read more
October 15, 2008
Presentation, Image Editing: Visual Communication Tools From MasterViews n.111
Photo credit: Alperiscan Instant VCASMO: Mix YouTube videos with Slideshare presentations into a single player Dr. Pic: Upload and edit images with this Javascript-based editor PixClip: Capture any part of your Windows machine screen Selfcast: Use your webcam to... read more
October 08, 2008
Slidewshow, Live Streaming: Visual Communication Tools From MasterViews n.110
Photo credit: G & A Scholiers Yodio: Combine pictures with audio narration and create slideshows Animasher: Use images and music to create Flash animations CSLive: Broadcast live or recorded images into your personal channel Search and download video from... read more
|
