Automatically change animation on all slides

Tonight's tip concerns visual basic code I crafted on the basis of the macro posted here by Chris Newman which is designed to remove all animation on all slides of a PowerPoint presentation. The vba code posted below will change all of the animation set for all shapes on all slides to the simple 'Appear' effect. Simply enter Visual Basic by pressing ALT + F11, and then enter the code in a new module.

On the line beginning, "sld.TimeLine.MainSequence.Item(x).EffectType =", you can enter whatever animation effect you choose. When you begin to enter text at the end of this line, Visual Basic will display the available animation effects.

Sub ChangeAllAnimations() 'PURPOSE: Remove All PowerPoint Animations From Slides 'SOURCE: www.TheSpreadsheetGuru.com/the-code-vault Dim sld As Slide Dim x As Long Dim Counter As Long 'Loop Through Each Slide in ActivePresentation For Each sld In ActivePresentation.Slides 'Loop through each animation on slide For x = sld.TimeLine.MainSequence.count To 1 Step -1 'Change Each Animation sld.TimeLine.MainSequence.Item(x).EffectType = msoAnimEffectAppear 'Maintain Change Stat Counter = Counter + 1 Next x Next sld 'Completion Notification MsgBox Counter & " Animation(s) were changed in your PowerPoint presentation!" End Sub

Highlighting Photo Areas with the Fragment Tool

In PowerPoint, you can use an easy trick to add emphasis to a specific area of a photo.

1. On the photo, circle the area that you want to emphasis with the circle or oval shape.

2. Then select both the shape and the photo itself. Be sure to select the photo first and then press CTRL and select the circle.

3. Under the Drawing Tools . . . Format menu, and on the far left select Merge Shapes . . . Fragment.

4. Then select the background photo and go to the Picture Tools . . . Format menu, and on the far left select Artistic Effects and choose a blurred version of the photo.

PowerPoint Slides Lock Up

PowerPoint 2016 and later versions, include a presenter view which will be activated when your PC or laptop is connected to two monitors or a projector. Presenter view allows you to edit and preview the presentation while the slides are shown to an audience.

The trouble is PowerPoint can lock up in this mode and prevent you from advancing the slides in main presentation, and limit you to working in presenter view. If this problem occurs, make sure that under Slide Show . . . Set up Slide Show, the "Browsed at a kiosk" radial button is not selected. If it is slides will not advance. It's also possible that you may experience the same problem if 'Presented by a speaker' is selected. In this case, simply check off the option at the bottom right of the dialog box: 'Use Presenter View'.