​Warning: When Not to Animate Your Slide Deck

Do you want a highly engaged audience? Of course you do! But be warned – overusing animation in your slide deck is not the way to accomplish your goal. Flying words and bursting stars may seem interesting, but are more of a hindrance than a help. With slide decks, a little can go a long way. So here are my personal guidelines for when to animate and when not to animate.
 
DO NOT

• Add more than three different types of animation in a single slide deck. Choose one or two (three if you must) and use them consistently throughout
• Use more than one style of animation on a single slide. Less is more!

• Add animation to slide decks that will be used in live webinars. Weak connectivity can cause them to distort. Instead of looking sharp and professional, they look sluggish and distracting.
• Use fast transitions. Early adopters of Prezi made their audiences motion sick with all of the quick movement from one image to another.

 
DO

• Add subtle animation to build your points. Appear, Moving In and Fade effects are all acceptable when you are layering several ideas on one slide.
• Add subtle transitions between slides, but keep them consistent throughout the entire deck. Fade works well here. If you want something with a bit more pizazz, try the Cube effect, with a 1.5 second transition and no bounce. Anything faster will leave your audience feeling nauseous. .
• Design presentations that keep your audience engaged in meaningful ways. Here are two simple ways to do this. Inspiration  and Longhand

 
 
 

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