Need a way to use Custom Animation to change JUST the color of a f

[Flopsy007]

(For the short version skip to the conclusion!)

WHAT I WANT TO DO (a simple example):
I want to make a slide in my presentation where I list a number of items or
lines with bullets or numbering. The background is black and I want the first
item to appear alone in white color. When I click 'next' I want the second
item to appear and the first item to fade to a dark grey and so on until all
five items are displayed, the first four in dark grey and the fifth in white.
Then I move on to next slide.

WHAT WORKS BUT IS REALLY TEDIOUS:
To do this right I have to make five slides, each with one more item than
the slide before and then color the items dark grey and the last one white.
Then I use the 'fade' transistion for moving through these slides. It looks
really great BUT you quickly get an obscene amount of slides to asminister.

WHAT SHOULD WORK BUT LOOKS UGLY:
The way you should be able to do it, of course, is to make a slide where the
first item is white and the rest black (so it is invisible at first) and then
use the 'Custom Animation > Add Effect > Emphasis > Change Font Color'
option to change the font colors everytime you click 'next', as descibed
above, thereby keeping everything on ONE slide.
This can actually be done - no problem there. The problem is that IT LOOKS
UGLY BECAUSE THE EFFECT NOT ONLY CHANGES THE COLOR, IT ALSO CHANGES THE WAY
THE FONT LOOKS - IT GETS THINNER AND MORE RUGGED

IN CONCLUSION: what I'm asking for is a way to use 'Custom Animation' to
change the color, and JUST the color, of some text on a slide WITHOUT
altering the looks of the text like the 'Change Font Color' option does.

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[Lucy Thomson]

What version are you using? Pre-2007 you could use one of the animation
schemes for this (can't remember the name but I'm pretty sure it was top of
the list). For 2007 (and previous too if you want) add the animation (e.g.
fade) to the placeholder, click on the drop down next to the animation in
the taskpane, select effect options and in the after animation drop down
select a colour. Note you can add this animation to the master slide and it
will automatically apply itself to all your slides.

Lucy

 

[LVTravel]

This is for PPT 2003 or earlier. PPT '07 later. The effect you need is Dim
after animation. Here is how to set it up:

Create your bulleted (with or without actual bullets) list making sure that
the Enter key is pressed behind each line.

Highlight all the lines of text you have created and set your base color
(white according to your OP) that the first mouse click displays. Set your
background to desired color so you can see your text since you would now be
white on white after your font color change.

Right click in the text and select Custom Animation. Depending on your PPT
version (these instructions are for '03 but are similar for earlier
versions) select Add Effect, Entrance, Appear in the Custom Animation window
that appears.

Next, click on the dropdown box on the last text item in the Custom
Animation window and click Effect Options. A window titled Appear should
show. Under Effect tab select dropdown for After animation. Click More
colors and select your color you want the line to be changed to on the NEXT
mouse click (Your OP said dark grey.)

Leave Animate text alone as it should read All at once (but for more effect
you can change it to word or letter for the line of text to appear on the
screen.

Now for the last item. Lets say you have five bulleted items. You will
show five lines in custom Animation. With all items still highlighted you
will need to click on Start, On Click directly under Modify:Appear on the
Custom Animation window. Without doing this last step it is possible that
all the lines will appear together. This step separates the lines into
individual mouse clicks.

One issue: Versions of PPT before, IIRC, 2003 would automatically go to the
next slide after the click on the last line but PPT 2003 requires one more
mouse click to "exit" the slide after the last line is displayed (the next
to the last click will change the last line to your dark grey and then the
final mouse click will go to the next slide.)

For PPT 2007 - Type the text the same as for the previous instruction.

Select all the lines. Click Animations on the ribbon. Click Custom
Animations on the ribbon (and if needed open the Custom Animation window if
it doesn't automatically open.) Click Add Effect and then click on
Entrance, More Effects, Appear.

All the other instructions are exactly the same as for the 2003 version
above.

Hope this does exactly what you want. If so, please let us know. If you
need any further help with this also post back with your version of PPT.

 

[Flopsy007]

Tank you both for your replies.

Sorry, forgot to say that I'm using PPT 2007.

You are right LVTravel, I tried your suggestion and HURRA! the 'Appear'
animation can do this without turning the text ugly - well it has some
limitations but it looks fine. One limitation is that I can't seem to make it
fade from line to line.
Another thing I'm trying to combine with the 'Appear' animation is to make
some text in a seperate box change for every line change. But I can't find an
animation that let you change the text.

If your interested you can download a small pptx-file with a few slides
showing the way it originaly looks - use this link:
http://www.savefile.com/files/1716562
And here's a link where I use the 'Appear' animation:
http://www.savefile.com/files/1716563

If you've got any ideas on how to create something like the presentation in
'Example 1' using only one slide, let me know (you'll be my hero

 

[LVTravel]

Tank you both for your replies.

Sorry, forgot to say that I'm using PPT 2007.

You are right LVTravel, I tried your suggestion and HURRA! the 'Appear'
animation can do this without turning the text ugly - well it has some
limitations but it looks fine. One limitation is that I can't seem to make
it
fade from line to line.
Another thing I'm trying to combine with the 'Appear' animation is to make
some text in a seperate box change for every line change. But I can't find
an
animation that let you change the text.

If your interested you can download a small pptx-file with a few slides
showing the way it originaly looks - use this link:
http://www.savefile.com/files/1716562
And here's a link where I use the 'Appear' animation:
http://www.savefile.com/files/1716563

If you've got any ideas on how to create something like the presentation
in
'Example 1' using only one slide, let me know (you'll be my hero

OK, 2007 here we go!

No hero status but see my example posted here:
http://savefile.com/projects/808673958

Using your original Example 2, I added the boxes from Example 1. I have
intentionally left the bottom items (boxes) staggered to show you how to
include the items at the bottom. All you would have to do is stack them one
on top of the other. Can be a lot of work but it is effective. I use this
method to draw arrows from a line of text to items on a diagram and even to
put pictures on the screen that describes what the line is about. One other
thing, with the animations this way instead of your individual slides method
it is almost impossible to create handouts for the individual examples.

If you go into animation view you will see that all you have to do is also
animate the items at the bottom of the screen and then drag each "box"
animation below the line animation and then change the animation to animate
"With previous" for the box but leave it "On Click" for the lines of text.

As for the "fade in" you can change it using my original post. Instead of
Appear go to more options, Subtle, Fade. Change the Speed to the speed you
need. To fade out you click the Change, Exit and set it to Fade and the
speed you need.

Again, let us know if this helps or if you have problems with the file
download or have more questions.

 

[Flopsy007]

Hi LVTravel
That's it! I can make those slides now without having my my dias overview
pane getting horribly long. Thanks (and oh yes, you're definately a hero -
the everyday life kind of hero maybe, but still, a hero nevertheless

 

[LVTravel]

Thanks for letting us know that what I posted worked for you. That's what
we all post here for, to try to help others solve problems.