Create a Looping Intro

Looping Introduction

As your audience enters the room animation at the beginning of your presentation can be helpful. You will be able to stop it and begin your presentation by following the techniques presented to you in this training session.

Using a looped presentation in which all slides except your intro are hidden, allows your audience to see only the introduction. Using a button link will allow you to start your main presentation even though the slide is hidden.

Create Welcome Slides

Create a few welcoming slides with a message prior to your main presentation and Save the presentation.

Screenshot of three slides. All three have a gray gradient in the background. The first says Welcome in the top left. There is a picture of a building in the top right. Across the bottom, there is a graphic with a blue triangle and an orange background. The second slide has a blue triangle on top of the gray background. On top of that is text that says Come In, Take a Seat, Get Comfortable. Across the bottom there is a black triangle and a blue background graphic. The last slide has a blue arrow pointing diagonally right with text that says We're going to have a great time. Across the bottom there is a black triangle and a blue background graphic.

  • From the Slides pane, select all the slides (click on the first slide, press and hold down the shift key and click on the last slide)

  • From the Transitions tab:

    • Within the Transition to This Slide group, select a slide transition

    • Within the Timing group, Uncheck On Mouse Click, select After and enter seconds (3-4 works well)

Screenshot of Microsoft PowerPoint menu options. Across the top there is a blue translucent bar. In the top left, there is a orange square with a "P' in it. To the right, there is a purple floppy disk icon, to the right there is a blue curved arrow pointing left with a black triangle pointing down, to the right of that is a blue circular arrow pointing right, to the right of that is a black line and a black triangle pointing down. To the right and in the center of the header screen, there is text that reads Presentation1-Microsoft PowerPoint. In the top right, there is a thin white line, an outlined square icon, and a white "x" icon. Below that there are menu options that read: File (with an orange background), Home, Insert, Design, Transitions, Animations, Slide Show, Review, View, Add-Ins, and Acrobat. The Transitions menu option is selected. In the options in the Transition menu, there are Preview (with two overlapping slide icons and a green triangle); Blinds (with a slide icon and a blue arrow); Clock (with a slide icon and a circular arrow); Ripple (with a slide icon and a circular icon on it); Honeycomb (with a slide icon and a bunch of circles forming a honeycomb shape); Glitter (with a slide icon and a hexagon shape); Vortex (with a slide icon and a blue arrow pointing right); and Shred (with a slide icon and gray and blue lines on it). To the right of that, there are three vertical buttons. The first is a black triangle pointing up, the second is a black triangle pointing down, and the third is a black triangle pointing down with a black line on top of it. To the right of that, there is a grayed out option that shows a slide with circles on it and text that reads Effect Options. It has a black triangle pointing down. Below all of this is text that says Transition to This Slide. To the right of the arrows, there are two areas with a black line in the middle and text below both that says Timing. In the first section, there is text that reads Sound (with a horn icon) and a dropdown field that says [No Sound]. Below that is text that reads Duration (with a clock icon) and a field that says 04.00. Below that is text that reads Apply To All (with an icon that shows white squares and a blue plus icon). In the next section, there is text that reads Advance Slide. Below that there are two checkmark boxes. The first says On Mouse Click. The second says After and has a field with 00:00:00 in it.

  • From Slide Show tab, within the Set Up group, click on Set Up Slide Show command.

    • Within the Set Up Show dialog box, select Loop continuously until ‘ESC’.

    • Within the Advance Slides section Use timings, if present option is selected and click on OK.

Screenshot of menu options in PowerPoint. Around the outside is a translucent gray. In the top left, there is text that says Set Up Show. In the top right, there is a question mark icon and an "x" icon. Below that is a solid gray background. There are two columns of items. On the left there is text that reads Show type. Below that there are radio options with text that say: Presented by a speaker (full screen) (selected); Browsed by an individual (window); Browsed at a kiosk (full screen). There is the outline of a box around that. Below that box is text that reads Show Options. Below that are checkmark options that are: Loop continuously until 'Esc' (selected); Show without narration; Show without animation. Below that are two dropdown fields with red rectangles in them to the left, there is text that reads Pen color: and below that is Laster pointer color. There is a square around all of that. In the right column, there is text that says Show slides. Below that are three radio buttons. They are All (selected); From and To (with two fields that have up and down arrows. One is between From and To and the other is after To). Below that is grayed out text that reads Custom show: (with a grayed out rectangular dropdown field). There is the outline of a square around all of that. Below that square, there is another square that has text at the top that says Advance slides. Below are two radio options that say Manually and Using timings, if present (selected). Below that square is another square with text at the top that says Multiple monitors. Below that is text that says Display slide show on: (with a dropdown field that says Primary Monitor). Below that is a checkbox that says Show Presenter View. Below both columns is text that says To show a laser pointer during slide show, hold down the Ctrl key and press the left mouse button. Below that are two buttons that says OK and Cancel.

  • From the Insert tab, within the Illustrations group, select Shapes and select a blank Action Button. Click, hold, drag and draw a rectangle in the lower right corner of the first slide.

  • From the Action Settings dialog box, check Hyperlink to and select Slide. From the Hyperlink to Slide dialog box, navigate to the first slide of your main presentation and click OK twice.

Two different screenshots. The top screenshot shows a PowerPoint window. To the left are the thumbnails of four slides. To the right, there is a menu option open with eight categories of symbols that include: rectangles, basic shapes, block arrows, equation shapes, flowchart, stars and banners, callouts, and action buttons. The second screenshot is of a dialog window. There is a gray translucent outline around the box. In the top left there is text that says Action Settings. In the top right, there are two buttons. The first is a question mark icon. The second is a white "X" on a red background. Below that, there are two tabs. The first is Mouse Click. The second is Mouse Over. Mouse Click is selected. There are menu options below. The text reads Action on click. To the right of that is a horizontal line. Below that, there are two radio buttons. The first is None. The second is Hyperlink to (selected). Below that is a dropdown field with text that says Welcome with a blue background. Below that is another radio button with text that says Run program. Below that is a grayed out field and a grayed out Browse button. Below that is another radio button with text that says Run macro. Below that is a grayed out dropdown field. Below that is another radio button with text that says Object action. Below that is a grayed out dropdown field. Below that is a black horizontal line. Below the line, there is a checkmark box with text that says Play Sound. Below that is a grayed out drop down field with text that says [No Sound]. Below that is a grayed out checkmark box (selected) with text that says Highlight click.

  • With the shape selected, right click and select Format Shape. From the Format Shape dialog box, within the Fill section, drag the Transparency slide to 100% and within the Line Color Section, select No Line and click on Close.

  • Copy and Paste the button onto the other two slides of your introduction, allowing you to move to main presentation from any slide of the intro.

Screenshot of the Format Shape options in PowerPoint. There is a white translucent header around the box. The top left has text that says Format Shape. To the right, there are two squares. The first has a question mark icon and the second has a "x" in it. Below that, there is a gray background. Along the left side, there is a menu with the following options: Fill, Line Color, Line Style, Shadow, Reflection, Glow and Soft Edges, 3-D Format, 3-D Rotation, Picture Corrections, Picture Color, Artistic Effects, Crop, Size, Position, Text Box, and Alt Text. The Fill option is selected and has a yellow background. To the right, there are Fill options. The right-side menu has text at the top that says Fill. Below that are radio buttons that say No fill, Solid fill (selected), Gradient fill, Picture or texture fill, Pattern fill, and Slide background fill. Below that is a box with a gray outline. In the top left of the box there is text that says Fill Color. Below that there is text that reads Color: and there is a gray button with a blue paint bucket icon on it. To the right of the paint bucket icon, there is a black triangle pointing down. Below that is text that reads Transparency. To the right of that is a slider bar with a gray bar icon. To the right of that is a field with text that says 100%.

  • To achieve the looping effect, from the Slides Pane, select all of the slides except the intro slides. From the Slide Show tab, click on the Hide Slide command-hiding all of the main presentation slides. With slides still selected, confirm that the slides are set up to advance On Mouse Click. Select the Transitions tab, within the Timing group.

When you are ready to begin your presentation click on the bottom right corner of any slides in the intro and it will move to the first slide of the main presentation.

  • Consider inserting an end slide at the end of your presentation as a warning sign that you are at the end of the presentation and you don’t click to the intro.

When using educational technology tools, be FERPA aware. To learn more, visit the Registrar's FERPA Guidelines site.