Microsoft KB Archive/259745

= PPT98: How to Play Animated GIFs in PowerPoint 98 =

Article ID: 259745

Article Last Modified on 10/3/2002

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APPLIES TO


 * Microsoft PowerPoint 98 for Macintosh

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This article was previously published under Q259745



SUMMARY
You can insert an animated Graphics Interchange Format (GIF) file into a PowerPoint 98 presentation and have it play back during a slide show. To do this, you must have Apple QuickTime 4.0 for the Macintosh or later installed on your Macintosh computer.

NOTE: This functionality only works on the Macintosh platform; the functionality is provided by Apple QuickTime 4.x and later.



MORE INFORMATION
To insert and set up the animated GIF file, follow these steps:
 * 1) On the slide on which you want to put the animated GIF file, point to Movies and Sounds on the Insert menu, and then click Movie from File.
 * 2) Navigate to where your animated GIF file is stored, select it, and then click Convert. PowerPoint imports the GIF file and associates the movie filmstrip icon with it.
 * 3) On the Slide Show menu, click Custom Animation.
 * 4) On the Timing and Play Settings tabs, configure when you want the animated GIF to start and how it should be played. Click OK.

PowerPoint now plays your animated GIF file during a slide show. When you move your show to another Macintosh computer, you also have to move all animated GIF files that you inserted into your presentation.

About Animated GIF Files
CompuServe Graphics Interchange Format (GIF) version 89a supports storing multiple pictures in a single GIF file. If a GIF file contains several pictures, each with slight variations between pictures, that file is known as an &quot;animated GIF.&quot;

Unlike the Microsoft Video for Windows (.avi) and Apple QuickTime Movie formats, the GIF format is designed primarily to display still pictures, not animated images. The most common reason to create an animated GIF is to incorporate multimedia effects in Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) documents on the World Wide Web. For this reason, programs that display animation effects fall into one of these categories:
 * Web browsers
 * Animated GIF editing programs
 * Media cataloging programs

Very few programs that are not in one of these categories can display the animation of an animated GIF file.

