How to Create Steve Jobs' Keynote

September 12, 2008 in Applications, Tips and Tricks | 16 Comments

Apple Special Event for September 2008 has ended. Steve Jobs has done his good job on presenting the new products. Nothing is really mind-blowing here. But from his keynote slides, I can see several interesting effects. For sure, we can employ those cool effects to work for our presentation slides.

There are several keynote effects that I like from his presentation and hopefully, I've successfully clone those down to my keynote. These animations are as follows:

  1. Flying Numbers
  2. Image Transitions
  3. Shining Numbers
  4. Rainbow-Colored Nano-chromatic
  5. Display Full iPod Nano Collection

Let's rock!


[Download Keynote File Here]

All of these effects can be set and reviewed from Inspector Pane (keystrokes Command-Option-I).

The Flying Numbers Effect

Description: Create flying text effect.

Step 1. Insert Text

Use Myriad Pro for font-family and Semibold for font-typeface. You can change the settings at Font Pane (keystrokes: Command-T).

Step 2. Create New Separate Numbers

There T (T for Text Box) icon at the toolbar, click on it and make a new separate number. Place this number correctly to fit previous slide. After that, cut and paste this number to next slide.

Step 3. Add Move Effects

Apply move effect for the numbers. Set it to Move to the proper place to fit the slide after transition. The move effects should be triggered together at the same time.

Step 4. Hide Certain Numbers

These numbers to be concealed are the numbers to be replaced by moving numbers. Keep them hidden so that the numbers won't overlap each other. To make them hidden, go to Colors Pane (keystrokes: Command-Shift-C) and move the Opacity slider to 0%.

Step 5. Play Slideshow

You can Play Slideshow with Command-Option-P anytime.

The Image Transitions Effect

Description: Create a smooth flipping image transition effect.

Step 1. Insert Two Images

Images with same dimensions are suitable for this effect. Put these two images on the same position. Keynote has yellow ruler to guide you.

Step 2. Add Flipping Actions

Build-out for previous image, Build-in for next image. These two effects should be run on the same frame of time.

Step 3. Play Slideshow

You can Play Slideshow with Command-Option-P anytime.

The Shining Numbers Effect

Description: Create a gracious, shimmering way of item's appearance.

Step 1. Insert Text

Step 2. Add Action: "Shimmer"

This is the built-in keynote effect. When you're attaching the effect, do remember to differentiate between actions need to be done simultaneously and actions need to be performed separately, which can be set with Start Build drop-down options.

Step 3. Play Slideshow

You can Play Slideshow with Command-Option-P anytime.

The Nano-Chromatic Color Effect

Description: Fill plain-white text with rainbow colors.

Step 1. Create Two Images

Plain white for the first, rainbow-colored for second one.

Step 2. Attach Move-In Effect: "Wipe"

So the second image will be revealed little by little from left to right with this effect. You can change the wiping direction anyhow you want.

Step 3. Play Slideshow

You can Play Slideshow with Command-Option-P anytime.

The Full iPod Nano Effect

Description: Display the Nanos as if they're coming from left side of the screen.

Step 1. Create Separate iPod Nano Images

Step 2. Arrange Images

Arrange them so that they look nicely queued. If you're going to put the source of incoming iPod Nanos from left to right, make sure you set the order of images correctly; You can always send object to back or bring it to front.

Step 3. Apply Effect for Each Objects: "Move In"

Select every single objects and attach the Move In effect to them. Choose the same duration and share the same Start Build time. Then the effect will be really nice.

Step 4. Play Slideshow

You can Play Slideshow with Command-Option-P anytime.

That's all. And remember Steve Jobs said that:

The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated.

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16 Comments

01:56 PM

Skaventh

Thanks, what a great share!

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05:23 PM

MacPhobia

Hey , what tool using to perform all this.. must not be Microsoft powerpoint i suppose... Am confused

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08:35 PM

Wendy <Webmaster>

PowerPoint won't be able to do such cool things. We, Mac users as well as Steve Jobs, usually use Keynote for our presentation :)

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08:48 PM

MacPhobia

Thats what i assumed wendy.. why would Steve jobs and his Mac followers would use Powerpoint ( a microsoft product ) ;-) So keynote is the tool .. thanks

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09:05 AM

Potato Man

This is awesome, can you send an e-mail how to add the iPod Touch. I also would like the iPhone 3G, please.

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04:22 PM

Ronald

This is a very good post on how the keynote was done, but I feel that Jobs was not using Keynote for his presentation, although many of the effect builds are found in Keynote. For example, the effect where the new iPod Nano is revealed, with camera flashes with a fade in, might be made with Keynote where the flashes are actually images and the Nano fades in, but I highly feel that it was made not using Keynote, as Keynote does not have such an effect by default. Great post anyway, now I can try them out myself! Thanks!

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09:06 PM

Calvin

Hello, but I was wondering, your last effect, the one with the Price - wasn't explained. Care to explain it? Thanks!

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10:28 AM

hellaBAY

You forgot the most important step. Step 1. Put on a fresh black mock turtleneck!!!

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02:33 PM

Wendy <Webmaster>

Hi Calvin, the last effect to flip the price uses the same concept as flipping images. The difference is only in the flipping axis, flipping images uses x-axis while flipping prices uses y-axis :)

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11:42 PM

Beppone

Great!! Thanks! :)

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04:02 AM

E

How do you even get the rainbow effect on the text? I see no where in Keynote to do that.

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08:28 AM

Wendy <Webmaster>

Oh, the rainbow image was made manually, with Photoshop gradient effect, and then attached to Keynote. The smooth wiping effect itself comes from Keynote.

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09:02 PM

Goobi

@Ronald: Jobs by nature of being the CEO of Apple gets to use the future versions of Keynote. He used the sparkle animation long before Keynote 08 was released. This is just a demo of what we're going to see in the next version of iWork (Macworld 09 anyone?)

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02:24 AM

Ryan

Love the other items, but Image Transition (Flip) is already in Keynote 4, along with many other options including Swap, Grid, Shuffle, Thumb Through... Simply choose the "Action" button (next to build in and build out). Then choose Flip from the dropdown. Now there's a window that looks like the quicklook style window to paste the images you want to flip between (or paste text into the box). If you want to make them flip a different direction, just choose it from the other dropdown. You can even flip different directions for the different pictures/text.

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09:43 AM

Abbey

please explain, "rainbow-effect" in detail. How its done thanks

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10:27 PM

Kaspth

Hey, cool post. Do you know a way to make those rainbow colors without the need of purchasing Photoshop? (It's quite expensive considering all I want to do is create rainbows. Ohh... beautiful rainbows.) Thank you in advance.

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