Understanding the Timeline Interface

Audio Transcription

Hello and welcome back to the fourth section of Articulate Storyline training series.

In the previous video we have seen, “what a timeline is and how to use it”. In this video, we will get familiar with the timeline interface and how we can modify the objects in a slide using it.

So, let’s start with this little eye icon here. You may find this option helpful while developing a slide that is packed with lot of content. If you click the icon against any object in timeline, that object will be hidden temporarily on the slide. Once again click the icon to unhide it.

Let’s see how this can come in handy with an example. If we look at this slide, let’s say we want to edit this first bullet point which disappears after a few seconds and then the next set of points appears. In this slide’s workspace, it is placed below the next set of points,

It can be difficult to select the correct textbox we want to edit. In that case, we can simply hide the other overlapping objects. Once editing is done, don’t forget to unhide the objects because hidden objects in the slide will not appear in the published output.

If you wanted to hide all the objects in a slide at once then simply click this eye icon on the top. In this way, it can be helpful to focus on a specific object we are working on without any overlapping objects.

Next, we have this lock icon. It is quite similar to hiding objects function with the only difference being that when this option is activated, the object will not be hidden but it would be locked to its current position preventing us from accidently moving or modifying that object. To unlock an object, click the lock icon once again.

Next, we have renaming the objects in the timeline. It is always a good practice to give a distinguishable name to the objects. That way we can easily identify the objects while attaching triggers to them. The most common way that we all know to rename is by double clicking on the name and then enter the new name. Alternatively, you can right-click and select rename.

If the name is too long to fit in the timeline tab, we can hover over this partition between the timeline and names section. Then click and drag the boundary for more real estate.

Next we have grouping objects. In storyline we can select specific objects and group them so that, when you move an object of that group, the other objects in the group will also move along without losing their alignment.

For instance let’s say, I wanted to group the first set of bullet points and the second set of bullet points separately. This way I can move each set of points at once without the need of selecting each bullet individually. To do that, I can hold control key and then select the first set of bullet points. Then, press control + G to group them.

Alternatively, you can select multiple objects and then go to arrange under home tab and select group. After grouping, if you want to rename, reorder, or animate each item in the group separately, then, you can click this little arrow in the timeline to expand or collapse the individual objects in that group.

To ungroup, you can simply select the group and press control + shift + G or click arrange and select ungroup.

Sometimes while arranging the slide objects to appear in sync with the audio, we might want to take a closer look at the timeline to rearrange them with precision. Then, we can use this slider at the bottom to zoom in and out at a portion of the timeline.

We can also preview the slide in the timeline using these play, pause, and stop controls. When we click on this play button, slide starts playing with in the workspace without switching to the preview mode. This can be very useful while synching the objects with the audio.

With this we have come to the end of this video, in the next video we will see how to modify the timing, duration and order of objects in the timeline.