What is the best way to convert pdf to Keynote without losing typographic control?

[DavidLaufer]

I would like to pull a multi page PDF into Keynote to add animation and typographic refinements. Anyone have a method that has been a success? 

[gary_sc]

What kind of animation are you hoping to do? Specifics would help.

However, #1) if you want to add a PDF to Keynote, just drag it onto the cell.

#2) you can open a PDF in Photoshop and save individual pages as png or gif images. If you save it as gif, you can assemble the gif images in PS and make a gif animation.

But these are just stabs in the dark since I do not know what you want to do.

[DavidLaufer]

Hi Gary thx for the reply. Currently,  I have a multipage presentation in pdf form, I woiuld like to convert it to Keynote, where I will add the animation. I tried converting my presentation to powerpoint, but it messes up the character spacing and line breaks. Just hoping there is a way to import a pdf to Keynote. 

[gary_sc]

Hi David,

I'm going to answer this a couple of ways.

First off, you can insert each page into a cell in Keynote, just drag it in. You can do NO formatting this way — what you drag in is what you'll see. If you have a chart, take a screenshot of that and drag it into Keynote or simply redo it in Keynote's tables (which gives you complete control on formatting).

If you want to do your text formatting within Keynote, you can copy and paste the text or export to Word (and if you have to open the word document up in Pages) and copy and paste into Keynote and reformat as necessary.

However, unless I'm not understanding what you've got in your PDF, this whole thing doesn't sound like a good idea. There's a rule of thumb when doing presentations: "Every time the audience is reading the screen, they are not listening to you." And remember, folks read at different speeds so some people will feel rushed while others will get bored while waiting for the next slide.

Keynote (and even PowerPoint) work best when you convey ideas on the screen, not text. Reading text while the speaker is saying the same thing can be painful and even "DEATH BY POWERPOINT!" Take a hint from the very best presenter in history: Steve Jobs. Go into YouTube and find any (ANY) presentation by him and you'll see he has images, lots and lots of images, if he has a chart, he's got the emphasis of that chart already blocked out to force you to see what he wants you to see. If he's got text, it's probably a quote that is short and to the point. If you absolutley need to have bullet points, have them have as few words as possible (per bullet point) and also fade out the ones you've already shown so that the viewer only sees the latest point as emphasis.

Again, I do not know what's in your PDF and I might be completely wrong with everything I wrote above and that's fine, I've been wrong many times, I'm tough. But as I read what you're doing, my spider-sense perked up. 

Good luck!

[DavidLaufer]

Hi Gary - thanks for that thoughtful reply!