Copy and Pasting Objects from Powerpoint

[Guest]

Hi I am recreating a MS Powerpoint presentation using Adobe Captivate 5.5.

I have not imported the presentation directly in Adobe Captivate as I dont wish to embed each slide as from what i understand how the PPT import process works, you end up with each PPT slide being converted into something a bit like a chunk of video embedded on each corresponding Captivate slide.  One cannot edit the objects and animations on this slide like you would other native Cp objects that had Cp animations applied.  To edit the PPT slide objects, you have to use the options to roundtrip edit to PPT and then back to Cp.

As a result I am copy and pasting each object seperately/individually on each slide.

I had followed the similar procedure while using Adobe Captivate 4. However, the problem that I am facing now with Adobe Captivate 5.5 is that whenever I copy paste an object from a PPT slide the size of the object increases a lot in Captivate. I didnt have such a problem using Adobe Captivate 4. Can you please help me solve this problem.

[RodWard]

Captivate 4 and Captivate 5/5.5 do not share the same underlying technologies.  Cp5 was totally rewritten.  So your issue may be due to the new platform being used.

If you don't wish to use the round-tripping functionality, your next best bet is just to use native Captivate objects for captions, shapes, etc, and import all images directly into Captivate.

Message was edited by: Captiv8r - Changed Captivate 5 to 4.

[AndyKingInOC]

I tested it a little, but you could try saving your objects in powerpoint as images (right click, save as picture), then importing them to captivate.  You might have to experiment a little with the image formats to get one that works.

I think when copy/pasting it's taking the original dimensions of the object, but when you save as picture it takes the dimensions you've set in ppt.

hope that helps.

[Guest]

But copying an object from a PPT slide and pasting it in Captivate 4, used to work fine while using Adobe Captivate 4. It worked like a charm.

We are planning to continue working making the project like this, i.e. copying objects from our PPT slide and pasting them in Captivate 4. We will then open the Captivate 4 project in Adobe Captivate 5.5. I believe this is a correct way? I wouldnt experience any drawbacks, problems using this method when I open the project in Adobe Captivate 5.5, will I??

[RodWard]

It's hard to say.  Upgrades usually work OK, but there are too many variables to give out guarantees, especially when you are talking about using objects that were not created natively in Cp.

I suggest you do one project as you suggest and then test thoroughly to see if the upgrade process carries any issues.

[RodWard]

Another thing you need to remember is that once you DO upgrade a project file to Cp 5.5 you cannot save it back down to Cp4 format again.  It's a one way trip.  So you would need to make sure you had all of the objects you needed from PPT before you upgraded the Cp file.  (Technically, you could still add in more slides by creating in Cp4, upgrading to Cp 5.5 and then copying the slides into the Cp 5x project.  But that would be extra work you would no doubt want to avoid?)

[AndyKingInOC]

vikojh wrote:

But copying an object from a PPT slide and pasting it in Captivate 4, used to work fine while using Adobe Captivate 4. It worked like a charm.

We are planning to continue working making the project like this, i.e. copying objects from our PPT slide and pasting them in Captivate 4. We will then open the Captivate 4 project in Adobe Captivate 5.5. I believe this is a correct way? I wouldnt experience any drawbacks, problems using this method when I open the project in Adobe Captivate 5.5, will I??

As Rod said originally, Cp4 and Cp5/5.5 are completely different programs.  Expecting everything to work exactly as before will lead to some frustration.

As for copying to Cp4 then up-converting to Cp5.5, my experience is that not everything will come straight across.  That is, you will possibly see some text formatting changes (example, text captions not justified how you originally had it), some advanced action quirks (example, slide/object will show the action it's performing, but it won't actually fire), and possibly some object formatting objects (example, objects not exactly where they should be).

That has been my experience, hopefully yours will be more smooth.

[Guest]

Hi Yeah so thats what we are doing. Copying objects individually from PPT and pasting in Adobe Captivate 4. Then converting the Adobe Captivate 4 project into Captivate 5.5 and then adding all the required effects to the objects. Seems to be working fine as of now, barring a couple of alignment problems faced with the Question slide options.

However, we recently noticed that now whenever we try and copy anything from PPT to Adobe Captivate 5.5, we are not able to paste anything. The problem faced earlier while copy and pasting (mentioned above was that the size of the object increases a lot in Captivate, but now we are not able to copy and paste anything.

Please help!!

[RodWard]

Have you tried closing down and rebooting your system yet?

[Guest]

Ummm no.. this desktop stays on throughout 24*7 even on weekends. Lemme try shutting it down and see if it helps.

Get back to you in a bit.

[Guest]

Hi. we will try rebooting in a bit.

Also for converting the text to speech option, which voice would you recommend best?

So for Adobe Captivate 4 we only had the option of 'Kate' and 'Paul'. We went ahead with Paul as Kate had difficulty in clearly pronuncing certain words. Paul was slightly better.

For Adobe Captivate 5.5, there are quite a few other options too right? Julliete, Microsoft Anna, Simon and Stefan. Microsoft Anna seems totally lousy and robotic.

Any suggestions?Or is Paul fine?

[RodWard · Accepted solution]

I always use either Kate or Paul (usually Kate) as these voices best approximate my speed of speaking.  I only ever use these TTS voices as a rough initial slide object timing mechanism.  I always end up recording my own voiceover for the final version.  The TTS versions are quite useful for getting client approval of the voiceover before going to all the trouble of dubbing in a real human voice.

[Guest]

Great Thanks for the help guys. Rebooting the desktop worked fine.

We will carry on using Paul only. Apparently, Julliete, Simon and Stefan are French, German and English respectively.

Cheers. Till next time