View Full Version : Bulleted lists


Ian Stark
December 8th, 2008, 12:44 PM
My clients often ask me to include bulleted lists in their corporate videos.

Leaving aside discussions about the aesthetic qualities of such requests, how do others create bulleted lists that reveal over time or at specific dialog points?

At the moment, I am creating a new track for each bullet point, aligning them, dropping in composite level envelopes, etc. It's not difficult, but it's time consuming. What is a real pain is where I then want to change the order of the bullet points or add/delete one.

Does anyone have a better method?

Suggestions that my clients use PowerPoint instead will be politely ignored! ;-)

Mike Kujbida
December 8th, 2008, 12:57 PM
Ian, here's what I've done when faced with doing this.
Create a slide that has 6 (as an example) bullet points.
Create 5 duplicates of it.
Open slide 1 and erase points 2-6, open slide 2 and erase points 3-6, etc.
Leave the required number of blank lines under slides 1-5 or it'll attempt to fill the screen with text and you don't want that.
Place on timeline in desired location.
Done :-)

Ian Stark
December 8th, 2008, 01:08 PM
Ah yes, very sensible! In fact, I've done that in the past - but for some reason when faced with the same situation today I didn't think to do that! Thanks for the reminder.

I wish there was a more elegant way to do it without having to create numerous additional tracks, though.

Mike Kujbida
December 8th, 2008, 01:21 PM
Ah yes, very sensible! In fact, I've done that in the past - but for some reason when faced with the same situation today I didn't think to do that! Thanks for the reminder.

Since it's Christmas time, no charge :-)

I wish there was a more elegant way to do it without having to create numerous additional tracks, though.

Since the titles appear at different times, it's only one extra track, not numerous ones - or am I misunderstanding your workflow?

Ian Stark
December 8th, 2008, 01:38 PM
Since the titles appear at different times, it's only one extra track, not numerous ones - or am I misunderstanding your workflow?

But if you wanted the list to build, so you had all six (say) on the screen, wouldn't you need a separate track for the clip with one point, a track for the clip with two points etc etc?

Thanks for the early gift, btw ;-)

Mike Kujbida
December 8th, 2008, 01:50 PM
But if you wanted the list to build, so you had all six (say) on the screen, wouldn't you need a separate track for the clip with one point, a track for the clip with two points etc etc?

Not necessarily.
What I've done in the past is just place them one after the other on the timeline.
You can then do a cut, dissolve or transition of your choice from one to the next.
Since you started by creating the slide #6 first and then subtracting from it, the "build" should appear seamless (i.e. no jumps due to formatting issues).
Just remember to leave the required number of blank lines under slides 1-5 or it'll attempt to fill the screen with text and you don't want that.
(I edited my first response to add this instruction).


Thanks for the early gift, btw ;-)

Merry Christmas from the "colonies" (Canada, that is)

Andy Wilkinson
December 8th, 2008, 01:50 PM
Ian, no, as Mike has eluded to.

1st section has a text (title) video line in the timeline say on the top row with bullet 1 (for say 5 secs), then the "clone" but with 2 bullet points for 5 secs and then so on.... until you get to the 6 bullets that you used to create the other 5 lesser clips.

All can be in the same video track of the timeline, no need to cascade them down.

Hope this makes sense!

Ian Stark
December 8th, 2008, 01:58 PM
Andy and Mike - your day has clearly not been as arduous as mine as you both are talking sensibly. I, on the other hand, am talking cobblers . . . .!

Of course that's the way to do it - thanks for the friendly advice!

Jason Robinson
December 9th, 2008, 02:00 AM
Ian, here's what I've done when faced with doing this.
Create a slide that has 6 (as an example) bullet points.
Create 5 duplicates of it.
Open slide 1 and erase points 2-6, open slide 2 and erase points 3-6, etc.
Leave the required number of blank lines under slides 1-5 or it'll attempt to fill the screen with text and you don't want that.
Place on timeline in desired location.
Done :-)

Ditto for my solution. absent a workable (and easy to use) text titling app, that is what I have had to resort to.