Inserting Movies in Powerpoint

Paul Smith's PowerPoint Pages
Movies in PowerPoint Presentations (For PC)

There is more than one way to add a movie clip to a PowerPoint presentation. If the movie format is compatible with PowerPoint, you can insert the
clip into PowerPoint, and it will play within the presentation. If it is not compatible you may be able use the movie but will need to launch it in a separate player.

It's vital that you try your movies on the machine from which you intend giving your presentation. A movie may work on your home PC or laptop, but may not run on a work computer, or vice versa.

Unlike photographs/pictures/clip art etc, a movie is separate from PowerPoint. To make sure the movie will work, create a folder for your files and always keep the PowerPoint and the movie in that folder.

The usual way to insert a movie into PowerPoint is from the insert tab on the PowerPoint Ribbon. Open the presentation in which you wish to have a movie play. On the PowerPoint ribbon, click on the insert tab, the n on movie. From the drop down menu that appeasr select "movie from file" and select the file you wish to use. You will be offered the option to have the file play automatically, or when clicked. Now when you launch PowerPoint full screen the movie can be played.
As a rule, movies with the file extensions "AVI" and "WMV" will play within PowerPoint, whilst those with the QuickTime "MOV" extension will not. MPG/MPEG files may or may not play, depending on available codecs. If an mpeg wiill not play, check that there is software on you machine to play DVDs. If not, install a player and you might find the the files will then work. If not, read on

Is my movie compatible? - PowerPoint uses "Media player" to run movies. It's confusing because this is not the "Windows Media Player" many are familiar with. If a clip does not run in Media Player, it will not run within PowerPoint. There's a convenient way of checking, - On your PC, click on: "Start" (bottom left of your screen) Then on "Run". In the box that appears, type: mplay32.exe, and click OK. When Media Player appears, you can check your files, by clicking "File" then "open" If the movie plays, it should play within PowerPoint, if not you may be able to link to it instead. Quicktime movies will not play in in PowerPoint using the usual "insert movie" route. See my Quicktime page for instructions to get you mov files working.

 
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[Picture of "Start/Run functions]		   mplay32  
mplay32

If you can't get your movie to work inside PowertPoint, make a hyperlink to the file. Type some text in slide, select it, right click and choose Hyperlink. (A)
Navigate to your movie, select it. and click ok (B). You will see that the text is inderlined. Now when you view the slide full screen, you can click on the link for the movie to launch in a new window.

Hyperlink
Hyperlink-02
A
B