The Stage

The Stage displays the layers of the currently selected slide. The layers can be freely sized, positioned, and rotated on the Stage. In addition to the slide layers, there may also be an optional background layer and an optional foreground layer (watermark). Both can be set in Settings... in the Slideshow menu.

If animation is enabled for a slide, the stage is displayed twice. The start of the animation is displayed on the left side, and the finish of the animation is displayed on the right side. That way you can quickly drag around the layers to create the desired animation effect.

Dragging to the Stage

Dragging files from the Finder or from the media browser in the Sidebar adds new layers to the currently selected slide:

Positioning Visual Items

You can position, zoom, and rotate items on the stage in several different ways:

Guidelines

As image, movie, or title layers are positioned, zoomed, or rotated on the Stage, guidelines will appear to help you align the items. By default items snap to these guidelines:

Use the yellow guidelines to create perfectly horizontal or vertical panning animations.

Contextual Menus

Right-click or Control+click on an item reveals a contextual menu. The commands in this contextual menu depends on whether an image, a movie, or title was clicked:

Clicking on a slide or title in the Stage:

Menu Submenu Description
Animation Enabled Enables or disables the animation for the current slide.
Reverse Exchanges the start and finish state of the selected layer, thereby reversing the animation.
Randomize Sets a random animation for the selected layer.
Zoom In Creates a zoom in animation for the selected layer.
Zoom Out Creates a zoom out animation for the selected layer.
Pan Pans across a panorama image or a vertical image.
Zoom Fill Stage Completely Fills the Stage with the selected layer, so that no part of the Stage background is visible.
Show Whole Image Displays the entire layer. If the aspect ratio of the layer differs from the Stage aspect ratio, then some of the Stage background will be visible.
Show at 100% Displays the selected image at 100%.
Layer Send to Front Sends the selected layer to the front.
Send Forward Sends the selected image forward.
Send Backward Sends the selected image backward.
Send to Back Sends the selected layer to the back.
File Get Info Shows the Info panel for the selected image or movie.
Quick Look Opens the Quick Look panel which displays the selected image or movie.
Is Placeholder Lets you choose a different image or movie file for the selected layer. All other parameters will be kept intact. If you choose an image or movie file with different dimensions, you will have to make some additional modifications to restore the previous appearance.
Cut Cuts the selected layer.
Copy Copies the selected layer to the clipboard.
Paste Pastes the previously copied layer on top of existing layers.
Delete Deletes the selected layer.
Copy Geometry Copies all geometry parameters (position, zoom, rotation) of the selected layer to the clipboard.
Paste Geometry After changing the selection, the geometry parameters can be pasted onto another layer. That way layers can be precisely aligned within a single slide or across multiple slides.
Copy Animation Copies all animation parameters of the selected layer to the clipboard, so that they can be pasted to other layers.
Paste Animation After changing the selection, pastes previously copied animation parameters onto the selected layer. That way animation effects can be transferred between slides.

Clicking in Stage background:

Menu Submenu Description
Show Action Safe Area Displays a dashed rectangle indicating the area of the stage that is 'safe' for displaying action (animation).
Show Title Safe Area Displays a dashed rectangle indicating the area of the stage that is 'safe' for placing titles.