An animation can signal status, reveal content, or draw the room's eye while you meet. Each kind of element animates in ways that suit what it is, so the right-click menu's Animation row offers only the animations that fit what you've selected, grouped by kind: Shape, Text, Sticky, Media and Icon.
A labelled element shows two sections under Animation, Shape for the box and Text for its words, so a frame can pulse while its label types itself in. Select several different kinds of element together and you get one section per kind, each applying only to the elements it fits. When only one kind applies, such as a single text element, its animations show directly under Animation.
Every option shows a tiny live preview of the real animation, paused on a telling moment; hover a tile and it plays. On a desktop you can also hover a tile to preview the motion live on your selection: it plays right on the element so you can compare options, and a click locks it in (move off the tiles and it reverts). None takes an animation off again.
Shape
For frames, link cards, and the boxed pieces of a Space such as desks and sofas:
- Pulse sends a ring the shape of the outline out from the element.
- Blink gently breathes its opacity, the classic "status light" when paired with a small coloured circle.
- Glow wraps it in a soft halo that follows its outline.
- Trace runs a light with a fading tail around its outline.
- Gradient drifts a soft band of colour across its fill.
- Heartbeat double-pumps its size in a lub-dub rhythm, and Breathe swells it slowly and gently; both stay in place, ideal for emphasis without distraction.
- Shimmer catches the light with a quick glint, and Highlight brightens the fill in a luminous "look here" swell.
- Bounce crouches, hops, and lands with a squash, and Wobble tilts side to side and settles.
- Shake jitters it side to side, and Jelly squashes and stretches it.
- Float drifts it in a slow loop, and Swing rocks it like a pendulum from its top edge.
Every effect follows the element's real outline, and the attention animations pause between beats so they read as deliberate rather than frantic. How far an element travels scales with its size, so a tiny status light and a large frame both look right.
Moving Any Element
The Shape animations that move or fade the whole element, Blink, Heartbeat, Breathe, Bounce, Wobble, Shake, Jelly, Float, and Swing, work on almost anything. Sticky notes and pictures show a Shape section beside their own, so a photo can bounce. Icons and text already have their own Bounce and Float, so they don't need it.
On a sticky note or a picture, the element plays one body animation at a time: picking Bounce replaces a Ken Burns, and picking Ken Burns replaces the Bounce.
Text
For the words of a text element, and for the label of a frame or a sticky note:
- Typewriter types the words in letter by letter behind a blinking caret.
- Words brings each word in, rising into place.
- Cascade drops the letters in from above, one after another.
- Focus sharpens the words from a blur.
- Scramble resolves random characters into the real words, left to right.
- Highlighter sweeps a marker stroke behind the words, and Underline draws a line beneath them.
- Wave ripples the letters up and down, Shine sweeps a band of colour across them, Flicker makes a few letters stutter like a neon sign, and Rainbow flows colour through them.
- Glow, Bounce, and Float move the words as a whole.
The ones that bring words in (Typewriter, Words, Cascade, Focus, Scramble, Highlighter, and Underline) play, hold so the words can be read, clear, and start again. Very long labels animate word by word, or all at once, so they stay smooth.
Sticky
- Flutter lifts the note's bottom edge as if in a breeze, and Sway swings it gently from a pin at its top.
- Peel curls up its bottom corner, and Lift raises it off the board as its shadow grows.
- Wiggle gives it a quick "look at me" wiggle.
- Drop drops the note onto the board, and Slap slaps it down.
- Pulse, Glow, and Highlight work as they do in the Shape section.
Media
For pictures:
- Ken Burns slowly pans and zooms across the picture, Zoom pushes in and back out, and Pan drifts from side to side.
- Tilt turns the picture gently, as if it were held in the hand.
- Develop brings the picture up from washed out to full colour, like an instant photo, and Focus sharpens it from a blur.
- Wipe wipes it in from the left, and Iris opens it from a circle at its centre.
- Sheen sweeps a band of light across it.
The motion stays inside the picture's edges and its crop.
Animating an Icon
Any icon can loop a glyph animation chosen from its menu: Spin, Beat, Pulse, Glow, Ping, Breathe, Shimmer, Bounce, Wiggle, Flash, Tada, Flip, Jump, Swing, or Float. A spinning gear or a beating heart adds life without a separate element; Glow, Ping, Breathe, and Shimmer emphasise an icon in place without moving it.
Four icons are drawn to move, so they arrive already animated: the Spinner and the Gear spin, the Heartbeat beats, and the Signal pings. Change or clear their animation from the menu like any other.
Speed
Once you've picked any animation, a Speed row appears in its section with Slowest, Slow, Normal, and Fast. It scales the timing while keeping each animation's character. New animations start at Slow, the calm default; step up to Normal or Fast for more urgency, or down to Slowest for the gentlest loop.
Repeat
Below Speed sits a Repeat switch, on by default. Leave it on and the animation loops for as long as the canvas is open; turn it off and the animation plays a single cycle and then rests, a one-time flourish rather than a loop. An animation that brings something in, such as Typewriter or Drop, plays once and stays revealed. Text animations start with Repeat off, so words play once and stay put; turn it on to loop them. Each section has its own Speed and Repeat, so a shape and its words can move at different paces.
How Animations Behave
- Subtle by design. They loop quietly so a board stays readable rather than busy.
- Shared with collaborators. Everyone in a live session sees the same loop; nothing is broadcast frame by frame.
- Reduced-motion safe. If your system asks for reduced motion, animations freeze to a tidy still frame, with everything fully shown.
- Frozen on export. PNG and SVG exports capture a still.
- Copied by the format painter. Animation is a cosmetic property, so the format painter carries it to other elements of the same kind, a motion such as Bounce to anything that can move, and a Text animation to anything with words.
Select several elements first and each section applies to every element it fits at once, so you can set a whole row of notes fluttering in a single action. With notes and a frame selected together, Animation shows Shape, Text and Sticky side by side.
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