Cut a hole in a shape?

Oct 28, 2015

Hi there.  This is probably a really simple thing to do; but I'm spending way too much time on figuring it out!  I would like to cut out a square/circle from a transparent shape to "highlight" a portion of an object behind it.  

Essentially what I'm doing is explaining different sections of a form via the slide layers.  When the user hovers over that section of the form, it shows the layer with an explanation.  

What I'd like to do is grey-out the form (put a grey transparent shape over it) but leave the section I'm explaining highlighted, or in normal light.  

Is there a way to do this without too many steps? 

4 Replies
Jackson Hamner

What I usually do is to make a copy of the highlighted object and crop it down to just the parts you want to highlight. I attached a .story file demonstrating this.

You could also use Powerpoint's 'Shape Intersect' feature to cut out a shape from another shape, but that I think would be kind of a pain to try to size properly when moving it into storyline. 

Erin Mahabir

@Jackson: thanks for the work-around... This might work well (although potentially tedious to get the exact placement)  

@Gerry: I will definitely request this, now that I know that this isn't already an existing feature that I just couldn't find!  Thanks for the link.  

I decided to use a "page tear" look to the shadow... (attached)