Flipbook & PowerPoint animation

I remember drawing figures in the corners of annuals as a child in order to make flipbook-style animation. I think they were mostly about aliens attacking Earth and cowboys and indians. Flip books are still going strong, as a web search will show, and they are useful tools to show short term changes e.g. volcanoes exploding, solar flares, different types of exercise, seeds developing, etc.

From Wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flip_book

There is an online flipbook maker at:-

http://www.benettonplay.com/toys/flipbookdeluxe/

I "borrowed" some flipbook sheets from the web and used them to make very effective PowerPoint animations. As with "scanmation", I removed the background in Photoshop and made .gif images. I imported these on to separate slides, lined them up and set up the slide show. On setting the slide show up, remember you want it to "loop until ESC pressed" and each slide must be on timed for 0.01s. I find this fine for my purposes. I feel that this form of animation, coupled with the use of custom animation and animated gifs, could be a source of rich creativity in many subject areas. Anyone want to have a competition and I'll find a prize?

This is a screenshot from an "Autumn" PowerPoint animation with animated figure,  falling leaves and opening conkers.

PS If you want really good and diverse resources to get into the spirit of autumn with go to the Nature Detectives website:-
http://www.naturedetectives.org.uk/