Expert: Joseph Silver - 2/1/2007

Question
Hi,

Please let me know how to animate (from the begining to the end of the trace) a single trace of ECG (Electro Cardiogram) and which software (preferably freeware) can be used to do this.

An example of this is in the following web site where an action potential of a neuron is shown:
http://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/ap.html

Can it be presented in powerpoint?

Thanks,
Kevin


Answer
Hi Kevin - I think your best bet if you want to use freeware is to create this animation as an Animated Gif. There are a bunch of freeware Animation Gif Builders on the internet. Animated Gifs, I am pretty sure, can be imported into Powerpoint (Quicktimes can be imported as well). You will also need to create artwork for the Animated Gif - this can easily be done in Photoshop, or in freeware.

I don't use a lot of freeware, but this link seems to have some suggestions for both the Gif Building program and the Paint program, as well as tons of tidbits on how to do it:

http://www.htmlgoodies.com/tutorials/web_graphics/article.php/3479881

In a nutshell, I think the basic steps are this:
1) Create artwork. In this case, 5-10 different individual gifs of the line starting at a single point and then growing to a full line.
2) Save the 5-10 gifs to a directory. Make sure the canvas size of each gif is exactly the same.
3) Use gif builder to compile all the gifs and save them out to an animated gif.

Hope this helps. Joe

http://designomotion.com/