Successful Presentation Strategies (Collection)

36. Go in the Right Direction

A Presentation Lesson from Akira Kurosawa

During his long and distinguished career, the great Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa pioneered many innovative cinematic techniques that are applicable to today’s presentation graphics. One is Mr. Kurosawa’s creative use of the Wipe, a filmic transition between scenes in which a new image slides across an existing image and replaces it—like a curtain being drawn across the screen.

In today’s fast-cut action films, the Wipe has fallen out of favor, but the effect is very useful in presentations where fast cuts can be jarring to an audience. More about speeds in a moment, but first let’s look at how Mr. Kurosawa used Wipes in his 1952 film, Ikiru.

Ikiru, which means “to ...