Overlays are on-screen elements that add detail and information to your animation's keyframes. There are four overlay types: Text, Image, Dynamic Text, and Shape. Text can be either static or dynamic. Static text is added in the form of titles and paragraphs. Dynamic text changes based on map properties such as time, range, or camera viewpoint during animation playback. Overlays can also be grouped to make it easier to reposition a related set of overlays or duplicate into another keyframe for reuse.
Overlays are listed in a gallery in the Overlay group on the Animation tab. These overlay choices are predefined configurations, meaning the settings for font, color, and position are already established. You can edit any of the overlays once you add them to your animation, but custom overlays cannot be created and added to the gallery for reuse.
To ensure that you are adding your overlay to the correct keyframe in which you want it to appear, double-click the keyframe in the Animation Timeline pane. This both selects the keyframe and navigates the map extent to match the keyframe extent. An overlay can also be added across multiple selected keyframes. For example, a title can appear in keyframe 2 through keyframe 5.
Tip:
When you expand the gallery, you can customize what you see. Use the filter drop-down arrow at the top of the gallery to only show the overlay element category you want to use, or leave the default set to All to list all overlay types in the gallery.
Insert text
The following text overlays can be added to your animation: Title, Outline Title, Shadow Title, Paragraph, Outline Paragraph, and Copyright.
To insert text, follow these steps:
- In the Overlay group, on the Animation tab, open the overlay gallery drop-down menu.
- Click the text element you want to add.
You do not have to click the view; it is automatically placed for you, ready to edit.
- Provide the text you want to use. You can type directly or copy and paste into the text box. For copyright text, accept the default or provide your own.
Paragraph text automatically wraps in the given shape.
- Click the Close button
to commit your text and close the edit session for the overlay.Additional edits can be made in the Animation Properties pane to update the overlay, including overwrite the text, adjust font properties, and reposition.
Insert images
The following image overlays can be added to an animation: Image (centered), Watermark (contains transparency), and Full Screen (scales to fit the screen).
Since Lock View Size is on by default, the image may be cut off in final export if you reposition it.
To insert images, follow these steps:
- Click the Image overlay.
- For images, use the Overlay Image window to browse to your file. The image is added centered in the view.
- For watermarks, the image is positioned to the lower right corner with 50 percent transparency.
- For full screen, the image is added and scaled to fit the screen size.
- Click the Close button to add the overlay and close the edit session.
- Select the overlay using the Animation Properties pane if you need to make further edits.
Insert dynamic text
Dynamic text overlay elements use dynamic tags. You can combine these tags with other dynamic and static text tags into a single element to further customize the text. Each type of dynamic text overlay (Map time, Map range, Viewpoint, Voxel Filter, and Voxel Surface) displays a predefined amount of formatting; however, you can insert or remove a piece of text in the existing element.
To insert dynamic text, follow these steps:
- Select the keyframes to which you want to add dynamic text from the Animation Timeline pane.
- Expand the overlay gallery drop-down menu and choose a dynamic text overlay type: Map Range
, Map Time 
, Viewpoint 
, Voxel Filter 
, or Voxel Surface 
.The dynamic text preset is added to the view as an editable text box for the keyframes you selected.
- Move, format, and edit the overlay as desired.
- Click the Close button to exit the on-screen editing and apply the overlay.
- Select the overlay using the Animation Properties pane to make further edits.
Insert shapes
The following shape overlays can be added to your animation: Point, Ellipse, Rectangle, and Arrow. Shapes can bring attention to features of interest in an animation. Overlay shapes cannot be saved separately or exported to a feature layer.
To insert shapes, follow these steps:
- Expand the overlay gallery drop-down menu and choose one of the four shape overlay elements.
The shape is added to the view but can be repositioned.
- Click the Close button to exit the on-screen editing and apply the overlay.
- Select the overlay using the Animation Properties pane to make detailed edits.
Group overlays
Overlays that are part of a related collection can be grouped together to help with organization. Expand the Overlay gallery drop-down menu and choose Group 
from the Common category of overlays. Click the Close button to apply the overlay. Drag and drop other overlays into the Group folder from the list of overlays in the Overlay page on Animation Properties pane. To ungroup an entire collection inside a group overlay folder, right-click the group and choose Ungroup. To remove a single overlay from the group, use drag and drop back to the main list.