# beamer blocks disposal in circle

I am happy with my beamer slides and I think blocks are nice to separate ideas...

But I've seen some Cisco presentations (most probably powerpoint) with like an image in the middle and then multiple blocks disposed around it (in a circle shape)

I think the effect is very nice, and I don't know how to do it in beamer: do you have an idea?

The idea is to have this kind of shape:

C1  C2 C3
\ | /
C4-Im-C5
/ | \
C6 C7  C8


Im is the image and all Cn are comments (and should be nice inside blocks)

Thank you Louis

PS: a perfect solution should allow to place some \pause in the blocks, so that we have first the image, then first comment and so on...

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I guess a TikZ solution is the best way to do this... \pause is probably not going to work, but more powerful overlay commands (\onslide etc) will certainly be available. –  Seamus Nov 24 '10 at 12:45

The image can/should be done in TikZ and the overlaying can be done using the \action command (\pause is not quite smart enough here).

\documentclass{beamer}
\usepackage{tikz}
\usetikzlibrary{shapes}

\begin{document}
\begin{frame}
\begin{center}
\begin{tikzpicture}
\action<+->{\node[fill=red,ellipse] (O) {Im};}
\foreach \text/\q in {$C_1$/135,$C_2$/90,$C_3$/45,$C_4$/180,$C_5$/0,$C_6$/225,$C_7$/270,$C_8$/315} {
\action<+->{\draw (\q:2cm) node[fill=blue!20!white,draw,rectangle]  {\text} -- (O);}
}
\end{tikzpicture}
\end{center}
\end{frame}
\end{document}

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Rabid dollar alert! Seriously, wasn't there a question recently about putting node text in mathematics mode automatically? –  Loop Space Nov 24 '10 at 13:20
@Andrew: lol. I thought about that but the OP doesn't want a bunch of math expressions arrayed around a central node, he wants text. So if he's cutting/pasting, he shouldn't have to undo the automatic putting of node text in math mode. I probably should have avoided math mode altogether and just went with C1/135,... –  Matthew Leingang Nov 24 '10 at 14:37
@Hendrik: thanks for the friendly edit. –  Matthew Leingang Nov 24 '10 at 16:39
This is exactly what I needed: thank you very much. I won't fear anymore to pass after Cisco guys ;) –  Louis Nov 25 '10 at 10:03