I did a recent webinar on PowerPoint. Here are some of the links that I shared. if you go to the main page you can find more tutorials and links to free PowerPoint templates.
Slide:ology: Great book on visual design concepts and how to craft better presentations. They have some good examples of branded templates that do work.
Presentation Zen: This book is very similar to slide:ology and will help you learn to communicate better with your slides. I haven’t read it yet, but his new book is supposed to be good.
Back of the Napkin: Great book on organizing ideas and visual communication.
Various PowerPoint books: Tufte is a critic of the poor use of PowerPoint. He offers a lot of good information on how to present complex data. There are also all sorts of good how-to PowerPoint books.
Free PowerPoint Templates via The Rapid E-Learning Blog
Create in PowerPoint and then save the images as graphic files. This way they’re easier to work with in your course.
Play around with the backgrounds. I like to use the default color theme so I can easily apply a new theme. But adding an image, like a wood panel in this demo, looks really nice.
Incorporate some animated elements. What would it look like to have the note slide out from the bottom? Or have the cards animate in?
Try to get as many of the elements on the master slide as you can. This saves time in production and speeds up publishing.
Here are some tutorials that show how I created the template with some additional tips. You can view them via the Screenr links or in the course below.
Someone asked how I animated the office people in the Security Demo that I posted a while back. So here’s a quick tutorial to show you three ways to do that type of animation.
The basic techniques are here:
Create a single motion path
Create a series of motion paths
Use the Flash once animation and duplicate the object
I work on a 30 inch monitor. So when I create a slideshow in PowerPoint and want to play it back, it fills my entire screen. This can be a little overwhelming.
On top of that, when I do a video tutorial I may already have my screen recorder set to a specific resolution like 960×600. I need to be able to do my screen recording and playback the slide show in the same window.
Here’s a quick tip to help set your slide show playback to a resolution that works with the screen recorder.
Here are the basic steps and then you can watch the tutorial below.
Go into Slide Show and then select Set Up Slide Show.
Select browse by individual window. This creates a scalable window that you can position inside the screen recorder.
Most people use the mouse and cursor to navigate the PowerPoint features. However, there’s a faster way. And that’s by using keyboard shortcuts.
Common Keyboard Shortcuts
There are some keyboard shortcuts that I use all the time. They are:
CTRL+D = duplicate slides or objects
CTRL+M = create a new slide
CTRL+X = cut the object off the screen and place on the clipboard
CTRL+C = copy object and place on clipboard for pasting
CTRL+V = paste object from clipboard
While those are the ones I use most of the time, there are all sort of shortcuts available via the keyboard. And once you know what they are and how to use them, it can really speed up your production.
Using the CTRL key and it works is the same across PowerPoint versions. With the introduction of the ribbon toolbar in PowerPoint 2007, how you use the ALT key is a little different.
Below are two quick video tutorials that explain how to use keyboard shortcuts in the different versions.
In Hollywood, when they make movies that require special effects they’ll use the infamous blue screen (although many times it’s a green screen). What they do is shoot the scene and then later replace the colored screen with a different image or video.
They choose a color screen that can easily be selected and replaced. Today, you’ll learn to do something similar in PowerPoint.
Let’s say you have a PowerPoint shape and you want to put a hole in it. In the example below, we’re going to create a piece of paper that looks like a 3-ring binder page. What we want to do is have the holes in the page be transparent.
Create the piece of paper in PowerPoint using the rectangle tool.
Then add three circles.
Fill the circles with a lime green (or any other color).
Get rid of the outline color.
Select the object and cut it from the screen (or CTRL+X). This places it on the clipboard.
Select Paste Special and paste it as a .PNG file. By pasting as a PNG file, you’ll maintain the image quality and retain any transparency.
Select the Set Transparent Color feature and click on the green color. That will make the green color transparent and you should end up with a see through hole.
That’s basically it. The transparent tool in PowerPoint 2007 and lower can only work on one color, that’s why you want the fill to be solid and to be a color that is no where else in the image. PowerPoint 2010 has a more sophisticated transparent tool feature.
Once you master this technique you’ll find all sorts of uses for it, like getting rid of backgrounds. Here’s a tutorial that shows it in action.
In the tutorial he covers how to save the assets you create and use in your PowerPoint slides. One of the benefits of creating your graphics in PowerPoint is that you can easily share the development files.
He also discusses three image formats and how they work in the slides.
Paste Special is one of those commands that doesn’t get used a lot in PowerPoint, yet it offers a lot of extra functionality. Let’s look at some of what you can do with the Paste Special command.
Below I added a bunch of information from the Microsoft site with a link. If you are inclined to learn everything about Paste Special, have at it. For those looking for the nuts and bolts, here it is.
When you copy an object it gets placed on the clipboard. This allows you to paste the object copied. However, by selecting Paste Special, you can paste the object and apply some other features.
One of the reasons I use Paste Special is to create a graphic in PowerPoint and then copy and paste it as an image so that I can use the object as an image rather than as a PowerPoint object.
A good example of this might be when I want to use the picture effects with something I created in PowerPoint. By copying and Paste Special I can convert the PowerPoint object to an image file on the fly. This is a big time saver.
To learn more about Paste Special, check out the quick tutorial.
You can specify formatting when you paste slides, pictures, objects, and text from other presentations, programs, or the Web into your presentation.
For example, like pictures and other objects, text in a presentation has its own formatting — such as typeface, color, and font size. When you copy text that has different formatting into your presentation, PowerPoint automatically reformats that text to match the text in your presentation. However, you can use Paste Special to maintain the original formatting.
On the Home tab, in the Clipboard group, click the arrow under Paste, click Paste Special, and then do one of the following:
To specify the format that you want to paste the slide, text, or object as, click Paste, and then use the table below to select a format from the Use this format list.
To add a hyperlink to a separate document or presentation, click Paste Link.
Note The Paste Link option is unavailable if you cut or copied content from a document that does not support the Paste Link option, or if the document that you are attempting to link to has not been saved.
Use this format
When:
Formatted Text
You want the text to retain the formatting of the text from the other presentation, program, or Web page.
Note When you copy text from another presentation, the Web, or a different program (that has different formatting) into to your presentation, by default, that text is automatically reformatted to match the text in your presentation.
Unformatted Text
You want the text to take on the formatting of the presentation you are pasting to.
The GIF file format is limited to 256 colors, and is therefore most effective for scanned images, such as illustrations, and less effective for color photographs. GIF is also a good file format for line drawings, black and white images, small text that is only a few pixels high, and animation.
The PNG file format is similar to GIF but it provides better color support. It compresses solid areas of color while preserving sharp detail, such as the detail in line art, logos, or illustrations with text.
You can save, restore, and resave a PNG image without degrading its quality. Unlike GIF files, PNG does not support animation, and some older Web browsers and applications do not support PNG.
You can save a picture as a 16-bit graphic (for use with Windows 3.x and later).
Picture (Enhanced Metafile)
You want the contents of the Clipboard to appear as an Enhanced Metafile (EMF) format.
You can save a picture as a 32-bit graphic, which supports more sophisticated graphics functions.
Device Independent Bitmap
You want the contents of the Clipboard to appear as a Device Independent Bitmap (DIB), such as a slide acting as a graphic for use on Web pages.
A DIB is a representation (that consists of rows and columns of dots) of a graphics image in computer memory. The value of each dot (filled in or not) is stored in one or more bits of data.
The Microsoft Windows BMP format can display millions of colors. Because it is supported by several programs, it is an extremely practical file format to use when you are providing an image to someone who may not have the program in which you created the image.
Note The Display as icon check box is only available if you use Paste Link or if you paste the content as an OLE object. You can then can change the icon for the content that you pasted.
A lot of people moan and groan about PowerPoint because there are so many bad PowerPoint presentations out there. But the way I see it, PowerPoint’s just a tool. If something done in PowerPoint is no good, tell the person who created the presentation or elearning course. Don’t blame PowerPoint.
I heard someone say that it’s still PowerPoint’s fault because it’s so easy to use. That’s just flat out ridiculous. Why don’t we start blaming pens or keyboards for all of the crap that’s out there. They’re a lot easier to use than PowerPoint and empower anyone who can type to write to produce worthless drivel.
To prove my point about the power of PowerPoint, I wrote a post for the Rapid E-Learning Blog that shows how you can use PowerPoint to build effective and viable elearning courses. You’ll still need to start with good instructional design. However, if all you have to sue is PowerPoint, there’s no reason why you still can’t build a decent course with it.
Below is an example of an elearning course created entirely in PowerPoint and then published with Articulate Presenter.
There are a number of ways to start working on your PowerPoint slides. Some people like to start with a template or choose a theme. I usually like to get my content outlined and kind of right before I work on the look and feel of the presentation.
In today’s post I am going to show how to use the outline view when starting your PowerPoint presentation.
How to Use Outline View
Create a new presentation. You can use a template if you want, but I just start with a blank slide.
When you get to the slide, click on the Outline tab. Then add your slide titles. When you hit Enter, you stay on the same level and can enter another slide title.
If you want to add a subtitle (or bullet point), press on the Tab key. That takes you down one level.
To go back up a level, press Shift + Tab. It’s as easy as that.
I like to quickly outline my thoughts using the Enter, Tab, and Shift Tab keys. Once I have my basic content outlined, I’ll start working on the slides.
PowerPoint Tutorial
Here’s a video tutorial that walks you through the steps above in more detail.
CTRL+D = duplicate slides or objects
