Hints & tips

Presentations

How do I do a presentation - I've never done one?

If you have PowerPoint or something similar it is really quite easy, especially if you make it graphics rich and avoid the mistake of having wordy slides you just read out.

A good way is to take an existing presentation you like then adapt it. Alternatively you can choose from the examples in your presentations package. Lighter designs are often easier on the eye and tend to work better with imported pictures.

These notes are mainly geared to PowerPoint 2003 or earlier.

How do I include existing pictures?

Insert, Picture, From File. Then find the image and insert it. Then you can resize it, drag it around etc.

How do I apply changes to all my slides?

Go to View, Master, Slide Master. There are normally different styles for title slides and the rest.

Normally you will have one master for detail slides (this can be adapted to suit graphics or text) and another for opening/closing slides.

How do I include a diagram?

PowerPoint is OK at diagrams and has quite a lot of hidden power in this area.

Start with Autoshapes at the bottom of the screen. You can also do them in another application and insert them into your presentation (via Insert, Object or hit the PrtScn key to capture a screen image then crop it in an image processing application, save it as a jpg and insert that into the presentation).

How do I copy a slide?

Insert, Duplicate Slide. Then amend the copy as you wish. This is the normal way of expanding a presentation.

To copy a slide from another presentation, open both presentations in Slide Sorter (thumbnail) view. Select (click on) then Edit, Copy a slide, switch to the target presentation and Edit, Paste. The slide will acquire the style of the target presentation but may need adjusting via Format, Slide Layout.

How do I change the order of slides?

View, Slide Sorter (PowerPoint) gives you a thumbnails view which lets you drag slides around to alter the order.

This is also a good view for duplicating slides.

You can even temporarily hide slides (right click, Hide Slide) so you can show a shorter version without deleting unused slides.

How do I alter the way the next slide appears?

In PowerPoint via Slide Show, Slide Transition. Many of these transitions are really quite irritating!

How do I do animations?

Right click on a picture, box, block of text or whatever and choose Custom Animation. This lets you assemble bits of a slide on a mouse click, after a delay etc.

Do not overuse! Also remember that if the slide only completes after a few mouse clicks you’ll probably only confuse yourself when using the presentation and forget how many clicks before the next slide appears. It’s better to have all animations happen after a delay, not on a click.

How to apply fancy shading effects?

For a box, right click and choose Format Autoshape. Then Color, Fill Effects, eg Two colors, From center.

Also try One color, From center. This can make diagrams look very professional.

Whichever piece of presentation software you use make sure you learn how to these types of effects - they are an easy way to make your presentation more impressive than most.

How do I solve a “Cannot save font ….” problem?

Via Format, Replace Fonts. Just change the problem font to Arial.

How to avoid boring the audience?

“Death by PowerPoint” is a phrase commonly used by office workers. Not everyone can be an electrifying speaker but it really helps if you:

• Use a nice clean style – lighter ones seem to work better.
• Use plenty of pictures and graphics.
• Don’t be too wordy on slides – they are just to prompt you and there is nothing worse than a speaker reading out each point on a slide.
• Avoid fancy effects and above all never infuriate and insult your audience by bringing up bullet points one by one and reading them out.
• Have far fewer slides than you thought you needed – if you are enthusiastic about your subject you will almost certainly overrun. Hide slides surplus to a particular event.
• Keep to your allotted time.  It helps having a watch or travel clock visible so you can pace yourself and not have to gabble your conclusions.
• Encourage questions while you go but be firm with people who just like the sound of their own voices.

How to ensure it will all work on the big day?

Ask whether anyone technical will be there on the day. It’s best to use their equipment because it will be set up to work with their projector, but make sure they’ve got the right software loaded, eg the free PowerPoint Viewer if they don’t have the full program. Also save it as a self running show (eg pps). Just take your presentation along on a memory pen.

If you have to take your own laptop, schedule some setup time, have a shortcut to the presentation on your desktop and practice flipping to multiple screens (might be Function F5) and changing your screen resolution (via right click on the desktop).