PowerPoint and Presenting Stuff

SlideMagnet: Conversation with Scott Schwertly

    Scott Schwertly is from Ethos3 Communications, an internationally renowned and award-winning presentation design and training company located in Nashville, TN. He is also the Editor-in-Chief of SlideMagnet, an online portal for the presentation space. Scott works with a wide spectrum of clients that includes Fortune 100 companies, Silicon Valley start-ups, and various other organizations throughout the world. He may live in Nashville, TN with his wife and three dogs, but he calls San Diego home – the place of his beloved San Diego Chargers. Scott has a B.A. and M.B.A. from Harding University.

In this conversation, Scott discusses his new SlideMagnet site.

Geetesh: Tell us more about SlideMagnet, and what is its raison d’être?

Scott: SlideMagnet is an online portal/magazine for both novice and professional presenters. It provides presentation tips and advice as well as the latest presentation technology news. The site features articles to help maximize the effectiveness of presentations through improved design, content, and delivery methods, and includes an ask-the-expert section. There’s also a community forum that encourages discussion on related topics.

When I first started Ethos3 close to 3 years ago, I found very limited online resources to build presentation knowledge. Thus, I found myself taking lessons from classics like the works of Dale Carnegie. The unfortunate reality is that I had to rely on books written from the 1930’s since I couldn’t find anything on the web. Today, the resources remain limited. There are, without doubt, some fantastic blogs and tools, but the overall resources are still lacking. My hope is that SlideMagnet will help fill that gap. With sites out there like SlideShare, SlideRocket, Presentation Zen, Slideology, and now SlideMagnet, 2009 will surely be the year of presentations!

My dream is that SlideMagnet will empower presenters. It’s a shame when people inquire with presentation design firms, but due to budget cuts or limited capital, they can’t afford solid presentation design services. Hopefully, SlideMagnet will serve as an alternative by providing tips, tricks, hacks, etc for the entrepreneur with a shoestring budget or the Marketing Director who is unable to receive corporate buy-in regarding presentation services.

Geetesh: What sort of content do you plan to make available on SlideMagnet, and whom is this targeted towards?

Scott: SlideMagnet has lots of great features including items such as:

• Decktionary: A presentation dictionary; includes common words as well as new slang
• Ask the Deckspert: You can ask SlideMagnet’s Deckspert any question related to building, designing, and delivering presentations
• Slide U: Webinars for presenters
• Political Speeches from the Past and Present: Relive the great speeches of yesterday and today
• The Daily Dose: Daily presentation tips and quotes; also includes a presentation site and gadget of the week
• and much more…

SlideMagnet is for everyone. Most importantly, it’s for presenters. It is my hope that SlideMagnet will be the catalyst for everyone’s next great presentation.

The views and opinions expressed in this blog post or content are those of the authors or the interviewees and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any other agency, organization, employer, or company.

Filed Under: Interviews
Tagged as: Design, Interviews, PowerPoint, Scott Schwertly

3-D Format Options for Shapes in PowerPoint 2007 for Windows

3-D Options seems like something that should work with the 3-D Rotation effect in PowerPoint 2007, yet it also works with other effects such as Bevel and Presets. In simple terms, 3-D Options let you format the bevel style of a shape with many more options that are available in the conventional Bevel gallery. You can customize options such as contour, contour color, depth, depth color, and materials. This detailed tutorial explains every option within the 3-D Options gamut.

Explore 3-D Format options for shapes in PowerPoint 2007 for Windows.

Filed Under: PowerPoint 2007
Tagged as: Effects, PowerPoint 2007, Shapes, Tutorials

Apply 3-D Rotation Effects to Shapes in PowerPoint 2007 for Windows

We have already covered all Shape Effects available in PowerPoint 2007 for Windows, except 3-D rotation. In this tutorial, we remedy that omission and show you how you can add a 3-D Rotation effect to a selected shape in PowerPoint 2007 (or higher version).

Apply 3D Rotation effect to shapes in PowerPoint 2007 for Windows.

Filed Under: PowerPoint 2007
Tagged as: Effects, PowerPoint 2007, Shapes, Tutorials

3-D Rotation Options for Shapes in PowerPoint 2007 for Windows

In this tutorial series, we showed you how you can play with all the effects available in PowerPoint 2007 for Windows. This is the last tutorial in this series and builds upon the previous tutorial that showed you how to apply 3-D Rotation to a shape in PowerPoint 2007 (or higher version).

Format 3-D Rotation attributes for shapes in PowerPoint 2007 for Windows.

Filed Under: PowerPoint 2007
Tagged as: Effects, PowerPoint 2007, Shapes, Tutorials

Apply Soft Edges to Shapes in PowerPoint 2007 for Windows

We have already explored a few of the effects that PowerPoint 2007 allows to be used on shapes, and that’s the reason they are called Shape Effects. Soft Edges are one of these effects, and we’ll look at what you can do with Soft Edges, which adds an eaten-up, feathered edge to a selected shape. Soft Edges work best with larger shapes, especially if you use some of the larger Soft Edge variations available. PowerPoint provides some ready-to-use Soft Edges, but there is no option to format Soft Edges beyond these readymade offerings.

Learn how to apply soft edge effects to shapes in PowerPoint 2007 for Windows.

Filed Under: PowerPoint 2007
Tagged as: Effects, PowerPoint 2007, Shapes, Tutorials