PowerPoint and Presenting Stuff

ColorSchemer Studio 2.0

ColorSchemer Studio 2.0 is a color-oriented application that can be used for creating new color schemes by mixing the color values to create schemes. All color schemes are created based on sound color theory principles. ColorSchemer Studio 2.0 is from the company of the same name, which also creates products like ColorPix, Galleria, etc. You can download a trial version of ColorSchemer Studio 2.0 from their site. They have a Windows version available now, and a Mac version in development, and also a free online version! For this review, we’re working with the Windows version.

Learn how you can use Color Schemer Studio 2.0 to create a color theme for PowerPoint.

Filed Under: Reviews
Tagged as: Color, Graphics, Review

Netmaps: Conversation with Carles Enric Lopez

Carles Enric Lopez is CEO of Netmaps, SA, a Barcelona, Spain-based company. He has a degree in Geography from the Universidad de Barcelona (UB) and the University College of London (UCL). In addition, he holds a Masters in Demography (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona) and is a Postgraduate in Urbanism (Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya).

In this conversation, Carles Enric Lopez talks about the use of maps in PowerPoint.

Geetesh: How can presenters and presentation designers benefit from using maps in their PowerPoint slides?

Carles: PowerPoint maps are not only perfect for making your presentations easier to create but also give them a far more professional look. Such maps are ideal if you are looking to add clear, visual references to your presentation. One of the benefits of our maps for presentations is that we have covered all the country maps in the world with the same kind of information, so it would be perfect for any company to unify their information.

You can modify any of the maps and make your own look and feel, so our maps can be combined with your corporate images in an easy way. It is a well-known fact that visual aids greatly help people to retain for longer the information which you present to them, and the speaker finds it much easier to engage with their audience and pull off a successful presentation if they don’t have to worry about technical problems or trying to describe geographical locations. PowerPoint maps will save you a lot of time and hassle since the maps have been purposely created for PowerPoint software, so you won’t have to worry about glitches, bad graphics, or difficult modifications.

Geetesh: Tell us more about your company and the PowerPoint-specific maps that you provide.

Carles: We, at Netmaps, have over 11 years of experience under our belts, and specialize in the creation of digital maps in a variety of formats, for example, PowerPoint, Illustrator, and Freehand. Our diverse team comprises experienced geographers and cartographers. Our head office is located in a four-story building in the quiet suburbs of Barcelona (Spain), but we have reputable customers in 69 countries throughout the world, such as DK, Time Out, National Geographic, African Development Bank, HP, BBC, Apple, and so on. We offer maps of continents, countries, and cities, both topographical, political, and road maps. Our maps for PowerPoint were created in 2003 because some of our largest clients needed specific and customized maps for their presentations. We used our beta website version from 2003-2005, with Maps 1.0 available. In 2006, we launched the new version of our website 2.0, and finally, in 2009, we have decided to start our PowerPointMaps version 3.0, which combines the free version 1.0 and the payable version. We have also reduced prices by 50% of version 2.0. Version 1.0 maps are completely free to download, and you can start using them straight away. Upgrading to version 2.0 maps (at a cost of just 49 euros each) allows you to easily modify the PowerPoint map.

Geetesh: Tell us more about your support infrastructure.

Carles: Our maps are fully vectorized, which means that our production team is working day in and day out to update any new information. When we update any of the maps, we also transform them to PowerPoint format to make them available for users of PowerPoint presentations.

We can be reached by either phone or email. You will be put straight through to a member of staff (no pushing lots of buttons!). If you choose to send us an email, we promise to get back to you within 6 hours. Our team comprises native-speaking English, French, Spanish, and German nationals. Our production team is on hand if you have any problems with downloading, but if all else fails, we can send the map to you via email. Our central server is in the UK, and we have backups in India and France. It means our presentation maps are guaranteed 24 hours X 7 days.

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: Carles Enric Lopez, Clip Media, Interviews, Maps, Netmaps, PowerPoint

OfficeFX Presenter v3.5

Have you ever wondered how you might transform your presentations into the kind of integrated media displays you see on television during high-profile shows and events? Examples would include the information graphics that appear during network nightly news broadcasts or major sporting events. In those displays, backgrounds move subtly, transitions incorporate key branding and design elements, and video is included in visually interesting ways? Our review product, OfficeFX? Presenter version 3.5 offers these capabilities and does so without changing the way your file looks or behaves in PowerPoint.

Read the Indezine review of OfficeFX Presenter v3.5.

Filed Under: Reviews
Tagged as: Add-in, OfficeFX, PowerPoint, Review

Apply Reflection Effects to Shapes in PowerPoint 2007 for Windows

This tutorial is part of the effects series for PowerPoint 2007. We already showed you how you can apply a shadow effect and tweak the shadow options. In this tutorial, we’ll show you how you can quickly add a reflection to a shape.

Note: Although you can add both a shadow and reflection effect to any object in PowerPoint 2007 or higher versions, it’s good to use just one of these two effects.

Learn how to apply Reflection effects to selected shapes in PowerPoint 2007 for Windows.

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

PowerPoint Slide Design in 2009: Conversation with Olivia Mitchell

Olivia Mitchell has been a Toastmaster, a management development trainer for a major bank, and a political candidate. Now she teaches others how to become more confident and effective presenters – through face-to-face training courses in New Zealand at Effective Speaking and her blog Speaking about Presenting.

Geetesh: Can you tell more about what got you interested in design changes for PowerPoint slides? And how did the idea of a group blog come about?

Olivia: Most of my course participants and visitors to my blog already know that bullet points are awful, but they don’t know what to do about it. I want to make it easy for people to transition from bullet-point slides to visual slides.

Many presentation design bloggers have a particular design style, and that comes through on their blogs. So I see my role as digesting all the great design styles that are out there and showing people how they can adopt those styles. For example, see my post The Top 7 PowerPoint slide designs.

The group blog came about because of a post by Laura Bergells from the Maniactive blog. Laura argued that in some cases, we need a return to more detailed slides. I started composing a blog post to respond to what Laura had written but realized that initiating a wide-ranging debate would be more interesting. I broadened the debate by suggesting that the theme of their posts should be “What you’d like to see in PowerPoint slide design in 2009.”

I invited presentation bloggers and selected experts to contribute. There’s now a total of 40 contributions. It seems to be an issue that people wanted to write about.

Geetesh: What’s your opinion about changes in design?

Olivia: I totally support the move away from bullet-point slides.

But I think there is an issue with integrating new design approaches into everyday business culture. It’s all very well to say that businesses should put as many resources into their PowerPoint slides as their brochures or annual reports, but that’s not going to happen. The reality is that everyday business people will continue to put together the majority of PowerPoint slideshows. They are not going to read design books or read the archives of Presentation Zen. They need quick and simple ways of putting together slides that don’t suck.

Geetesh: Can you quote some opinions from the numerous blog posts that have been put up as part of this group blog initiative?

Olivia: Here are some of the themes that have come through.

First, from the presentation bloggers who are in the trenches working with business people, there comes the theme that most presentations still suck. Here’s Bert Decker:

I would estimate 90% of all types of presentations are created by people who go to their computers and start the process by using the PowerPoint outliner or going right to writing text and bullets on the slides themselves. So, the end result is totally PowerPoint-driven, and we have information without influence and data without emotion.

Many other bloggers echoed this.

There are two main controversies that came through. The first one is “Does Design Matter?”. On the one hand, you have Joey Asher saying:

But ultimately, my position on PowerPoint is this: it’s largely irrelevant to whether you accomplish your goals. That’s because PowerPoint and other visuals, no matter how graphically pleasing, don’t inspire audiences, sell ideas, or win business.

and on the other, Ellen Finkelstein:

I’d like presenters in 2009 to know that design is important. Good design provides a professional, custom look that says that the presenter cared enough about the audience to do more than slap on a default background. Companies hire professionals to design their websites and printed brochures; why not their presentations, which are just as important?

The second controversy is “Simplicity versus Detail”. This is the issue that Laura Bergells discussed in the post that sparked the project. The majority suggested that there should be one idea per slide and that should be supported by a visual.

But there was also a significant minority who suggested that it should depend – this from Brent Dykes:

I am concerned that rather than adding the simple, visual approach to presenters’ “toolboxes,” presenters will use it as a hammer for all presentation situations. Just because bullet points may be perceived as the duct tape of PowerPoint design (inelegant and ugly), it doesn’t mean bullet points aren’t effective in certain situations.

Many bloggers used this opportunity to reiterate key design principles – there’s a lot of unanimity around these — which will provide clear guidance to presenters. For example:

• Remove extraneous detail from your slides
• One idea per slide
• Put details in the handout.

Finally, many bloggers also looked at what might be ahead. The most interesting theme here was the influence of social media techniques on PowerPoint and presenting. Laura Bergells suggested that:

The brevity of Twitter can make you a better designer. A better headline writer. A better presenter. Using and studying Twitter can be a powerful exercise in how to get your point across swiftly and succinctly.

I’ll be publishing four round-up posts to highlight these themes. The first one is already published: PowerPoint Slide Design in 2009: Does Design Matter?

You May Also Like: Slide Design in 2009: Changes, by Geetesh Bajaj

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, Olivia Mitchell, Opinion, PowerPoint