PowerPoint and Presenting Stuff

Shape Intersect Command in PowerPoint 2016 for Windows

PowerPoint 2016 for Windows lets you take a bunch of selected shapes and then apply one of the five Merge Shapes options to end up with some amazing results. However, the Intersect option that we are exploring within this tutorial works a little differently than the Combine, Fragment, Subtract, or Union options that we explore in other tutorials. Before we look at how the Intersect option is different, let us understand what it does.

Learn how you can intersect shapes in PowerPoint 2016 for Windows.

Filed Under: PowerPoint 2016
Tagged as: Merge Shapes, Microsoft Windows, Office 2016, PowerPoint 2016, Shapes, Tutorials

Pickit Plug-in for PowerPoint: Conversation with Henrik Bergqvist

Henrik Bergqvist has been a part of several start-ups and is one of the founders of Pickit, an aggregated image bank and Microsoft Office partner. Henrik has been practicing his entrepreneurial skills since the beginning of 2000. He has a history of mixing the creative and rational sides when it comes to education and work. Henrik has worked with business development within several markets and countries around the world, such as Russia, India, Japan, United States, Turkey, etc. He is also the author of the book Ten Truths about Business Development, published in 2011.

In this interview, Henrik talks about the Pickit Plug-in for PowerPoint.

Geetesh: Henrik, can you tell us more about why you created the Pickit plug-in for PowerPoint?

Henrik: Since its launch in 1990, Microsoft’s PowerPoint has become an integral tool for presenting ideas and work results. In today’s world, the photo medium is crucial when communicating a concept and making a point. With 95% market share and over 1.2 billion users worldwide, it is estimated that millions and millions of PowerPoint presentations are made each day. But 85% of the photos used online are stolen from the internet and used without legal clearance, meaning that the photographers who own the images receive neither recognition nor financial remuneration. In the meantime, the sharing of photos online has skyrocketed in the last few years. We see that the existing image banks nowadays offer a great service for the professional photo buyers, but the non-professional photo users with low or no budget for photos are faced with no legal alternative to Google and Bing. We saw that the market is broken, and we decided to do something about it.

So we launched Pickit with the vision of a fair-trade photo market, where users can get personalized content for low or no cost and photographers and photo-sharing enthusiasts get rewards and recognition for their efforts. And with our Office integration, Microsoft customers benefit from being able to find shots that possess an individuality and creativity not found in standard stock images, adding genuine authenticity to their work. People who can’t find a particular image can send a ‘Photo Mission’ request to Pickit’s community of photographers, who are briefed on the exact needs of the user, and can submit their work in response. Anyone can upload content onto the Pickit platform, regardless of their photographic experience. Our curation is dedicated to serve slide show presentation creators. The Pickit Market contains photos from thousands of photographers worldwide, as well as aggregated content from other image banks, and any person or organisation can publish and sell their photos on Pickit Market. We return 60% of the income to the photo providers and our community, meaning that photographers get rewarded for their contributions.

Geetesh: What feedback have you received from users of the Pickit plug-in for PowerPoint—can you share some thoughts?

Henrik: The feedback has been overwhelming. We saw the demand upfront, but it has been so fantastic to see so many knowledge workers from all spheres using and loving our tool. Since Clip Art’s death in 2014, Pickit has been the alternative to use within the Microsoft Office environment. What our users love most is the fact that they can find their images exactly where they need them, without ever leaving PowerPoint and Word.

And given that our community of photographers can share their creative work from anywhere, at any time with the help of our mobile apps, each client is presented with a variety of pictures from around the globe to choose from, easy and fast. By signing up to Pickit, users also get the possibility to curate their own image collections that they can later access on every platform. This is one of our most popular features, people find it to be both really convenient and great fun. In addition, our universal Windows 10 app for PC and mobile is used and loved by thousands of people with passion for pictures, and all the wonderful ratings and reviews we get in the Windows store worldwide are a reflection of that.

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: Add-in, Clip Media, Interviews, Pickit, Pictures, PowerPoint

Shape Fragment Command in PowerPoint 2016 for Windows

PowerPoint 2016 for Windows provides five options within the Merge Shape gallery. While four of the five options either remove or retain something, the fifth option known as Fragment finds common ground by keeping everything. Yes, it discards nothing at all. In fact, it “fragments” each possible division caused by overlapping shapes and turns them into many small shapes.

Learn how you can fragment shapes in PowerPoint 2016 for Windows.

Filed Under: PowerPoint 2016
Tagged as: Merge Shapes, Microsoft Windows, Office 2016, PowerPoint 2016, Shapes, Tutorials

Presenters Network: Conversation with David Grupper

David Grupper is the creative director for Point Made Animation, a studio specializing in explainer video and advanced PowerPoint animation. As a communications professional with extensive experience in highly collaborative, in-house environments as well as independent creative consulting, his print and digital work reflects, represents, and strengthens institutional identity and conveys strategic messaging. David is a careful listener, uniquely able to clarify complex issues and reconcile diverse interests, resulting in unique and innovative solutions.

In this interview, David talks about Presenters Network, an event being held in New York for presenters.

Geetesh: David, can you tell us more about the Presenters Network event being held in New York this July?

David: Much has already been written about the solitary freelancer, working alone, whose only human contact is the mail carrier. So I should not have been surprised when I got together with a small group of presentation designers and heard something similar.

Like many others, David Greenbaum is a PowerPoint specialist at a well-known telecom corporation. Far from the isolated freelancer, David works closely with colleagues every day. He is friendly, outgoing and professionally assertive. Yet, he told me that he almost never meets other presentation designers. The small gathering where he told me this was a rare and welcome opportunity for him to share ideas, technical tips, and stories that would be appreciated only by another presentation expert.

Occasionally, presentation specialists will meet each other at a conference where several speakers have each brought their tech people. Other than that, there is only one annual gathering, the Presentation Summit, a powerful national conference where presentation experts meet for four days at a hotel.

If you are not attending the Summit, there are always Linkedin groups. But, of course, there you are in front of your computer monitor again.

Luckily, there is another option. On July 19, presenters, designers, speakers and other PowerPoint folks will meet at the Presenters Network, an annual after-work event where a select group of professionals will enjoy drinks on a beautiful rooftop deck in midtown Manhattan and hear from PowerPoint experts. Experts like Microsoft MVP Nolan Haims or YouTube sensation P-Spice. And meet the folks who are launching the new Presentation Guild.

This is the second time this annual gathering will be held and it’s the only one of its kind in New York. You can find out more at Presentersnet. A limited number of discount tickets are available through the event’s sponsor, Point Made Animation (use promo code: pointmadeanimation).

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

Filed Under: Interviews
Tagged as: David Grupper, Events, Interviews, Point Made Animation, Presentation Skills, Presenters Network

PowerPoint and Presenting News: June 7, 2016

Do you want to use a picture fill in PowerPoint that spans across shapes on the same slide? We explain how you can achieve these results! We look at a new timeline graphic from SlideModel that is different, and we also bring you answers to three presenting questions in a video from TJ Walker. Adam Noar of Presentation Panda discusses five Presentation Hacks, and Xie Kai of PowerPointLabs talks about the Picture Slides Lab feature in their free PowerPoint add-in.

PowerPoint 2016 for Windows users can learn about formatting shape outlines and inserting shapes. They can also learn about rotating and duplicating shapes — and also the Merge Shape commands. Finally, do not miss the new press releases and templates of this week!

Read Indezine’s PowerPoint and Presenting News.

Filed Under: Ezine
Tagged as: Ezine, Indezine, News, PowerPoint