Category: PowerPoint

by AJ George 

Today we are always on the go, and we are seldom without our mobile devices. For this reason I thought it would be a good idea to investigate some just-in-time app solutions for presenting PowerPoint presentations on the road. Spoiler alert: it didn't go well.

First, the good news.

iPad: SlideShark

SlideShark is available in the AppStore for free and does a terrific job. To use SlideShark, you first upload your PowerPoint presentation from your computer to www.slideshark.com. Then you download the SlideShark app on your iPad. Once you have logged into your SlideShark account, your uploaded presentation appears in the SlideShark app on your iPad, ready to be presented with full animation functionality. You advance the slides by using a simple swipe gesture. Click-to-start animations start with a tap of the screen. To skip between slides, you swipe the screen up to reveal a pane containing all of your slides and then tap the slide to which you would like to advance. You can also hide slides from within the app so they do not show in your presentation. I am extremely pleased with this app. Rating: Highly Recommended

Now the bad news.

iPhone: iPresenter for Microsoft PowerPoint

Hypothetically speaking, this app will allow you to move through presentations on your computer by using your iPhone as a remote. My best advice, however: don't even waste your time. I spent $3.99 on this in the AppStore, which is roughly $3.99 too much, considering I could never get the partner software to install correctly on my PC. I tried several times, checked and re-checked that my system requirements were correct, but it never worked. Rating: Disappointing.

iPhone: mbPointer

Deja vu: this app should do the same thing as the iPresenter, but, alas, it falls short. I spent $2.99 on this app, but it did not work. The instructions in the app say nothing about downloading the receiver software to your system. Had I not read the reviews, I would not have known at all. However, even after reading the reviews, downloading the receiver software to my computer and ensuring that both my iPhone and the computer were on the same wireless network (which they also don't tell you, but someone in the reviews did), it still could not connect to the receiver, giving me "Error Code 60" but no solution for what to do about said error code. Rating: Disappointing.

iPhone: iClickr

This free app should function as a remote clicker for your PowerPoint presentations. I, however, could not get it to work. First the computer download told me I didn't have the correct version of Microsoft PowerPoint on my PC (even though I did). Then the iPhone app told me it was unable to connect, either through a digital Bonjour connection or through a manual connection via IP address. I fooled around with this app for about half an hour, and made sure to check the instructions given in the App Store, but could not get it to work. Judging from the app's reviews, I am not the only person to have these issues. Rating: Disappointing.

For me, except for the success with SlideShark, the world of iDevice apps for PowerPoint is still in its infancy. How about you? Are you having success with an app that you'd like to share? Let us know in the comments below.

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AJ teaches a live, 3-hour class that offers tips/tricks for improving the look and feel of your PowerPoint presentations: Slide Sprucing: Remodeling Lackluster PowerPoint Slides for eLearning and Presentations. 

by AJ George 

 

After completing your poll and tweaking the design, you can either download, copy and paste the slide into your PowerPoint presentation, share it on Facebook, Tweet it, add it to your blog or web page, email it, or download it for Prezi presentations. While I do prefer Shakespeak's direct integration into PowerPoint from a design stand point, I think Poll Everywhere's ease in sharing across multiple platforms makes it a really great alternative. Which of the two is the better option really depends on what you plan to do with the polls you create.

Poll Everywhere is free at an introductory level. If, however, you would like to poll an audience larger than 40, moderate responses, or customize how people vote, you'll need to pay for the service. Click here for pricing plans. 

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AJ teaches a live, 3-hour class that offers tips/tricks for improving the look and feel of your PowerPoint presentations: Slide Sprucing: Remodeling Lackluster PowerPoint Slides for eLearning and Presentations. 

by AJ George 

Download and add Shakespeak to your PowerPoint deck and you'll be able to create presentations that allow your audience to text, tweet or use a Shakespeak website to send in votes to polls or written responses to questions, which can appear right up on your screen. (The obvious negative side effect of the latter is that you may have that bad seed in your audience who would send in something inappropriate, but never fear, you can adjust the settings to choose whether or not you want these messages to automatically display.

Downloading Shakespeak adds a tab within PowerPoint with options to add a vote slide, add a message slide, edit the presentation/vote/message, start/stop the session, clear the results, open the moderator, or watch a tutorial on how the plug-in works. When you enter a vote slide or a message slide, the plug-in automatically inserts an instruction slide that will alert your audience how to vote or submit messages.

 

Don't like the way that slide (or anything else added by Shakespeak) looks? That's cool; it's all fully editable just like any other PowerPoint slide. 

Clicking the Start Session button allows you to choose how you want votes and messages to come in (SMS, Twitter, online, or all of the above), and then you can get started. After the session you'll be given the option to save or discard the results of your vote and message slides. The service is not free, but you'll receive 20 credits with your download. Additionally, you can test out the slides for free prior to your actual presentation. Click here for pricing information.

Are you using Shakespeak or something similar to collect responses from your learners? How's that working out? I'd love to hear from you.

AJ teaches a live, 3-hour class that offers tips/tricks for improving the look and feel of your PowerPoint presentations: Slide Sprucing: Remodeling Lackluster PowerPoint Slides for eLearning and Presentations. 

by AJ George 

1. In PowerPoint, choose File > Info.
2. At the far right of the screen you will see a small preview image of the presentation. Directly below the preview, click the arrow next to Properties to view a drop-down menu. (What a sneaky little hidden menu!)
3. Choose Advanced Properties to open the Properties dialog box.
     
4. Click the Contents tab to view all the fonts used in the presentation.
    

See also:

• How to Save a Presentation with Embedded Fonts
• How to Find and Delete Embedded Fonts

AJ teaches a live, 3-hour class that offers tips/tricks for improving the look and feel of your PowerPoint presentations: Slide Sprucing: Remodeling Lackluster PowerPoint Slides for eLearning and Presentations. 

by AJ George 

1. In PowerPoint (2007 or 2010), choose Insert > Illustrations > Chart (to open the Insert Chart dialog box.)
2. Select your desired chart and click OK.
3. On the PowerPoint slide, right-click each individual element of the slide that you would like to format and choose Format Data Series. (The Format Data Series dialog box will open.)
4. Format to your liking and click the Close button.

Note: Don't bother editing the excel spread sheet at this point, your data will not be saved with the template.

5. Ensure the chart is selected on the slide and chooseChart Tools > Design > Type > Save As Template(to open the Save Chart Template dialog box).

    

6. Give your chart template a name and click the Save button.

How to Use a Chart Template

1. In PowerPoint, choose Insert > Illustrations > Chart (to open the Insert Chart dialog box).
2. Click the Templates folder at the top left.  


 

3. Select your chart template from the gallery and click the OK button.

Note: If you would like your chart template to be the default chart style, click the Set as Default Chart button (as seen above) on the Insert Chart dialog box. To edit the template, click the Manage Templates button.

Please note that applying a chart template to an existing chart may cause your system to crash. Ensure you save frequently.

1. In PowerPoint, select your chart on the slide.
2. Choose Chart Tools > Design > Type > Change Chart Type (to open the Chart Type dialog box).



3. Click the Templates folder at the top left, select your chart template from the gallery, and click the OKbutton.

Your chart will now reflect the formatting of the template.

AJ teaches a live, 3-hour class that offers tips/tricks for improving the look and feel of your PowerPoint presentations: Slide Sprucing: Remodeling Lackluster PowerPoint Slides for eLearning and Presentations.

by AJ George 

1. With your presentation opened in PowerPoint 2010, choose File > Save & Send > Create Handouts.
2. Click the Create Handouts button.  

This will send your presentation to MS Word. Since we are not actually interested in the handouts, you can choose anything from the Send to Microsoft Word dialog box and click OK. MS Word will open.

3. In Word 2010, press [Ctrl] [F] on your keyboard to bring up the Navigation pane.
4. Click the more arrow to the right of the Search Document field.



5. Select Advanced Find from the drop-down menu.

The Find and Replace dialog box will open.

6. At the bottom of the dialog box, click the Formatbutton and choose Font.
7. In the Font field, type the name of the offending font and click OK.

This will return you to the Find and Replace dialog box.

8. Leave the Find What field blank and click the Find Next button.

Word will find where the font was used so you can delete whatever is causing the hiccup back in your PowerPoint presentation.

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AJ teaches a live, 3-hour class that offers tips/tricks for improving the look and feel of your PowerPoint presentations: Slide Sprucing: Remodeling Lackluster PowerPoint Slides for eLearning and Presentations. 

by AJ George 

 

When creating PowerPoint presentations and moving them from one computer to another, one area of concern is fonts. If you've used specific fonts within a presentation, the same fonts need to be installed on any computers that will open the presentation. To prevent missing fonts from being an issue, there's a good chance you can embed the fonts you used to ensure your presentations look the way you designed them.

 

Good chance? I say "good chance" because not all fonts are embeddable. Fonts must be of the TrueType variety. Additionally, fonts must not have licensing restrictions that prevent embedding. If you are using standard fonts (Arial, Times, Verdana, etc), you probably won't need to worry about licensing restrictions. That being said, if you're worried about someone not having your font on their system, you probably aren't using the standard fonts. 

 

 

If you're using a Mac, I've got bad news… the Mac versions of PowerPoint can't embed fonts, nor can they use fonts embedded in a PC-born presentation.

If you're using a PC, the fonts need to be TrueType for them to embed. In PowerPoint, you'll notice all fonts have either aTT (TrueType) or an O (OpenType) next to them in the font list. But here's the catch: some OpenType fonts have TrueType font data and can also be embedded.  If you'd like to know if your OpenType font contains TrueType font, view your computer's Fonts folder (Start > Control Panel > Fonts). Right-click within an empty space within the folder and choose View > Details. Fonts with file names ending in .ttf (whether TrueType or OpenType) contain TrueType font data and can be embedded.

But wait, there's more! All embedding licenses are not created equal. There are three different types of embedding licenses.

Installable: Fonts may be embedded in documents and permanently installed on the remote system.

Editable: Fonts may be embedded in documents, but must only be installed temporarily on the remote system.

Print & Preview: Fonts may be embedded in documents, but must only be installed temporarily on the remote system. Documents can only be opened as read-only.

Installable is great, but is pretty hard to come by. In most cases, you're going to be looking for an Editable font. Unless you just want your presentation to be viewed, and not modified or edited in any way, I would steer clear of Print & Preview fonts.

So, how do you know which type of license your font has? The easiest way is to download and install Microsoft's TrueType Font Properties Extension. Doing so allows you to right-click a font from the Fonts folder and chooseProperties to see the Embedding license (among many other properties).

Note: Navigate to your Fonts folder and right-click a font before downloading the properties extension. You may already have a Properties option there.

Whew, that was an awful lot like work! On a positive note, finding out whether or not your font is embeddable is the hardest part. Once you know that a font can be embedded, embedding it is a simple process.

1. Open your presentation in PowerPoint.
2. If you are using PowerPoint 2007, click the Microsoft Office Button > Save As. If you are using PowerPoint 2010, choose File > Save As.
3. From the Save As dialog box, click the Tools button and select Save Options.
4. Select Embed fonts and then click OK.
5. At the bottom of the Save area, select Embed fonts in the file. From there you can choose whether to embed all the characters, or just those used in the presentation. If you are forwarding the presentation for further editing, you may want to include all characters.
6. Click OK.

Keep in mind that embedding fonts will increase the file size of your presentation, especially if you embed all of the font's characters.

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AJ teaches a live, 3-hour class that offers tips/tricks for improving the look and feel of your PowerPoint presentations: Slide Sprucing: Remodeling Lackluster PowerPoint Slides for eLearning and Presentations. 

by AJ George 

During a previous article on Perfecting Motion Paths, I made a short PowerPoint video illustrating the final motion path animation. Let's say I'm going to teach a class on how to use Motion Paths. In the class, I'm going to give a presentation that shows this video. In the video there are two uses of motion paths, and I want a little blurb to pop up when the second one starts, alerting my learners that this is a separate motion path.  Did you know that this can be accomplished in PowerPoint by using video bookmarks to trigger animations? Here's how:

Add a Bookmark to a Video

1. In PowerPoint, insert the video on the desired slide (Insert > Video).
2. Set the video to play automatically (Video Tools > Playback > Video Options > Start > Automatically).
3. Play the video. (Pause it when you reach the point where you would like to trigger an animation.)
4. Choose Video Tools > Playback > Bookmarks > Add Bookmark.



A yellow dot will appear on the video control panel, signaling there is a bookmark.

Add a Triggered Animation to a Bookmark

1. Add the text (Insert > Text Box), shape (Insert > Shape), or image (Insert > Picture) you would like to appear at this bookmarked spot of the video. You can put it anywhere on the slide.
2. With the inserted object selected (in this case I inserted a text box), add an entrance animation (Animation > Advanced Animation > Add Animation).
3. Click the Trigger button to the right of the Add Animation button you just clicked (Animation > Advanced Animation).
4. From the drop-down menu select On Bookmark and choose your desired bookmark (you can add more than one bookmark to a video, so there may be several).



5. With the inserted object selected, add an exit animation (Animation > Advanced Animation > Add Animation).
6. View the Animation Pane (Animation > Advanced Animation > Animation Pane­)

You will notice that the exit effect is set to happen prior to the bookmark trigger. We will fix that next.

7. On the Animation Pane, select the exit animation (it will be the one with a red star in front of it).
8. At the bottom of the Animation Pane, click the Re-Order button pointing down until your exit animation appears on the pane below the entrance animation.
9. Click the more arrow for the exit animation and choose Timing from the drop-down menu.



The Disappear dialog box will open. 

10. From the Timing tab, ensure After Previous is selected from the Start area. Adjust the number in the delay field to anything you like. In this case, my video is short, so I have set my delay to just .5seconds.



11. Press [Shift] [F5] on your keyboard to preview the slide and ensure the triggered animation is working properly.

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AJ teaches a live, 3-hour class that offers tips/tricks for improving the look and feel of your PowerPoint presentations: Slide Sprucing: Remodeling Lackluster PowerPoint Slides for eLearning and Presentations.

by AJ George 

Last week I showed you how to animate a picture in PowerPoint so that it came in as a puzzle, piece by piece. That was cool. But if you followed along last week, read on to find some bonus tips for making the animation a little more realistic and adding some finishing touches.

How to Make an Animated Puzzle Look More Realistic

1. From the Selection and Visibility Pane, select all of the puzzle pieces.
2. On the slide, right-click one of the puzzle pieces and choose Format Object.
3. From the Line Color category, change the line color to black.
4. From the Line Style category, change the line Width to 1 pt.
5. From the 3-D Format category, in the Top Bevel area, change the Width to 5 pt and the Height to 2 pt.
6. Click the Close button.

The puzzle pieces will now appear 3-dimensional. 

 

Make the Puzzle Pieces Disappear

1. Select everything on the slide (press [Ctrl] [A]).
2. From the Animations pane, choose Advanced Animation > Add Animation.
3. From the Exit category, choose Disappear.

All of the items on the slide will appear selected on the Animation Pane with the Disappear animation applied to them.  

4. Click the more arrow on the last animation effect and choose Timing.
5. From the Timing tab, click the Start drop-down menu and select With Previous. Increase the Delay to whatever you would like. (I would suggest something like 2 seconds.)

Voila, you've done it! I see this effect being really nice in conjunction with a team photo to show how everyone is a part of the bigger picture, but I'm sure there are many other applicable uses for it. How will you use this animation? I'd love to hear from you. 

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AJ will be teaching a live, 3-hour class that offers tips/tricks for improving the look and feel of your PowerPoint presentations: Slide Sprucing: Remodeling Lackluster PowerPoint Slides for eLearning and Presentations. The class is later this month and there is still time to sign up.

by AJ George 

A recent question in the Microsoft Office forums inquired about the process of animating a picture in PowerPoint so that it came onto the slide piece by piece–like a puzzle. The question was answered, but the answer was not exactly what the original poster had wanted. The answer explained how to make a picture look like a puzzle, but not how to have the separate pieces come in one-by-one. That is what I will cover today.

The original answer referenced this tutorial: Puzzle Pictures in PowerPoint. The tutorial includes a pre-made puzzle framework from PowerFrameworks, which I will also use.

Make an Image Look Like a Puzzle.

1. Download the puzzlepicture zip file at this link.
2. Unzip the file.
3. Start PowerPoint.
4. From within PowerPoint, navigate to the unzipped puzzlepicture folder and open sg002_1200_rectangle.pptx.

A presentation will open with an image of a whale overlaid with puzzle pieces.  

Note: If you are using an earlier version of PowerPoint that does not support .pptx files, follow the instructions here for using the .ppt file.

5. View the Selection and Visibility Pane by choosing Home > Drawing > Arrange > Selection Pane.

   You will see 12 puzzle pieces (these are the numbered Freeforms) and one rectangle.

       

6. Click the Hide All button at the bottom of the Selection and Visibility pane to hide everything on the slide.
7. Right-click the slide and select Format Background.

The Format Background dialog box will appear. Currently there is a picture of a whale set as the background so Picture or Texture fill is already selected.

8. From the Insert from area, click the File button.
9. Navigate to your own image, select it and click the Insert button.

Your image will now be the background of the slide.  

Note: If you notice sluggish response times in PowerPoint, consider inserting a lower resolution image.

10. Close the Format Background dialog box.
11. On the Selection and Visibility pane, click the Show All button to make all items visible again.  The puzzle pieces are already formatted with a background fill, so the pieces are comprised of the image you inserted. If you simply wanted your image to look like a puzzle, you would be done. Continue on if you would like your image to appear on the slide one piece at a time.

Animate the Puzzle Pieces

1. View the Animation Pane by choosing Animations > Advanced Animation > Animation Pane.
2. On the Selection and Visibility Pane, hold down the [Ctrl] key while clicking to select each of the 12 Freeform puzzle pieces.
3. From the Animations tab, select the Appear animation.

All of the puzzle pieces will appear selected in the Animation Pane.

4. Click the more arrow on the last animation effect and choose Timing.

   

The Appear dialog box will open.  

5. From the Timing tab, select After Previous from the Start drop-down menu and increase the Delay number to stagger the appearance of the puzzle piece. I went with .5 seconds, but you can choose whatever you like.
6. Click the OK button.
7. On the Selection and Visibility pane, click the Hide All button to hide all the puzzle pieces. Click the box next to Rectangle 16 to make it visible.

You will be left with a large blue rectangle. 

8. Right-click the rectangle on the slide and choose Format Shape.

The Format Shape dialog box will appear.

9. From the Fill category, change the fill color to whatever you would like. (For my project, I wanted it to appear as though initially the slide was blank, so I chose white.)
10. Click the Close button to close the Format Shape dialog box.
11. On the Selection and Visibility pane, click the Show All button to make all items visible again.
12. Press the [F5] key on your keyboard.

Your image will now come in as a puzzle, one piece at a time.

To use the slide in any other presentation, select the slide from the slide sorter pane (or in Slide Sorter view) and copy and paste it into your desired presentation.

Note: When pasting into another presentation, be sure to paste using the Keep Source Formatting option. Learn more about pasting options here.

Check back next week for tips to make your animated puzzle look more realistic!