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Page 080 of PowerPoint tutorials, presentation essentials, personality interviews, and PowerPoint news.
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Author: Geetesh Bajaj
Product/Version: PowerPoint
August 25, 2011
We all are exposed to slides that can be so hazardous to our vision! One look at a horrendous slide, and it really doesn't matter if the content is great or not -- because the slide may have nothing understated about it. Such loud slides can ensure that audiences look more at the look of the slide rather than the content. You might end up with such slides even with no fault of yours, because someone else designed them for you! Fortunately, there is an easy, one-click process to restore the sanity in the slides -- it's called the Reset button. Remember, the Reset button is your friend.
Learn how to reset your slide formatting with one click in PowerPoint 2010.
August 24, 2011
Recently on the Indezine's PowerPoint and Presenting Stuff Linkedin community someone started a thread with the question "What are some alternates to using Microsoft PowerPoint?" Various people chipped in with suggestions. But the question got me thinking and what follows is a short article stimulated by that discussion.
August 24, 2011
While PowerPoint does provide a plethora of Shape Effects, there's something about the Bevel effect that makes it stand apart. Once applied, the Bevel effect can make your shape look embossed, like a button, or even a pillow -- the different output variations occur since there are many Bevel presets available in PowerPoint 2011 for the Mac. Play with all the presets, and some Bevel presets will make your shapes will look as if they can pop out of the slide -- fortunately, there are plenty of Bevel effect presets that are more restrained and understated!
Learn how you can apply Bevel effects to selected shapes in PowerPoint 2011 for Mac.
August 23, 2011
Columnar text layouts are something you see often in Word documents or even in published formats used by desktop publishing software. PowerPoint 2010 gives you some column capabilities, although don't expect anything close to the controls provided by word processing applications. In PowerPoint, you can set up a text container to possess multiple linked columns.
Learn how you can insert columnar text within a text box or other text containers in PowerPoint 2010.
August 22, 2011
Ellen Finkelstein is a Microsoft PowerPoint MVP and author of several PowerPoint, Flash, and AutoCAD books. Her articles have appeared in numerous magazines, newsletters, and blogs. As a best-selling author, her books have sold over 300,000 copies and been translated into over 14 languages. In this conversation, Ellen talks about 7 Steps to Great Images, her new ebook.
Aug 22, 2011
Glow effects are quite different from other PowerPoint effects -- they add a nice halo around a selected shape or most other slide objects. Once you apply a glow effect to any shape in PowerPoint 2011, you may find that the defaults just do not work for you. Especially since the default glow options are limited only to Theme Colors -- so if you want to make some changes, probably change the glow color, its spread or transparency, etc. -- then this tutorial will teach you how you can access the advanced Glow Options in PowerPoint 2011, which make all those changes doable.
Learn how to make changes to the Glow effect applied to the shapes in PowerPoint 2011 for Mac.
August 19, 2011
Shirley Lewis is the Licensing Director at JewelBeat.com. With over 10 years of experience in the music industry, specifically in music licensing for retail, Shirley has worked to license music for numerous Fortune 500 companies. A lover of all music, social media shy yet a computer nerd, Shirley Lewis onboard with the JewelBeat team is looking to change the landscape of music licensing, one $0.99 track at a time. In this conversation, Shirley discusses why and how you can use JewelBeat's music clips.
August 19, 2011
Internal margins are relevant to all the three types of text containers in PowerPoint -- these three containers are text boxes, text placeholders, and shapes that contain text. Internal margins control the amount of blank space between the perimeter (edge) and the actual text within the text container. Although these margins are similar to the margins of pages in a word-processing document like Microsoft Word, there is a significant difference. Each text container has its own individual margins set, and you can have entirely different margins for one or more text containers, even if they reside on the same slide.
Learn about setting internal margins for text boxes in PowerPoint 2010.
August 18, 2011
PowerPoint 2011 for Mac includes the same Shape Effects that are part of PowerPoint 2007 and 2011 on Windows -- we have already explored how you can apply Shadow and Reflection effects to selected shapes in PowerPoint 2011. In this tutorial, we move to the next effect, Glow that adds a hazed color perimeter outside the shape area -- yes, this is an Outer Glow and not an Inner Glow effect.
Learn to apply a Glow effects to shapes in PowerPoint 2011 for Mac.
August 17, 2011
This technique originated from a video clip that Bruce Gabrielle posted on his blog -- this video showed you how you can create a triangular table in PowerPoint by either creating a picture of the table itself (which makes the table non-editable) or by creating a picture of the table with just empty cells so that you can place a transparent table with figures or words over it. While both techniques are amazing, I wanted to use a process whereby not only is the table editable, but the ending shape need not be limited to just a triangle. Also you can use this to hide and show parts of not just a table, but almost anything else including video clips.
Learn how to make cookie cutter shapes in PowerPoint 2010.
August 17, 2011
PowerPoint broadly provides three types of text containers: text placeholders, text boxes, and shapes -- and although boundaries between these three types of text containers are blurred, all the three are sufficiently similar in their characteristics for layout options for the text contained inside them. In this tutorial, we will explore the alignment and text direction options for text within a text container in PowerPoint 2010.
Learn how you can control text layout in PowerPoint 2010.
August 17, 2011
Reflections can look so cool -- and since they show the same fill and outline attributes of what they reflect, they can end up being so distracting for your audiences! However, most of PowerPoint's reflection presets that you learned to apply in our Reflection Effects for Shapes in PowerPoint 2011 are a little too attractive. The good news is that you can tone down the effect a little -- or if you want you can also get more adventurous and have your slides bounce off their projected screens! Whatever your scenario may be, you can edit the reflection properties to suit your creative freedom -- for instance, you can change the transparency or distance of the reflection, as you will learn in this tutorial.
Learn how you can make changes to the Reflection effect applied to shapes in PowerPoint 2011 for Mac.
August 16, 2011
Text boxes in PowerPoint need to be moved and resized within different areas of the slide. While you may think that selecting and resizing is all that is to be done, that's not the entire truth because there's so much more you can do even with mere resizing -- if you know that these options exist! In a previous tutorial, you learnt how to move text boxes on a slide. As suggested in that tutorial, you should only resize text boxes, and not text placeholders on the slide since the positioning of the latter is normally controlled by the Slide Master. Typically text placeholders for regular text content or even slide titles are located in the same position on successive slides -- so if you really do need to resize a text placeholder, do it within the Slide Master so that this change of size happens on all slides, providing a consistent look to your presentation.
Learn how to resize text boxes on a slide in PowerPoint 2010.
August 16, 2011
Effects are a cool feature in PowerPoint that lets your shapes stand out. No longer you have to be content with flat shapes that appear to be depressed within the slide itself. Having said that, moderation is the key -- do not go overboard with the effects! In our series on Shape Effects in PowerPoint 2011, you have already explored how you can apply a Shadow Effect to any selected shape. In this tutorial, you will learn how you can quickly add reflection to a shape. So what's the difference between a shadow and a reflection? A shadow is typically of one color, normally gray and is influenced by the direction of a light source. Reflection is also dependent on light but it shows all the colors of the original object in a blurred way -- as in the reflection on water or glass.
Learn how to apply Reflection effects to a selected shapes in PowerPoint 2011 for Mac.
August 15, 2011
Jamie Garroch, CEO of GMARK Ltd., founded the company in 2009 to provide presentation professionals with PowerPoint software, content and training. Jamie conceived the idea for the company's first product, ActivePrez from a non-linear presenting need and has recently added several other add-in products; MapPrez, SwiftPrez, Circlify and interactive maps. In this conversation, Jamie talks about Circlify, a PowerPoint add-in that makes drawing multiple shapes in a repeated pattern seem easy.
August 15, 2011
PowerPoint makes a great drawing program -- however it is not too easy to duplicate content such as shapes, especially in a repeated pattern without summoning too many dialog boxes. However, tasks such as these can be made super simple -- probably more simple than even doing it in a dedicated drawing program using Circlify, a third party add-in for PowerPoint. Circlify lets you quickly create circular graphics and intricate illustrations for icons, logos, illustrations, etc.
Read the Indezine review of Circlify.
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