Presentation Design

IT Network Diagrams

2010-05-17T18:21:00.004+08:00

17th May '10 - -

Many in the IT sector would have encountered these network diagrams from time-to-time. Most use icons, clipart or some other software aside from powerpoint to build the diagrams up.

In this short video I want to showcase two quick points:
1. Network Design and 2. Digital Libraries -

Remember, for network diagram design:

1. Use a custom-build library database of icons (in a 3D isometric view)

2. Use a grid to help layout the network lines (if its not too complex)

3. Reuse icons to quickly place network objects, and eliminate needless redrawing, or searching for the right clipart.

Chart Blogs

2010-05-17T10:20:00.003+08:00

17th May '10 - -

Like many of you, charts is an essential part of any business presentation and like many of you, excel is our best friend (and worst enemy). The process of data visualisation I've learn't is a new skill set, and not an easy one for a subject that can be quite complicated. Finance has many variations, as with many other types of charts; some data is combined, some require custom charts and so on.

Here are a few interesting blogs that I've found useful for choosing the right chart for the right data, chart design and formatting and some data visualisation ideas.

Excel Charts – good examples and tutorials using excel.

Flowing Data -

Junk Charts - Deconstruction and reconstruction of questionable viz.

Visual Business Intelligence - From popular B.I. guy, Stephen Few.

Chart Porn – never mind the name, a good site for charts.

Datavisualiztion.ch -

Simple Complexity

information aesthetics

Isometric 3D Diagrams

2010-05-02T18:04:00.005+08:00

2nd May '10 - -

I'm posting some of the sample 3D isometric diagrams plus a recent one of the Singapore MRT (nb: I cut away certain information) to further showcase the ability of powerpoint (2007 version) to render these types of graphics.

These types of 3D infographics offer more real-world context than their 2D counterparts, which for the most part, are good for abstract concepts like strategy/ framework / process diagrams.

These are not difficult to do in practice but knowing what you want to design takes a little longer. I have posted a basic tutorial on these types of diagrams previously and is available as a youtube video but I will be posting some updated ones soon.

Here is just 4 examples of what could be done...

*Please note that Slideboom cannot convert all the 3D graphics properly. Just n case you think they look odd!! :)

Tell me what you think, how often or would you need these types of diagram in your work?

Page Flip Effect

2010-05-02T16:54:00.004+08:00

2nd May '10 - -

I had posted some time ago a similar effect for curling the page edge and turning it. And having seen many other effects using 'wipes' I thought I'd let you see another version of the page flip.

Believe it or not, this only uses two types of animation- can you guess what they are?!

Well, here's a clue, one is an 'entrance' effect, and the other is an 'exit' effect... see if you can produce this too before I reveal the answer....

15 FREE Diagrams

2010-04-21T14:49:00.004+08:00

21st April '10 - -

As mentioned, I will be posting on occasions some new diagrams for you guys to download and do with them as you please. You have a fair mixture here, and I'd be ahppy to hear your thoughts on the kind of diagrams you struggle with or would like to see a tutorial on.

As in the classes, some of the give aways are not meant to be at professional level, as I always like to see you guys work on them, polish them up and come up with something uniquely yours. In fact, looking at these, the conversion to slideboom has affected the animation - but don't worry once you download them they should all be okay.

To download these, follow the link by click on the icon to Slideboom, where you can proceed to download these and other powerpoint files.

Enjoys these diagrams, more to come...

YourSingapore.com

2010-04-21T14:37:00.003+08:00

21st April '10 - -

If you haven't heard of Singapore, then perhaps our new branding campaign will help you out. Take it from me, living here for almost 20 years - i wouldn't want to live anywhere else. After many years of being "uniquely singapore", its now "your singapore". It invites travellers to make the Singapore experience your very own.

I'm not here to discuss the merits of the branding campaign which is currently all the talk at the moment, but I just wanted to share the design that appeared in the TV adverts.

Of course, I couldn't help but potter around for a few minutes to try and do a quick re-creation of it in powerpoint. It's not meant to be finished, but I think alot could be done if given some proper time. It would be interesting to see how the agency has laid out the new slide templates and stuff... I'd love to work on those...

Been Busy...

2010-04-21T13:47:00.003+08:00

21st April '10 - -

Hi Guys, in case you've been wondering where I've been (don't worry, not gone), just got busy!

Just a brief note to let you I'll be posting some of the (backlog) new materials for your to watch and download.

Business has been good and we've been through our first branding make-over (tidy-up perhaps). Our new magazine is out and the new website is under development so be sure to check that out in a few months - has some nive innovate 3D touches to it.

Anyway, the company we worked with have a great bunch of guys at BDC and you can see some of their work here.

if you want to engage them, just mention my name - don't think it will give you any discounts though - but it's always nice to know where you've been referred from.

Cheers
Mark

22 Laws

2009-12-20T18:32:00.002+08:00

20th December '09 - -

This post is for a select group that attended a recent workshop.

Follow the links to slideboom where I'll be posting the remaining notes:

Infographic Example

2009-11-08T18:36:00.004+08:00

8th November '09 - -

In a recent edition of the Straits Times (and credit goes to them), dated on the 4th Nov'09 I came across an article promoting SPRING Singapore.

I was intrigued because it had a very nice infographic based on some of their activities. So I decided that night to re-create it in PowerPoint v2007 as a clear demonstration how easy it can be to design these types of graphics. It is also a great way to enhance your own presentations by introducing these types of 3D graphics.

Continue to source your own newspaper for examples and have a go yourself at trying to re-create them, it makes for great practice. I will have more video-tutorials on infographics coming soon.

*any colour issues due to way file is converted.

Straits Times Infographic Example

View more presentations from Mark Normand.

12 Free Diagrams

2009-11-08T18:07:00.004+08:00

8th November '09 - -

There are a lot of good sites such as PresentationLoad and others offering some incredible looking business diagrams and well worth taking a look at.

As with many of these sites, for those not familiar with Shapes, it can appear that the diagrams depicted are quite sophisticated but if you know how shapes are broken down, angled and then coloured many of these diagrams can be easily created.

For a start I’m offering 12 free diagrams that I’ve drawn myself for you to download, share, and/or incorporate into your own presentations.

The next couple of tutorials I will demonstrate how you too can draw some of these diagrams.

Enjoy these first!

PowerPoint PPTPlex

2009-09-20T17:35:00.005+08:00

20th September '09 - -

PPTPlex uses Plex technology to give you the power to zoom in and out of slide sections and move directly between slides that are not sequential in your presentation; and is available here (over at the office labs).

I've recently installed this add-on to test its features and you can see a quick demo of my own experience using it.

There are pro's & con's in using it and I would say that its very much (at this stage) for users doing sit-down presentation-cum-meeting styles, that require linkage with other external data documents such as word, excel, and pdf. For delivery of presentations that have you on your remote, it will depend on the features that your remote has - if its a simple remote, the zooming portion will have you running back to the laptop constantly.

In short:

The Con's
- loses all the animation
- loses all the video
- If remote device is simple, then delivery is clumsy
- low-res pictures will still get distorted

The Pro's
- Nice zooming feature
- Visibly opens external documents (no need to click the hyperlink)
- Groups sections of your slides together (audience get to see a complete overview)

Here is another video (different user) on PPTPlex.

Designing 3D Isometic Graphics

2009-09-13T12:39:00.004+08:00

13th Spetember '09 - -

I've already uploaded a few examples of isometric infographics and really appreciate the ability of the 2007 version to handle 3D a little better than earlier versions. I will continue to post a series of different video tutorials and images later... save the best (and more complex) till later!

In this tutorial, I really just wanted to show the very basic mechanisms to begin construction of an isometric infographic. I have included a video I chanced upon a video for some new business park development in China. The graphics in places are quite striaght forward (aside from some of the animation) and very basic replications of them in powerpoint are possible.

So watch this video first, and then see how you can replicate it in powerpoint (only in 2007 version).

Infographic : Introduction of Chengdu ChengPan Area by yx.shawn from yx.shawn on Vimeo.

Watch this brief tutorial...

Simple Chart Makeover

2009-09-13T12:23:00.005+08:00

13th September '09 - -

In this video tutorial, I would like to highlight some simple 'cosmetic' changes to charts to help clean them up (especially for those copying & pasting from Excel).

The additional use of animation should always be used sparringly with charts, and only if it really assists in making the data presented more readable for the audience.

Free Stock Image Sites

2009-09-02T16:53:00.005+08:00

2nd September 2009 - -

Here are a handful of sites to check out when considering the use of stock photography on your next project, taken from a compiled listing from smashingmagazine.

Stock.XCHNG
Stock.XCHNG is one of the leading free stock photo sites on the Internet featuring over 400,000 quality images. Photos are available in five different sizes for print or web. Visitors can see the popularity of an image by viewing how many times the photo has been downloaded.

Free Digital Photos
Thousands of images are available for corporate and personal use. Photos are free but the site requires a link back or there is an option to buy a high resolution version.

Free Range Stock
Just sign up for a free membership, log in and download high-quality, high-resolution free stock photos and textures. All images are at least 2400 x 1600 pixels and can be used for personal and commercial use.

Every Stock Photo
Every Stock Photo is a search engine for free photos. These come from many sources and are license-specific. Membership is free and allows users to rate, tag, collect and comment on photos.

Photogen
Photogen is a source for quality, high-resolution free stock images. Photos are available for commercial or personal projects. Users must register for a free account to download images.

ImageBase
ImageBase offers free high resolution photos. In addition to beautiful images, the site also offers free PowerPoint Templates.

Free Stock Photography
Free Stock Photography offers a plethora of completely free Royalty-free stock photography. Browse over one hundred categories from animals to toy and games.

Freepixels
Freepixel offers free stock photography for any use. You can easily search for images as well as make full use of the tag cloud. Over 3,000 images are featured and some are usually found on paid registration sites.

Stock Vault
Stock Vault features over 13,000 free stock photos from over 3,600 photographers. The site’s helpful tutorials, videos and articles can also be a powerful tool for any designer.

Tunnel Highway Infographic

2009-08-17T21:06:00.003+08:00

17th August 2009 - -

With the recent opening of Singapore’s road tunnel system "Kallang-Paya Labor" (KPE), the Land Transport Authority website was a good example of a clean, well informed site. Inside were many examples of how the tunnel was constructed and the features that went into it, including downloadable brochures that had tunnel infographics.

Of course the brochures were designed by professionals, but the typical isometric view they used to construct the visuals suits the nature of the 3D settings in PowerPoint perfectly; more so in 2007, then the 2003 version.

Below is a sample of a reconstructed infographic taken from the brochure in the 2003 version; and serves to depict the difference between using the Parallel (isometric) view and the Perspective view. Later examples of the 2007 will appear in other tutorials.

Infographics add a whole new depth to PowerPoint diagrams and whilst not suited to every occasion can be a very powerful visual device to clarify particular messages.

Diagrams & People

2009-08-17T21:03:00.001+08:00

17th August 2009 - -

For the longest time, I’ve been developing diagrams and of course looking at many others from various sources; and one thing struck me about all these diagrams and that is was “what is the best way to depict people?” In most cases, it boils down to four types:

· Silhouettes
· Pictogram
· Cones
· Icons

Whilst some are more abstract than others, all are achievable in design right in your PowerPoint, and none of them take too long to do. Except for maybe the use of icons (although these too can be designed in PowerPoint); but are a lot easier to downloads from clipart or other such sites offering them.

The typical diagram types tend to use specific images, and whilst this is not an absolute rule, does tend to aid in sorting out what images are best used for certain diagram types, such as:

· Network Diagrams mainly use Icons
· Concept diagrams/ Infographics use a mix of Silhouettes and Pictograms
· Statistics (e.g. manpower diagrams) use Pictograms
· Organisation charts use silhouettes

It will also depend on the realism and/or abstractness of the diagram you are creating.

Below is a depiction of the four major categories of people and some sample diagrams from various sources using them.

SlideShare Best Presentation Contest 2009

2009-08-17T20:56:00.001+08:00

17th August 2009 - -

Now in its third year, Slide Share is running their Best Presentation contest for 2009, open to anyone for presentations is various categories such as Business, Education, Design, and many more.

The competition is open from 3rd August to 3rd September.

SlideShare World's Best Presentation Contest 2009

View more documents from Amit Ranjan.

Whilst former winners have produced some quite decent presentations, I find that the inclusion of professional design houses introduces some unfair competition. Also it would be nice if they limited the topic.

What I would like to see a difference in is the way that many of these presentations are put together, e.g. gets some facts, find a picture (not of their design or doing) and sticking a text box on top. I wouldn’t really warrant these too much merit and would like to see more design from the use of PowerPoint itself. Drawing your own infographic and diagram merits more than simply copying it from someone else’s (even if the source is quoted).

For those in my former classes, you might want to ut Singapore on the map and entered in to the competition – plenty of facts and figures (as well as history) about Singapore to make for an interesting presentation. Who knows, if Singapore Tourism Board see it, they might give you a free holiday for promoting Singapore?! How about it STB?

Visit SlideShare for more details and see past winners.

Keynote Vs. Business Slides

2009-08-17T20:50:00.001+08:00

17th August 2009 - -

This was a good post from another great site that tackles powerpoint issues; called 'PowerPoint Ninja'. In it, the author talks about the issue with too many slides being reduced to simple pictures and one-sentence text statements that all too often are not realistic – in a normal business setting.

He goes on the say… Too often I hear people talk about PowerPoint presentations like there is only one flavor of PowerPoint. If you read popular presentation design books like Presentation Zen or Slide:ology, you’d swear that most people are tasked with keynote presentations like Seth Godin and Steve Jobs are. A more visual approach with less text is definitely a good strategy for keynote presentations. However, let’s be realistic that only about 0.012% of presenters are delivering keynote presentations on a regular basis.

Read the rest of the article here.

Download Free Infographic

2009-08-16T23:26:00.001+08:00

16th August 2009 - -

As part of the new series of tutorials, I will be putting up some new video tutorials to show how modern looking infographics can be drawn using the different versions of PowerPoint. Whilst 2007 has far more capability in terms of its 3D tools - 2003 versions can still do some pretty interesting stuff if your willing to get to grips with the 3d toolbar.

As a start, please find this free download of a 2003 version infographic.

New Blog Site Launched

2009-08-16T23:17:00.001+08:00

16th August 2009 - -

Hi Guys, as you may have noticed I have updated the blog site; and whilst it is still a work-in-progress, I'm sure your going to find a lot of great new materials and resources to get your hands on.

So stay with me, post your comments, ask your questions and I'll be happy to respnd and share them with the rest of the guys.

Thanks for your continued interest.

Free Resources

2009-06-16T20:00:00.002+08:00

16th July 2009 - -

Every few months or so there are a myriad of new free tools coming onto the web that can be used in conjunction with powerpoint, or assist in your content preparation. Here are a couple of links to useful places for your PowerPoint inspiration - did I mention they are all free?!

For Images
www.sxc.hu
www.freedigitalphotos.net/
www.behold.cc

For Editing Images
http://www.pixlr.com/
http://fotoflexer.com/
www.Splashup.com

For charts:
http://chartchooser.juiceanalytics.com/
http://www.perceptualedge.com/blog/
http://help.infragistics.com/Help/NetAdvantage/NET/2008.1/CLR2.0/html/Chart_2D_Charts.html

For Inspiration:
www.behance.net
www.smashingmagazine.com
www.thefwa.com

Image Rotation Animation

2009-06-16T15:56:00.001+08:00

16th June 2009 - -

Hey guys, more blog posts to come as I've been busy compiling a set of new things for you all to download and try out.

Before that, I've uploaded another take on the Image movement that I've previously posted in this blog before. This type of animation can again be used for viewing text, shapes and images without the need to keep the "grow/shrink" effect in action - this just uses simple motion paths.

ROTATION ANIMATION - SLIDEBOOM

View more presentations or Upload your own.

Winners of SlideBoom Contest'09 Announced

2009-05-16T11:30:00.000+08:00

Winners of SlideBoom Contest'09 Announced

SlideBoom Presentation Contest 2009 took place 18 May - 21 June 2009.Contest participants submitted a lot of awesome slideshows on Business, Education, Career and other interesting topics.

This contest became a unique opportunity for many participants to reveal their creative potential and to get a professional expertise of their presentations. Over 180 people who joined the Contest Group enjoyed close to 70 works submitted. Most of them are full of outstanding effects and lovely animations all created in PowerPoint.

Go to the competition site to view the winners.

Using Quotes in Slides

2009-05-11T17:11:00.000+08:00

Using Quotes

Just like any other message in your slide, try to stick to the "one message per slide rule" - even when it comes to using quotations. Don't stick them at the bottom of a slide, or at the end of a 'Q&A' or 'thank-you' slide.

Take time to articluate these important quotes as they can validate a point your making, transit to another point, reveal industry data or survey results. I often say to people don't use quotes from long-ago speakers of wisdom - not doubting the wisdom - buts its usually not relevant to the context of your typical business presentation.

Use quotes from:

- Industry & Business Leaders
- Research and Survey
- People known in your areas (products, industry, etc.)

When designing a quotation slide, try to remember to:

- Always try to have the picture of the author of the quote
- Source of the quote, including dates
- Picture of the original source documents
- Only highlight the 'main' sentance to be quoted (not the whole document).

Quotation Sample

View more presentations or Upload your own.

Silhouette Samples

2009-04-27T13:04:00.001+08:00

27th April 2009 - -

Throughout much of the advertising that you see out there, as well as in many presentations, the use of silhouttes can be a very powerful (yet simple) visual device. It allows for quick reference to the subject matter using plain colours and lets the audience focus on the core message/ accompanying text.

This is just a quick example of it being used on a title slide and a quick diagram.

Silouhette Demo

View more presentations or Upload your own.

Here is an actual presentation from the economist will many good examples of the use of silhouettes.

Economist Ads On Edge Recession

View more presentations from pteer.

Tutorial Downloads

2009-04-10T13:36:00.002+08:00

10th April 2009 - -

Thanks for all those attending the PowerPoint classes and the kind comments, and as promised here are some of the answers for the tutorial questions set.

These are all meant to improve your animation skills, so you can see the final version here as well as download the files.

This is available in your workbooks, but this simple side-flow animation allows you to control the flow of bullets rather than revealing them all at once.

Side flow 2 answer

View more presentations or Upload your own.

Download the file here.

In this second example, you were tasked to put together different animation effects to see if you could replicate a simple page-flip effect.

Page Flip answer

View more presentations or Upload your own.

Download the file here.

Lastly, following from the .gif animation, you were tasked to achivie this loop animation similar effect using 'motion paths'.

Loop Answer

View more presentations or Upload your own.

Download the file here.

Who got them right? Or who just waited for the downloads! :)

2009-02-22T16:56:00.000+08:00

Old Samples, Examples & Testers

For those that have attended some of my workshops & courses, you may have seen these before. These are mainly a mix of old samples, quick presentations (although I'm not proving the 'full', rather edited versions) and testers I had done a few years ago.

Since we're in 2009, there is a whole new batch of demo's, samples, and giveaways - the catch? You have to join my workshop to get them!

Nevertheless, enjoy these (older) ones... but sadly, the music and sound has been removed from them. And there may be glitches in the animation & timing due to using SlideBoom (but hey - it's free!)

2009-02-18T21:19:00.000+08:00

From Bullets-to-Boxes... Colour

This is just a quick follow-up to the previous post to remind those that do use colours to border or box their bullet points to use those available colours that match their logo's, corporate colours and other colour indicators.

2009-02-17T12:14:00.000+08:00

From Bullets-to-Boxes...

One of the many great topics that arise in powerpoint is the use of the grid, and the 'rule of thirds'. However, aside from using a great picture and a small amount of text the questions that most people ask me is "that's great from limited text, but what if I really can't remove them - and how can I make them look better laid out?"

No an easy question to answer, because in every makeover, there are text that can be refined - nevertheless, using grids in any number of ways allows us to, at the very least, rearrange the way we place our bulletpoints. We can achieve this by boxing them up, using borders and refining the colours to match our corporate slides to eliminate those white backgrounds and floating text.

Here are two brief examples to highlight this:

2009-02-12T15:25:00.000+08:00

Interactive Menus

Not many people include these into presentations and typical are more suited to large presentations, or those that can be run independantly at Trade shows, Exhibts, and so on. The basic mechanisim to get menus working in your powerpoint is the use of Triggers and Hyperlinks.

What's interesting is that finding inspiriation for menus, again, comes not from looking at other powerpoint slides and use of action buttons - but everyday things like digital signage and DVD Movie menus.

Using menus allows you to place a universal menu bar, meaning it appears on every slide. Or, you can create a menu that appears only when you click for it, and thereby not distracting the viewer away from what every maybe appearing on screen at that time.

You can donwload a sample menu here.

2009-01-21T20:03:00.000+08:00

FREE Icons for Your Presentations

If you've ever looked a Microsoft, Cisco or other tech presentations, you would have noticed their use of Icons. Icons these days have come along way from the small pixel art to hi-res stunning designs which aid in visualising some of data to make it more understandable.

However, many peole grab directly from the web or use clipart - neither are a great option. In hunting around for FREE hi-quality icons I came across a great site called Iconlook.com.

The premise is easy - simply type in a search (similar to google) for the object you wish to find as represented by an icon and a whole list of icons will appear for you to choose from.

I've also linked a few other good sites:-

- Free Icons Web
- Smashing Magazine
- Icon Archive
- Fast Icon (freeware)
- Dry Icons

2009-01-20T15:54:00.000+08:00

Sideflow Gallery Animation Download

I created this simply version of a gallery viewing technique often used on websites. Much like Apple's 'coverflow', this is sometimes referred to as 'sideflow'. You can see an animated verions below.

Frankly, I didn't spend too long coming out with this, and was not meant to be a fantastic pixel-perfect visual. Rather, I did want to get it out there and available for download so you guys can play around with it and see the different sequences of animation - you can obviosuly incorporate this into your own presentations and make it look better using some of your own images.

Click here to Download the file (this is a 2007 version of powerpoint).

2009-01-19T12:33:00.000+08:00

Think You Know Charts?

We've all got them in our PowerPoint slides - copy and paste from excel and present the data! The three basic flaws with doing this is (1) they look ugly, (2) they may not be the best representative chart type to go with the data and (3) most people forget to bring meaning to the data they are presenting.

These skills are not intuitive; they rely largely on analysis and presentation skills that must be learned. One online quiz goes on to examine if people really know what chart types to use with some good examples - click on Graph Design I.Q. Test. It's a fun way to demonstrate your graph design prowess or help your colleagues see the differences between good and bad design. You can read more about data visualisation (and I'll be sure to feature it more in this blog) at Perceptual Edge.

2009-01-19T11:41:00.000+08:00

New Tutorials Coming Soon...

If you've been wondering why their hasn't been a post for several months, it is simply because we have been developing a new website for the business Impress Training - and of course along came the christmas holidays...

But don't worry, I have a bunch of new resources and new tutorials coming your way and I'll also be addressing some of those questions from the comment box - so stay tuned...

In the meantime, you might want look at our new company business site (looks good on a plasma screen), although this may not totally be PowerPoint related - more of a shameless plug!

2008-10-12T22:42:00.000+08:00

Slideshare Vs. SlideBoom

After using slideshare for sometime, one might think that this is the only slide sharing application online but there have been a few others such as slideboom.

Below is a brief demonstration of a quick animated powerpoint slide saved uploaded in slideboom.

The big difference really is that is saves the animation and slide transitions, as well as being able to upload pptx files; something I wish slideshare would move onto. The biggest drawback for slideboom is not so much its features, but its reach. Compared to slideshare, the views (ie. the eyeballs) is very low and they wil have to do alot more to push it and make it competitive in a crowded online space. Nevertheless, try it out, spread the word - with the animation it makes the experience alot more enjoyable.

Having said that, there is still alot of crappy slide shows on both sites...

2008-10-11T11:32:00.000+08:00

Free Download of ebook & Blog Images

As a supplement to the ebook and some requests from readers I've now put up a .zip file for download that contains many of the images used in the exercises featured in the ebook as well as those seen here in the blog such as the 'paper clip', 'sticky tape'. Most images are courtesy of SXC.

In coming blog posts I wil also be placing some sample powerpoint slides that contain animation files and a few extra goodies for readers of this blog.

Download the file here.

Have fun with them in your presentations!

2008-10-10T20:53:00.000+08:00

Presenting (Bad) Financial News

With the current finanical crisis upon us, there's going to be plenty of management meetings packed with presenters feeling the heat as they deliver some poor finances. Whilst this is never fun, it is a reality of the job that most people have to face from time to time. So is there any way of presenting bad news, both it terms of the actual presentation and visuals.

Typically, from a 'slide' perspective, I would remind most people that senior managers are more interested in what you have to say, than show. In these situations, it's your capability as a manager that is clearly being tested. Whilst you must account for the numbers (there's no running away from it! And do expect to get verbal rebuts), and highlight some of the issues, it is more important to spend time on the recommedations for implementing key actions.

Slides then, should be kept to the minimum - stick to this type of general flow:

Key Financial Summary (highlights & Lowlights) - the type of data shown here may depend on whether your a listed company and/or division you're representing.

Key issues affecting the results

Key actions and recommendations

Remember to add in all expected/projected revenues as well as any timelines and deadlines.

Don't clutter the slide with unneccessary visuals - keep it simple with the numbers.

Also, try to avoid just cutting and pasting excel sheets that display the whole chart - control the flow of your presentation or you will find yourself in a situation where your discussing the top line, and your managers are grilling you at the bottom line - knocking you off all too often a train of thought and prepared issues to highlight.

I also came across a timely article on the CNN website from Anne Fisher, Senior Writer with the article entitled "How to Deliver Bad Financial News". I have also put some of the main points her in this slideshow for you to view.

How to deliver Bad Financial News

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: visuals news)

2008-10-05T17:47:00.000+08:00

3D Word Art Scene Titles

Word Art has never been a great feature in PowerPoint until the 2007 version came along. Too long have we seen slides with the old cheesy 3d-orange tilted titles stuck to many slide shows (see slideshare and slideboom for endless examples). At least with this new 3d render and choices of colour, the opportunities to blend both image and title have given rise to do some pretty neat things.

You'll see these all the time on TV (e.g. Animal Planet) and movie opening titles (e.g. Panic Room) as well as some TV News segments.

So if you want to use Word art:

Use it mainly for Title slides and Transition slides.
Use Minimum Text
Adjust the Shadow and Reflection effects for added realism
Use some depth to give it a solid fill
Use the lighting angle effects to blend it in to the picture (which means taking note of the image light source)
Use colours that allow the text to stand out but not necessarily contrast.

And as with most things 3D in PowerPoint, less is more.

2008-09-25T16:12:00.000+08:00

TV Broadcast Graphics for PPT Practice

I've often said that broadcast graphics provide a great source of inspiration rather than looking at many other ppt slide shows out there. Two very useful websites provide some good examples of images and video of TV idents, break fillers and charts to aid in some creative design; they are Idents and TV Ark respectively.

I've always thought that the BBC has so far had the best and easiest of designs to follow in context to their news grahpics as seen here in this youtube video:

When I say to many people "look at the news" (whether its your local news or an international network), don't get too put off by the fancy graphics and animation - start slowly. Most broadcast graphics use grids to layout the content and you can do the same and from there and build up, adding images and correct amounts of animation.

You might be surprised that alot of the aimation is looped and thus doesn't require too much as you can see from the video of my PowerPoint replication of the BBC and ITV broadcast graphics.The end of the video shows the breakdown of components to make the graphics come alive.

When you see this on a plasma screen it's hard to tell the difference and people are often amazed that this is done in PowerPoint!

2008-09-25T10:04:00.000+08:00

NEW E-Book "PowerPoint (2003) Mechanics"

Due to overwhelming response from the slideshows and tutorials posted here and the fact that still many of you are using version 2003, I have put together a no-nonsense step-by-step Visual Guide containing many different effects that can be applied to your presentations.

The ebook consists of:

120 pages,

over 20+ tutorials

step-by-step instructions

large screenshots with every step

Just some of the tutorials include:

Create a 3D Picture reflection

Creating simple Aqua Icons

Creating a Widget

Creating Your Own Vector Art

Creating Your Own Business Art Silhouettes

Custom Animated Organisation Charts

and more...

Priced at just US$5, this book should aid anyone around the world still using 2003 to enjoy some of the the same effects as v2007. Great for anyone in training and education as well as business - this guide will help you learn the 'mechanics' so you can apply your creative juices to your own slides!

Secure payment made through Payloadz/paypal

2008-09-24T20:06:00.000+08:00

Singapore Prime Minister Using Slides

August 9th marks Singapore's National Day (the day it broke away from Malaysia), and was the scene of the annual National Day Rally Speech delivered by PM Lee.

The full 6-part speech can be found at the channelnewsasia website.

The interesting fact is that this is most likely the first time that PM Lee has used Slides to hightlight certain issues facing Singapore today such as the falling population, the economy and issues with society. In looking more closely at the slides one can see that they are stripped down and plain - for the very reason that everyone can follow them. Most of the charts used are simple bar and trend charts with clear headings and labels; this too follows the one-message per slide rule.

The visuals were large and uncluttered, some used to highlight websites, scenes of Singapore and some used to inject humor such as the Electronic Road Pricing system on a small island just off the coast of Singapore (and next to Malaysia - reference to the Pedra Blanca case).

Take a brief look at some of the slides presented, as this is how charts should be laid out - i.e. simple as can be, for all to understand.

2008-09-24T19:58:00.000+08:00

PowerPoint Survey by Ellen Finkelstein

A new survey has been posted, "Have you had a Death by PowerPoint experience?" from EllenFinkelstein.com which you can click on here to participate

Tell your experience and get a free copy of the 22-page e-booklet, 7 Steps to Great Images. The compilation will be free and will not only be great reading; it will include practical steps and techniques to avoid Death by PowerPoint."

2008-07-12T12:25:00.000+08:00

Business Presentations by Steve Jobs

With the launch of the new 3G iPhone upon us, I guess I couldn't go too long without (like many others) mentioning the presentation style and visuals by what some have called the best business communicator in the corporate world: Steve Jobs.

What's interesting to me is the formula used by Jobs to introduce new Apple products and services and how easily it can be translated to many of the presentations we do in everyday business. Aside from the obvious flair, there are some benchmarks we can adopt from his presentation structure. In a recent post from bNet.com, Carmine Gallo gave a brief overview of some key indicators typically used throughout a Jobs presentation.

Opener and theme setting
Let the audience have an expectation of what's to come with revealing too much, and use various opening techniques to achieve this.

Survey the Industry landscape
Present and build an expectation for your new product or service by letting everyone know the current market, current competitors and the obvious need for your solution.

Present the solution
Sell them the solution, but base this on the benefits (not the features) and make meaning from numbers. Aside from the obvious 'showmanship' to sell the new product, this still has to be backed up by sound business costing/finances.

Present it Visually
Slides show represent 1 message per slide and should be visual, more than textual.

Natural Delivery
Use body language that is more natural and conversational in tone - use good use of your hands in an open manner.

Closing
End the presentation with the same as the opening to bring the presentation full circle.

Steve Jobs has been doing this for a long time, and like anything else takes patience, practice and preperation. And like your own presentations, many fail, because they don't employ some of the basics - most like to wing-it, but this is the surrest way to do a terrible presentation. Take a look at past and present presentations by Steve Jobs and see the obvious fine tuning, but continual salesmanship that he possesses.

Steve Jobs First Presentation

Steve Jobs Latest Presentation

2008-07-03T17:49:00.000+08:00

Business Charts layout

Much is usually written about charts and layout, and I will be providing some video tutorials on how to lay them out soon, as well as using the appropriate chart types for specific data. Before that, I though I'de recover some familar ground pertaining to charts and what you need to be going for when you use them in presentations.

Look at any professional chart, be it in a newspaper publication, TV news, News Magazines, Annual reports there will always be some common traits to them. Not forgetting of course the purpose of a chart and/or diagram is that it is meant to 'simplify' the data for easier reference - not make it more complicated.

Good examples can be found everywhere - such as these examples from Bloomberg TV. A company which is data rich, often displays their charts using fairly standard principles, which can be applied to your presentations, such as:

2D: use 3d very subtely if you're going to use it but the general rule of thumb to avoid distorting data is to use 2D charts.

Background Colours: should not clash with the charts and thus end up having either traditional black & white (following most corporate templates) or other darker/lighter variations (even if they're animated they will be done with high degrees of ocpacity).

One data: should be displayed (much like one theme/message per slide) - if there are other information items, try not to clutter the chart and use subtle animation to bring points in one at a time.

Show Values: seems obvious, but clearly display the values, and this may mean re-sizing the font-size in the chart-editor. Much like normal text the value is by default something like size 12 - which is unreadable.

Chart Colours: similar to an earlier blog, try to use colours along the same hue/variation or those of your corporate colours. Don't stick with the default settings. Keep 'red' as a powerful colour indicator if you need to reference specific data - just remember 'red' is never good in finance charts!

More video tutorials on charts to follow.

2008-06-30T13:58:00.000+08:00

Template Theme: Grunge Worktop

Of course I have no idea if this is really how it is refered too? But for the sake of argument, will call it 'grunge worktop'. Grunge in short is using irregular, dirty, broken and torn images in visually contrasting compositions. Huh? Yup, as a business manager, I bet you never throught you would learn all this...!

If you have ever seen some of the latest websites and adverts coming out over the recent year, there are always definite markers to indicate a certain trend in design that is happening - grunge (vector, floral, retro...etc) has been with us a while, but havent seen too much of this in PowerPoint Presentations - of course, there will be times when it is more appropriate than others to use this type of design theme (rather than calling it a template). You can find some good inspirational exmaples at smashingmagazine in their grunge section to get an even better idea.

These are useful if your making public presentations (web or event) to a certain target market such as youths and young business people who are more into these types of trends. It allows your presentations to stay fresh and relevant with this target group - all the better if your product and service is meant for them. It's not difficult to put together, and all images come from SXC, and are simply 'inserted' into the slide - that's it - now its just down to a bit of creativity.

2008-06-30T13:02:00.000+08:00

Presentation Competition

One of the sites mentioned before in this blog for uploading and reviewing others presentations slides from around the world is Slideshare. Last year they ran a competition to see some of the world's best presentations (the only downside about last years competition was that that many countries weren't included, including Singapore), this has changed and most of the world can now compete!

Have a look at the website and competition rules, and some of the prizes up for grabs. Here is a little more information about the competition: -

View Upload your own

2008-06-23T17:13:00.000+08:00

Using Motion Paths for Diagrams

Typically in presentations whenever their is an Organisation Chart, Process Diagram, Excel sheets or other large charts to review - it's unfortunately too small to read most of the time.

This simply comes from the bad habit of 'copying and pasting' the work into PowerPoint and then resizing the whole thing to fit into one slide - usually with dire consequences. To counter this, the tutoiral below explains that you can infact resize these diagrams larger than the slide itself and by using motion paths you can then move the diagram around the screen to introduce different elements. Thereby makeing the diagram clearer, readable and it also allows the presenter to bring elements on screen and remain in controll rather than revealing all elements at once (much like bullet points).

2008-06-23T16:25:00.000+08:00

A Source for Inspiration

Most people tend to ask me where they can find other good powerpoints to draw inspiration from - and aside from the few that you find here and there - my usual answer is don't look at many other powerpoints - because they suck!

Some love them, some don't - but they've been in the business for years and most people need look no further that their TV to draw inspiration. For me, if I want to benchmark some of my slides against the professionals - I need to see professional graphics. And that means loking at the News, or newspapers, advertising and digital signages.

I think the news is a great representation of what we typically do in presentations anyway with the anchor person being the presentor and simple and effective news graphics neatly viewed in the background. If all they needed was bullet-points all the way - they too wouldn't need an anchor person. It's really about putting a face, an emotion, and adding value to the richness of the content. The news is very visual these days (never mind the crawls!) - so re-look at it with the volume down and seek inspiration from the news broadcast graphics and the layouts that they employ for different infographics such as quotes, charts and diagrams. Not only that, notice to use of large 'headline & tagline' text and not paragraphs (i.e. topic sentences).

Some good examples are: BBC (UK), CNN (US) and iTV (UK)

2008-06-17T10:35:00.000+08:00

Free Online Image Editors

We all know PowerPoint is not the greatest image editor (v2003 or v2007) and as for cleaning up images, aside from the 'set transparency' and 'crop' tool, there isn't much else we can do to tidy them up or get rid of those annoying background bits. Apple's keynote does have a nice 'alpha' tool which does a good job of this - so where does it leave us? Photoshop - great tool, if you have it or can afford it - so where else can you get a image editor?!

If you have access to the web, there are now a bundle of good (and bad) online applications out there available for free. Some of the better applications are for cleaning up pictures and other types of images. With the recent announcement of Adobe Express (a 'very' stripped down version of photoshop), it would be good to review just 5 (because you wont use 10 or 20!) good online applications.

Adobe Express (Registration required and Free to use) - great for cleaning up images and performs all the basics required. Limited use of special effects.

Picnik (Registration required and Free to use) - one of the better online applications that have come out to clean and improve images.

Lunapic (No Registration required and Free to use) - simply editor but is packed with alot of speacial image and animation effects; but don't expect 'hollywood' style - rather, simple .gif animations.

Pictures2Life (Registration required and Free to use) - simliar to the online editors but allows you to do some basic animation effects in addition to the normal tweaks.

Gimp (Registration required and Free to download) - if you're looking for more than just a simple image editor then Gimp is a downloadable application that has all the comparible features of photoshop (think of it as Photoshop v5). Great application but the difficulty level to get to grips with it is obviously a lot higher so alot of patience is required.

2008-06-13T18:13:00.000+08:00

Choosing Colours for Your Charts

If you have looked at most presentations and the diagrams, charts and tables the colours look very mis-matched in comparison to the coporate colours often used. Mainly this is because people either use the default Excel colours or they choose colours to (rightly) highlight differentiations, but it ends up looking like a rainbow.

If you look at many professional presentations, or better - annual reports. The first thing you will notics is the consistant colour schemes being used. As a quick tip for business professionals, don't worry too much about choosing colours - because they are already choosen for you to a large extent. The fastest way is to look at the corporate logo, adverts and other professional marketing colaterals that exist and they will dictate your colour scheme.

Taking BP annual report slides as a good example, the logo being a shade of green thus dictates that all charts and diagrams will have similar colouring. You would also notice it only uses colours along the same hue (or variations of the same colour - lighter and darker). Using this quick tip will help standardise and produce more professional looking slides.

2008-06-06T10:46:00.000+08:00

Sample Slide Presentations

Slide sites are now now popping up all over the web, with these two I see as becoming the most notably so far; namely slideshare and slideboom. Slideshare has been around for a couple of years now and has recently added in audio - but slideboom has the advantage of keeping your powerpoint animations in tact (as well as any music and audio). Added to this, there is a niffty little ppt-to-flash converter that is free from the same company called ispring.

Here are a collection of better looking presentations from these two sites: -

View Upload your own

2008-06-04T21:22:00.000+08:00

3D People for Business Graphics

I'm a big fan of using as little text as possible and substituting this for actual 'verbal' presentation; thus leaving the slide to have a much more visual impact. I like to use alot of abstract pictograms to best represent certain situations and processes.

Anyone in engineering and the technology fields would already be used to having computer icons connecting over network dotted lines and other such system graphics. One of the many types of graphics as seen on sites such as stockxpert and istockphoto are of 3D business people providing conceptual representations of actions. These pictograms are universal in their understanding and hence provie a very strong visual reference rather than using text.

From a perspective of putting together a quick presentation, these are easy to put together, shape and bend into positions to perfectly express different situations and obviously is alot more attractive than having text all over the slide.

The man is composed of an Oval and Rounded-Rectangle, which are later Grouped when you constructed a basic man shape. In v2007, we then apply some basic 3D perspective and changes to the Bevel Depth to approximately 20. The rest is really up to you in terms of creativity. Take a look at the previews and some of the great work available for fee-download at the above sites to garner some ideas. Enjoy this quick tutorial...

2008-06-02T19:25:00.000+08:00

The Powerful Pitch

One the Net's most favoured speakers is Guy Kawasaki, a former Product Evanglist for Apple and now a Venture Capitalist, was speaking on The Art of Innovation at the Microsoft Small Business Summit recently about to create a great presentation. This was a free online event that lasted for five days. There are approximately fifty eight sessions designed to provide small business owners with strategic insights from experts in business and technology.

His style is what I would refer to as 'smart-casual' and may or may not work in the boardrooms of Asia. What is important to note though is the energy that comes across - something that definitely lacks with Asian presenters. I was once asked by a participant why I couldn't showcase more Asia Business speakers and I replied "name me 5 'business' speakers that you know of, and believe are good presenters!"... then came the silence. It could be argued that cultures and society are different, which does have some part to play but when I hear they are 'angmoh' (english translation :'westerners') and thats why they can do better I always disagree and instill that anyone can have that energy and passion - but it is down to you to master and conjure it up. Guy obviously loves what he does and that clearly comes across.

Alot of blogs have been written on Guy's style and his '10-20-30' approach - but rather than me telling you about it, why don't you here it from the recent event and some other presentations done by Guy.

These are some of the other presentations as delivered by Guy.

2008-05-31T09:26:00.000+08:00

Spotlight: Ellen Finkelstein

The PowerPoint community is quite large and I do urge everyone to explore the different tutorials available out there. In this Spotlight, I'm featuring Ellen Finkelstein. A well known author of AutoCAD and PowerPoint since 1996, she has published several books on the subject. Ellen has a great website/ blog of her own which I urge you all to visit.

I would also like to share one of the tutorials as featured from her site as a better way to highlight certain key text. You can also find the tutorial by clicking here.

Slides with lots of text on them are hard for audiences to comprehend quickly. There's simply too much information. Either people listen to the presenter and ignore the slide, or more likely (and worse), they read the slide and ignore the presenter. The brain simply has difficulty listening to one set of words while reading another set. Also, studies show that people tend to skim what they read on screen (as opposed to what they read on paper); therefore, they miss many of the words. The best solution is to put fewer words on a slide. It's easy to divide one slide into three, for example. Another important technique is to edit ruthlessly, removing any unnecessary words.

Use a Different Colour

An easy technique is to use a different color for key words. People quickly get the point by skimming these words. Simply select the key words and choose another color by clicking the Font Color button on the Formatting or Drawing toolbar.

Another method is to use custom animation to display a filled rectangle behind the key words. Follow these steps:

1. Choose Rectangle from the Drawing toolbar. (In 2007, choose Insert tab> Shapes> Rectangle.)
2. Drag across some key words to cover them with the rectangle.
3. Remove the outline and specify the fill of the rectangle. The color needs to be a strong contrast from the text, yet show up against the background. To remove the outline, use the Line Color button on the Drawing toolbar and set it to No Line. To change the fill color, use the Fill Color button on the Drawing toolbar and choose an appropriate color. (In 2007, on the Format tab, use the Shape Outline button in the Shape Styles group, and choose No Outline. Use the Shape Fill button and choose an appropriate color.)
4. Choose Slide Show> Custom Animation. (In 2007, choose Animations> Custom Animation.)
5. Choose Add Effect> Entrance> Wipe. You can choose any entrance animation you want, but keep it mild. A Fade animation is also nice.
6. Set the parameters for the animation at the top of the Custom Animation task pane. For Wipe, set it to wipe From Left. I used Fast for the Speed setting. I left the On Click setting so that I could control the timing as I was speaking.
7. Right-click the rectangle, and choose Order> Send to Back. (In 2007, right-click and choose Send to Back.)

2008-05-30T22:29:00.000+08:00

Drawing a Vector Inspired Business Graphic

Of the many presentations that I put together, in addition to the main brand-theme for Impress Training, is the use of Vector-inspired business (men) graphics. In an earlier post for sample slides I noted that I basically drew myself into the slides. So I'm going to show you very quickly how I did this.

Now, you can find this type of artwork in many media today, and there is great deal of stock art available at Stockxpert (paid) as well as other sites and a few samples at SXC (which I contribute a few images now and then, and they are Free). Of course, if we don;t have the resources to pay for stock art but we like this type of vector illustration we can very quickly produce a similar effect. These are great for producing business and training slides and can be used for a variety of content matter.

How they can be used will come later - for this post, let's just draw a simple business graphic. I have provided a video tutorial here in v2007 - but it is exactly the same process in v2003. Please note that we are just using the 'curve tool' and 'fill effects'. And be warned - in v2003 the curve tool will 'have' to be used in conjunction with the edit points to smoothen out the edges. This is a very quick demonstration, so please take some time when it comes to doing yours.

2008-05-29T18:17:00.000+08:00

Using Subtle Gradient Effects

I was watching TV a few nights ago and glanced at one of the commercials from United Overseas Bank advertising a joint promotion of their credit cards and audi. Here is the actual commercial.

One of the things that struck me was - that would make an easy powerpoint slide. You see, the best way to get inspiration for your slides, as I learned a long time ago, is rarely by looking at someone else's slides as they typically suck! I found that by looking at broadcast news graphics, marketers, advertisers and other professionals in the design and marketing arena you get ideas for constructing more powerful slides - in terms of the visuals and the messages.

In this particular example, we find many other products have used this simple effect, which we'll use to replicate in powerpoint. It's a great visual device for drawing people to looking squarely at the product. This can be used to great effect in product slides, or show casing information items.

I have provided two versions, and here is the PowerPoint v2007: -

and here is the v2003 for PowerPoint.

2008-05-28T15:01:00.000+08:00

Sample Slides: First-time Manager

I would like to share some of the slides that appear in my First-time Manager course, from Impress Training, regarding the topic (one of many topics) 'Motivation'. The course itself is meant to provide, not just insights, but real practical tips to managers as to how they can implement it in the office. All too often many management courses are great at providing frameworks but not the 'how to' which required at the 'ground level' for operational and new managers alike. I hope that those that have attended or are due to participate find the course useful in bridging this gap.

Pertaining to the design, it is important to note your 'audience' - based in Singapore, many of the cases studies and management frameworks coming from the west are very hard to convey or even put into practice when the culture is so different; a good recent example of this happened in Korea with KIA (see the businessWeek Asia article). Hence, many of the case studies, articles are all referenced from Singapore or around the region to make the point more meaningful. Not all cases are reflected in the sample slides though. The traditional bullet points have all but been removed in order for the presenter to elaborate on key topics (i.e. the presenter does the talking, not the slides - which are used for visual reference and topic introduction).

Further, all picture images were taken mainly from SXC or Google images except for the vector people. These were actually drawn from real pictures of me (!) in various postures and then using the 'curve line' tool traced around and 'coloured fill' later. These were then saved as .png files to retain the transparent background and were ready for use in other presentations.

View Upload your own

2008-05-28T10:19:00.000+08:00

A moment away from business

Stepping away from business presentations for a moment, these two examples were created to showcase some of the uses of the animation effects in powerpoint. There may be times when businesses and even schools conduct ro participate in trade shows and events that require some form of running presentation. Yet don't have the resources to hire professionals to create professional looking flash designs or other similar slide content. In these two examples, they were merely to showcase 'motion path' animation.

The Miniture Earth presentation is a very short, and telling, flash animation that has done the rounds in Youtube for sometime now and I urge everyone to visit the main site. In part, this was created as a request from someone to have a PowerPoint version so that they could play in an event that covered similar themes - and although the timing was short, the prevailing animation still did the trick. I created this about 2 years ago on v2003 of powerpoint.

The other sample is a replication of one of my favourite artisit's Moby music video of "Why does my heart feel so bad". Again, it's just a short clip (not the whole sequence) song demonstrating motion path animation in v2003. Not being an 'animator' by trade, please forgive the less than professional outcome... and people wonder what I do on rainy days!

2008-05-26T21:10:00.000+08:00

An example of 'Quality' not 'Quantity'

In a recent talk broadcast over at TED, Alisa Miller gave an insightful presentation as to how the US recieves it's media and what stories from around the world it had tended to focus on - those that dominanted the news in recent months were Iraq and Britney Spears. Although the presentation style was somewhat let down by the referal to cur cards (pr large A4 paper) in this case, the presentation flowed well and made use of minimal slides but each has a clear cut message.

In our own design of slides, as you can see from this talk there is much to be said to keep information to the core facts to maximise it's impact on the intended audience.

The design elements make use of black backgrounds, which are preferable in presentations in larger rooms as it focuses more attention on the displayed images and text on screen. Text is short and images and take up half the screen. All sources are quoted towards the bottom, which any academic and business presentation should strieve to do -but ensure the text is a darker colour than the main text and smaller in font size so it doesn't avert attention away from the main message.

The software being used for Alisa's presentation is Apple's Keynote. Above are some sample slides from her talk, but take 5 minutes to watch it and take note of the simple yet effective use of slide information.

2008-05-25T23:28:00.000+08:00

Subtle use of 3D Perspective

You only have to look around today to see the major influence that Apple has had on the design asthetic of many other companies. Most notably the 'reflections' effect - see any handphone or tech product advert. Added with a 3D perspective, many images have a very powerful visual feel.

In PowerPoint, many people over do it as with the 3D WordArt; and one must really learn to appreciate the subtle touches of using 3D to pull off such an effect. With v2007 this has become easier, as shown in the brief video. In v2003 this is alot harder and the overall effect not as convincing.

However, next time you have a line of products you wish to showcase, use this nice subtle visual effect. Just remember to use the 3D directions using 'Perspective' and not 'Parallel' to create 3D look.

2008-05-25T17:22:00.000+08:00

SlideRocket ready to take off

A new software application thats crept up on the web over recent months is SlideRocket. An online application that "provides for every part of the presentation lifecycle. It integrates authoring, asset management, delivery and analytics tools into a single hosted environment that allows you to quickly create stunning presentations, intelligently manage your assets, securely share your slides, and measure the results."

The demo looks promising and seems to blend two favourites such as the effects of Apple's keynote with the Options of Microsoft PowerPoint. Do check it out.

2008-05-25T16:55:00.000+08:00

Share your slides with SlideShare

It was about a year ago, I came across slideshare and and uploaded some old workshop slides for creating visual effects in PowerPoint (v2003). One year on, and I'm amazed at over 100,000 thousand people have downloaded these slides and found some of what was in there useful. Thank-you to everyone. I'm sharing them here so you get a rough sense for what this blog will be about - but since these slides are almost 3 years old, there will be better presentations to follow, share and learn.

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