1. Make it readable
Point size must be readable for the proposed space. If an individual is to view the presentation on a computer screen in front of him, it need not be as large as a show intended to be viewed from the back row of an auditorium. If delivery can’t be determined, there are some good middle-ground standards.
2. Use visuals to focus attention
Images can be distracting, but also work to focus attention. Individuals (who read) will read the content in the first second or two. The presenter must then be relied on to hold the viewers attention on the screen, and on the content, while the extrapolation and detailed content delivery occurs. The right images can help keep the participant focussed on the screen, and thereby on the presentation.
3. Deliver content simply
Know the audience, and a delivery system that is best for them. While animations might be distracting for an older audience, for a younger audience it can be a tool to hold attention. Therefore it’s essential to know who the presentation is designed to reach.
4. Deliver content consistently
As mentioned, templates not only help with ease of building PowerPoint shows, but consistent delivery also helps with messaging.
5. Keep it simple
If the content starts building on a particular slide, question if it should be two slides. Remember that the attention given to an individual slide will wane. The longer that slide is up on the screen, the more participants will look away, and become distracted. But put a new slide on the screen, and the attention of the participants can be likewise refreshed. Avoid having to linger for too long on any individual point on any individual slide, unless there are some elements that move on the screen, and thereby “refresh” the audiences attention.
6. Make it memorable
There are 3 keys to making a compelling, memorable slide:
• Use only 3-7 words
• Use active verbs (ideally start with an active verb)
• Keep the slide focused.
7. Keep the show short
The flip side to breaking out slides is to not have too many slides. One way to help with this is to compartmentalize a large presentation into sections, and provide an agenda at the start. One really great graphic method of helping viewers determine where they are in the paradigm of the presentation is to provide a little navigation bar, at the bottom or the side of the slide, providing wayfinding orientation, much like a website. But as important as it is to let the participant know where he/she is in the presentation, it's also important that they not get lost along the way, in too many slides.
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Monday, September 22, 2008
PowerPoint Training (3 of 5):
Six Reasons to use a PowerPoint Template and a Slide Library
1. Consistent delivery. PowerPoint is all about consistency, and tools to help enforce consistency, as a tool for focusing content. This allows for delivery of information, within definable and organized parameters.
2. Templates allow you to take advantage of a Pre-Built Slide Library.
A library of slides is an invaluable creation tool. The more Slide Types that can be identified up front, the more streamlined the creation process can become.
3. Templates with a Slide library add Drag and drop slide functionality.
With templates built to the same design allows simple drag-and-drop functionality within the formatted slides that would not be available for slides pulled from templates outside of the RHB template.
4. Easy production of a lesson from scratch.
All of these elements combine to create a workflow that makes it easy to set up a consistent lesson. This is especially true if you are creating a product with multiple PowerPoint presentations, or developing a sales force who need to deliver multiple different presentations on different aspects of a large product line.
5. Slides can be created with Pre-built functionality.
The animations and functionality can be built right in. Complicated animations and reveals can be built once, then repurposed. This amortizes the cost of creating complex (and often very interesting) slides,which makes for better presentations.
6. Creates, over time, a reduction of work.
Again, the more slides you make from scratch, the more you can add to your library. The bigger your library, the fewer slides you need to create from scratch later on. Again to use the example of a sales force, if a salesman builds a new slide for a new product, (or more likely has a staff designer with PowerPoint savvy do so) then that slide can be easily added to a library that can be distributed to all of the sales force. Such a library is easily updated, small and therefore easily (digitally) portable, and distributable.
2. Templates allow you to take advantage of a Pre-Built Slide Library.
A library of slides is an invaluable creation tool. The more Slide Types that can be identified up front, the more streamlined the creation process can become.
3. Templates with a Slide library add Drag and drop slide functionality.
With templates built to the same design allows simple drag-and-drop functionality within the formatted slides that would not be available for slides pulled from templates outside of the RHB template.
4. Easy production of a lesson from scratch.
All of these elements combine to create a workflow that makes it easy to set up a consistent lesson. This is especially true if you are creating a product with multiple PowerPoint presentations, or developing a sales force who need to deliver multiple different presentations on different aspects of a large product line.
5. Slides can be created with Pre-built functionality.
The animations and functionality can be built right in. Complicated animations and reveals can be built once, then repurposed. This amortizes the cost of creating complex (and often very interesting) slides,which makes for better presentations.
6. Creates, over time, a reduction of work.
Again, the more slides you make from scratch, the more you can add to your library. The bigger your library, the fewer slides you need to create from scratch later on. Again to use the example of a sales force, if a salesman builds a new slide for a new product, (or more likely has a staff designer with PowerPoint savvy do so) then that slide can be easily added to a library that can be distributed to all of the sales force. Such a library is easily updated, small and therefore easily (digitally) portable, and distributable.
Thursday, September 18, 2008
The Point of PowerPoint (2 of 5):
Building design consistency
The first big time-saver is to build a usable, and re-usable, template.
If produce one of something, it’s unique. If you produce two, it’s a pair, but not necessarily a consistency. Make three or more of something, and you’ve begun to define consistency, and that's the core of good design. People like consistency, and it’s what PowerPoint was designed for. So, in order to build a solid template, you have to have enough of a volume of the types of slides you'll typically see in order to solidly develop consistency.
A great start toward establishing consistency between more than one PowerPoint presentation, and thereby developing or promoting an identity, is to build a reusable template. A good template can save hours of work, and consistent use of a template facilitates reuse of slides from a slide library.
Consistency in a presentation allows the participant to focus on the content, because the framework for that content is a consistent “box”— a frame that provides context, but by remaining the same, does not call attention to itself. This familiar framework offers a lot of benefits—but first I should address the dangers.
The templates which come standard with PowerPoint most often feel like they were designed by Mondrian, if Mondrian was a colorblind dyslexic. As a result, many “out of the box” PowerPoint presentations are garish, and poorly designed in terms of color selection, based entirely on the template. And as a result, there is a thriving business in the selling of PowerPoint backgrounds, for those without the savvy to create one on their own, with any image manipulation software. But even then, the ability to create a background doesn’t infer the design ability to create an effective one. I’ll get into that in one of the future installments.
With the design issues in mind, once you have an attractive and effective identity created, in the form of a n attractive and workable background, there are still other elements to apply, toward consistency. PowerPoint templates consist of a Master Slide, which have Master Slide styles (including footer styles) , and Notes Page Styles. Using these elements regularly and in the same manner, and using templates that share the same characteristics as a “set,” can help ensure 3 things:
• Consistent placement
Text elements in terms of font choice, hierarchy and placement can be set on a Master Page in the PowerPoint document.
• Consistent identity
Master pages can be set up with text sizes and image placements that assure consistent identity. This includes color and specialized graphic effects beyond the standard templates Microsoft packages with the program. Using the Master Page consistently and exclusively assures that the identity will be consistent.
• Ease of use
A properly built template is easy to create new slides in. This allows the writer to focus on the content, and not the formatting. Of course, the key to this is to have prebuilt formatting in the template that covers 80-90% of the writer’s content needs.
And you’re on your way.
If produce one of something, it’s unique. If you produce two, it’s a pair, but not necessarily a consistency. Make three or more of something, and you’ve begun to define consistency, and that's the core of good design. People like consistency, and it’s what PowerPoint was designed for. So, in order to build a solid template, you have to have enough of a volume of the types of slides you'll typically see in order to solidly develop consistency.
A great start toward establishing consistency between more than one PowerPoint presentation, and thereby developing or promoting an identity, is to build a reusable template. A good template can save hours of work, and consistent use of a template facilitates reuse of slides from a slide library.
Consistency in a presentation allows the participant to focus on the content, because the framework for that content is a consistent “box”— a frame that provides context, but by remaining the same, does not call attention to itself. This familiar framework offers a lot of benefits—but first I should address the dangers.
The templates which come standard with PowerPoint most often feel like they were designed by Mondrian, if Mondrian was a colorblind dyslexic. As a result, many “out of the box” PowerPoint presentations are garish, and poorly designed in terms of color selection, based entirely on the template. And as a result, there is a thriving business in the selling of PowerPoint backgrounds, for those without the savvy to create one on their own, with any image manipulation software. But even then, the ability to create a background doesn’t infer the design ability to create an effective one. I’ll get into that in one of the future installments.
With the design issues in mind, once you have an attractive and effective identity created, in the form of a n attractive and workable background, there are still other elements to apply, toward consistency. PowerPoint templates consist of a Master Slide, which have Master Slide styles (including footer styles) , and Notes Page Styles. Using these elements regularly and in the same manner, and using templates that share the same characteristics as a “set,” can help ensure 3 things:
• Consistent placement
Text elements in terms of font choice, hierarchy and placement can be set on a Master Page in the PowerPoint document.
• Consistent identity
Master pages can be set up with text sizes and image placements that assure consistent identity. This includes color and specialized graphic effects beyond the standard templates Microsoft packages with the program. Using the Master Page consistently and exclusively assures that the identity will be consistent.
• Ease of use
A properly built template is easy to create new slides in. This allows the writer to focus on the content, and not the formatting. Of course, the key to this is to have prebuilt formatting in the template that covers 80-90% of the writer’s content needs.
And you’re on your way.
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
The Point of PowerPoint (1 of 5): Thinking before Inking.
“Think before you ink” is an old expression I picked up in my comic book days, speaking to the fact that a good comic book inker had to be a strong artist, not just a “tracer of pencil lines.” A good inker thinks before he inks, and knows the marks he needs to make in order to make an effective product. And like so many things in comics, that’s an analogy for almost anything. Before a presenter starts building a presentation, essentially putting ink to paper, the thinking needs to be there.
And that thinking needs to answer 2 core questions.
What is the Point?
The “point” of a PowerPoint show is to communicate information. To do this you need to follow some simple rules for visual presentation. You need to build your show with:
• Clear readability
• Clear communication
• Ease of use (and not over-use)
What is the Focus?
The “focus” of a PowerPoint is different from the point, for our purposes. For this, we’ll define the focus as “what do you want the participant to walk away from this with?” There is a specific point to each slide, and to the presentation as a whole. To keep the focus clear, you need to be sure that you:
• Keep the viewers attention. It’s inevitable that in a presentation attention will wander. Viewers of all ages look to understand what the point is, but if the feel they’ve gotten it, their attention will wander. If you hand out a printout of all the slides in a presentation, inevitably there will come a point in each and every slide when the audience member with this in hand, will look to see what the next slide is, even though the speaker hasn’t finished speaking on the current slide. This is a signal that the participant feels he or she has gleaned the point, and is anxious to move on to the next point. This is an area where (when not overdone) animation and imagery can help—in keeping the participant focussed on the slide, and thereby glean more from the content.
• Don’t overwrite the slide. If a slide has several bullets, consider making it two slides. According to a study by the US Navy, the average adults attention span is 18 minutes. Ideally for a PowerPoint presentation, that would be broken down into chunks of about 2-4 minutes per slide. If a slide is overwritten or takes longer than 5 minutes, you can count on having lost your audience’s attention at some point in there.
• Plan the content as more than what is read. Content should introduce the idea, and allow the speaker to extrapolate, or you lose the participant’s attention. The participant can read faster than the presenter can talk. If the speaker is merely reading what is on the screen, and adding nothing, you're going to have a room full of bored participants. You'd have been better served emailing the presentation.
•Give the audience something to look at. I'm not talking about extra bells and whistles, or distracting images, or useless clip art. Give the audience images with impact, that point to, emphasize, and work with the content. A picture really is worth a thousand words, and in an environment where you don't want a thousand words, they are especially valuable. This is where my own area of experience comes in—in creating visuals that highlight the content in a dramatic way, and thereby creates an environment where the participant is more likely to get the point, and walk away with the point securely in pocket.
With those overarching goals, getting into the specifics of “how” can provide some shortcuts to making a PowerPoint presentation simple. effective, and attractive.
And that thinking needs to answer 2 core questions.
What is the Point?
The “point” of a PowerPoint show is to communicate information. To do this you need to follow some simple rules for visual presentation. You need to build your show with:
• Clear readability
• Clear communication
• Ease of use (and not over-use)
What is the Focus?
The “focus” of a PowerPoint is different from the point, for our purposes. For this, we’ll define the focus as “what do you want the participant to walk away from this with?” There is a specific point to each slide, and to the presentation as a whole. To keep the focus clear, you need to be sure that you:
• Keep the viewers attention. It’s inevitable that in a presentation attention will wander. Viewers of all ages look to understand what the point is, but if the feel they’ve gotten it, their attention will wander. If you hand out a printout of all the slides in a presentation, inevitably there will come a point in each and every slide when the audience member with this in hand, will look to see what the next slide is, even though the speaker hasn’t finished speaking on the current slide. This is a signal that the participant feels he or she has gleaned the point, and is anxious to move on to the next point. This is an area where (when not overdone) animation and imagery can help—in keeping the participant focussed on the slide, and thereby glean more from the content.
• Don’t overwrite the slide. If a slide has several bullets, consider making it two slides. According to a study by the US Navy, the average adults attention span is 18 minutes. Ideally for a PowerPoint presentation, that would be broken down into chunks of about 2-4 minutes per slide. If a slide is overwritten or takes longer than 5 minutes, you can count on having lost your audience’s attention at some point in there.
• Plan the content as more than what is read. Content should introduce the idea, and allow the speaker to extrapolate, or you lose the participant’s attention. The participant can read faster than the presenter can talk. If the speaker is merely reading what is on the screen, and adding nothing, you're going to have a room full of bored participants. You'd have been better served emailing the presentation.
•Give the audience something to look at. I'm not talking about extra bells and whistles, or distracting images, or useless clip art. Give the audience images with impact, that point to, emphasize, and work with the content. A picture really is worth a thousand words, and in an environment where you don't want a thousand words, they are especially valuable. This is where my own area of experience comes in—in creating visuals that highlight the content in a dramatic way, and thereby creates an environment where the participant is more likely to get the point, and walk away with the point securely in pocket.
With those overarching goals, getting into the specifics of “how” can provide some shortcuts to making a PowerPoint presentation simple. effective, and attractive.
Monday, September 1, 2008
Observations on the Teen Demographic (Part 3 of 3): Talk with me, not at me: The importance of interactivity
Television and print media are traditionally “push” media; uni-directional with predefined “receiver” structures. In contrast to this, one of the major appeals of the internet is its ability to function in the same way with traditional “push” content, but also, more importantly to work interactively with viewers, and provide “pull” content. This interactive engagement of the viewer, getting the kids into acquiring information and directing the course of their learning, creates a sense of community and personal involvement. Kids tale part in gaining education, and in participating, value what they’ve gained.
A personal aside: I learned as a child one of the keys to a strong education is a perception of education as something you take, not something that is ”given” to you. That is, if you have a teacher that is un-engaging, and delivering material that is uninteresting in an “easy” class, it remains the responsibility of the student to try and dig something out of the hours spent in class. Especially in college, where every hour in class represents an investment of cash, I could never understand the glee in others eyes at a teacher not delivering, or, on occasion, not showing up. Sure, you get credit for the class. But you don’t get the value that the credit you paid for was supposed to represent. How can you image that you’re “getting over” by not having to have a class because the teacher doesn’t show? As a concept, it still blows my mind. But this is not a popular attitude, and one that’s difficult to spread. But the internet seems to be doing it quite well—if a site does not deliver, it does not get clicked-through, and opportunity for deeper diving and increased communication is lost.
But as the interactive communication offered on the internet becomes more popular, and even expected, it becomes difficult for traditional print media to echo, and complete. The interactivity can be mimicked to a certain extent in print publications through interactive activities like quizzes, discussion questions, and group activities. Notably, teen girl magazines are increasing their level of interactivity as well in this way; this will probably further escalate with the intense magazine competition that exists. Young male magazines such as Maxim also are following this paradigm.
In schools, there has been a shift from lecture-oriented teaching to cooperative work (broadcast model vs. interactive model), again allowing students to participate in knowledge acquisition. I myself am engaged in acquiring my Masters in Graphic Design through an online course, because of the flexibility it affords. This method of teaching is becoming more prevalent even in the least technologically savvy school districts. In an era where interactivity, cooperative learning and higher thinking skills are becoming so important, it’s a good idea to consider how we can possibly incorporate these teaching methods into publications and print as well.
Style of visual presentation can have a big effect on reader involvement. It’s a confirmation of the intuitive response that an anonymous author (one that just lists facts, describes things as happening to neither the author nor the reader directly) is much less appealing and involving for the reader than a “visible” author, one who creates an I-you relationship with the reader (as opposed to an I-it relationship). The bottom line is that the importance of talking to the reader, or more appropriately, engaging the reader in a conversation as part of the process, and really creating an engaging conversation, is becoming an essential part of assuring interactivity in print media. That is, talking to the reader, not at the reader, is a key, essential distinction—and one that is not easily achieved.
A personal aside: I learned as a child one of the keys to a strong education is a perception of education as something you take, not something that is ”given” to you. That is, if you have a teacher that is un-engaging, and delivering material that is uninteresting in an “easy” class, it remains the responsibility of the student to try and dig something out of the hours spent in class. Especially in college, where every hour in class represents an investment of cash, I could never understand the glee in others eyes at a teacher not delivering, or, on occasion, not showing up. Sure, you get credit for the class. But you don’t get the value that the credit you paid for was supposed to represent. How can you image that you’re “getting over” by not having to have a class because the teacher doesn’t show? As a concept, it still blows my mind. But this is not a popular attitude, and one that’s difficult to spread. But the internet seems to be doing it quite well—if a site does not deliver, it does not get clicked-through, and opportunity for deeper diving and increased communication is lost.
But as the interactive communication offered on the internet becomes more popular, and even expected, it becomes difficult for traditional print media to echo, and complete. The interactivity can be mimicked to a certain extent in print publications through interactive activities like quizzes, discussion questions, and group activities. Notably, teen girl magazines are increasing their level of interactivity as well in this way; this will probably further escalate with the intense magazine competition that exists. Young male magazines such as Maxim also are following this paradigm.
In schools, there has been a shift from lecture-oriented teaching to cooperative work (broadcast model vs. interactive model), again allowing students to participate in knowledge acquisition. I myself am engaged in acquiring my Masters in Graphic Design through an online course, because of the flexibility it affords. This method of teaching is becoming more prevalent even in the least technologically savvy school districts. In an era where interactivity, cooperative learning and higher thinking skills are becoming so important, it’s a good idea to consider how we can possibly incorporate these teaching methods into publications and print as well.
Style of visual presentation can have a big effect on reader involvement. It’s a confirmation of the intuitive response that an anonymous author (one that just lists facts, describes things as happening to neither the author nor the reader directly) is much less appealing and involving for the reader than a “visible” author, one who creates an I-you relationship with the reader (as opposed to an I-it relationship). The bottom line is that the importance of talking to the reader, or more appropriately, engaging the reader in a conversation as part of the process, and really creating an engaging conversation, is becoming an essential part of assuring interactivity in print media. That is, talking to the reader, not at the reader, is a key, essential distinction—and one that is not easily achieved.
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