Presentation Design Masterclass: Video Presentation Shows How It Should Be Done
Good presentation design can make all the difference. There is nothing like a text-heavy, default-templated PowerPoint deck to automatically send an audience to sleep. Admittedly we aren't all born graphic designers, and there are limits to the time and talent any one person might have at their disposal. That's why it's important to shamelessly rip off presentations that really work.
Last weekGarr Reynolds expressed his doubts about online presentation sharing platform Slideshare, using as a counterpoint the excellent showpiece presentations put together by Lawrence Lessig. Lessig's presentation design relies heavily on the interaction between his visually-striking, simple, fast-cut slides, and his own delivery of the content. Take a look for yourself how effective that can be over at YouTube.
But Lessig isn't the only one creating powerful presentations we can learn (and steal) a lot from. In the following video, made by design students Clemens Kogler and Karp Szmit we have a masterclass in visual design for presenters.
Admittedly, attempting to reproduce the following masterpiece of motion graphic design is a feat most likely beyond we average PowerPoint users, but this doesn't mean that there isn't plenty to learn from watching it.
So what is it that makes this presentation so powerful?
For one thing, a lot of the slides don't stand up by themselves. Put them on Slideshare without the voice over narrative and you have a confusing, meaningless tangle of pretty words and images. This is a good thing. Presentation slides should not be a makeshift teleprompter for the presenter, but rather a way to visually illustrate and add impact to what they have to say.
In Le Grand Content (the title of the video) this perfect synergy between voice and imagery is woven into the very fabric of the presentation. Were it not for the voice, the images would be merely decorative. Were it not for the images, the voice would be merely conversational. But together, the results are explosive. If there is only one lesson to be learnt from this excellent production, this is it: presentation visuals should forever be supporting and adding impact to the presenter's main communication goals.
Furthermore, this is a textbook illustration of the word 'flow'. Presentations that really hang together nicely flow seamlessly from beginning to end, rather than stuttering and starting, stopping cold and jerking back into motion uncomfortably.
While the flow achieved relies on the combination of the free association inspired stream-of-consciousness at the heart of the film, as coupled with the endlessly mutating, updating parodies of information graphics, this is not something impossible to achieve for the average presenter.
Okay, we might have to forfeit the beautifully animated, exquisitely rendered 3D motion diagrams to an extent, but the key here is that sense of movement, the constant pushing forward from one point to the next.
Whether this is achieved with hundreds of single, one and two word slides, with slick animation, or even with well thought out slideshow-like images that support your speech, the result is the same. You are telling a story, and you don't let your audience go even for one second. Make them follow you - make them want to follow you - by threading one piece of information into the next.
This flow is achieved through simplicity, and lots of it. At no point does the screen become crowded. Information might come, go and even mutate at a lightning fast pace, but it never leaves you wondering where you should be looking. Every slide should be simple, visual and as high impact as the one that preceded it.
It's much better to have ten slides in the space of a minute, than one that unfolds laboriously in those torturous slow builds and bullet points. There are no bullet points to be seen in this video, and for good reason.
Good presentation design supports everything you have to say, adds weight and impact to it, and if it's really working, holds the attention of your audience. This is not achieved by hurling text and endless, poorly put together graphs at people.
