MasterView International Creating and Managing Effective PowerPoint Presentations for International Audiences ______________________________________________________________ MasterView International by IKONOS New Media November 15th, 2001 Issue #6 Executive Editor: Simone Luchini Editor-in-Chief: Luigi Canali De Rossi _______________________________________________________________ This issue's theme: *INFORMATION DESIGN FOR PRESENTATIONS* - Part I
============================================================== We come together again to explore a new topic that goes beyond simply knowing how to use our preferred presentation tool, PowerPoint. We are going to spend two full issues analyzing in depth the concept of Information Design, a.k.a. the art of transforming quantitative data into effective visual displays. After having discussed with my students on various occasions I have realized that there is a need shared among many professionals who can desire effective design and delivery of presentations which contain statistical charts and graphs. I know that presenters, managers, trainers and in general all the users of PowerPoint usually want to be able not only to insert a statistical chart into a presentation, but they also want their audience to make good sense out of it in the shortest time possible. The time of splashy presentations going only for glitz is over. People do not want to see only strong color combinations, items flying across the screen, and tumbling titles. They want to know what you have to say and WHY IT SHOULD BE IMPORTANT TO THEM. These are the things that count in the end. In this very interesting issue Editor-in-Chief, Luigi Canali De Rossi, will share with you his expertise on the subject and will provide you with a good introduction of what Information Design is and why it is relevant to us as presenters. In addition, he will show you the best practices and principles for effective table design when used for presentations, and on the design principles and criteria that should guide your selection of 2-D or 3-D charting styles when creating statistical graphs. I will personally guide you to see which are the most important chart types available in PowerPoint and when you can use each one. You will learn how to animate a chart (you already know one trick, don't you? If not, check article 6 on MasterView #1: at http://masterview.ikonosnewmedia.com I will close this issue reviewing how you can keep your statistical graphs always up-to-date with the source file. Before I begin, I would like to spend a few words of tribute to my colleague Mihai Alexandru Bocsaru. Mihai is MasterView new Webmaster and has re-organized and improved MasterView's Web site. Thanks to him, MasterView has now a fully working Web site with separate web pages for each single issue and article of the newsletter. Go check it out at: http://masterview.ikonosnewmedia.com And now, let's get the ball rolling and start learning about Information Design! ============================================================== 1) *WHAT IS INFORMATION DESIGN* ============================================================== by Luigi Canali De Rossi "Information Design is the detailed planning of specific information that is to be provided to a particular audience to meet specific objectives. The output of Information Design consists of visually delivered information which is highly designed for the benefit of the user." The myth that says that a high level of design corresponds to a high level of apparent or "evident" design features is the opposite of the premise of Information Design. Its mandate is to optimize the layout of information which facilitates navigation, readability and immediate understanding of what the information communicates. The purpose of Information Design is to SIMPLIFY, INTEGRATE, FILTER and SELECTIVELY EMPHASIZE information. Information Design is often utilized in preparing quality diagrams and charts, information maps, direction maps, organigrams and flowcharts, and almost any kind of technical or business-oriented information. Business graphics and statistical charts are a good example of an area in which Information Design is extremely useful and effective. Information Design is all about the psychology and physiology of how users access, learn, and remember information; the impact of colors, shapes, and patterns, learning styles. Information Design takes pride in analyzing and identifying what works, what doesn't and why, in those situations where information is to be easily understood and comprehended. Information Design usually encompasses many different responsibilities and tasks, including: a) Analysis of users' needs and learning styles b) Selection of the most effective layouts, colors, fonts, and graphics c) Identification of most effective navigational infrastructures d) Application of principles of simplification, synthesis and integration e) Testing of readability, contrast and legibility in adverse situations and for handicapped users Information Design is a distinct area of interest in respect to Information Architecture and Information Planning. Here is a brief definition of three Information Arts and how they relate to each other: 1) Information Architecture deals with organizing information at the lowest level into usable information structures. IA analyzes content, and groups it according to user profiles and communication goals. IA responsibility is the one of guaranteeing integrity and functionality in how information blocks are organized and interlinked in an information system (Web site, CD-ROM, etc.). 2) Information Planning focuses on all aspects required to prepare and support the information delivery of a specific set of information products over a set time span. This generally includes understanding the product goals, studying the audience and their needs, considering possible alternative delivery media, defining specific information "units" (books, chapters, Web pages, etc.). In this area of interest, one would also include the identification of appropriate human resources, specifications of job roles and profiles, definition of time plans and logistics. 3) Information Design specifically focuses on the information itself in one or more information units, and usually it encompasses the information aspects of industrial, identity and graphic design, content design, page design, Web page design, composition, illustration and typography. The practice of information design invites questions of how people learn or prefer to learn and how they use information. It also raises questions about how to design information for different cultural and various other contextual differences in the audience. Information is now frequently delivered utilizing electronic media such as Web sites and CD-ROMs (with new possibilities for user interaction). A new discipline has emerged which deals with these aspects of information design from a user-centered point of view: Interaction Design. [Definition of Information Design authored by Michael Lawlor] for WhatIs?com website at http://whatis.techtarget.com Yale University offers the Yale Style Manual, an information design guide for Web site creators at http://info.med.yale.edu/caim/manual/ ****************************************** Luigi Canali De Rossi's Information Design Recommended Reading List by Prof. Edward Tufte Envisioning Information http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0961392118/qid=100575505 5/sr=1-4/ref=sr_1_3_4/104-3151861-7826339 The Visual Display of Quantitative Information http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/096139210X/ref=pd_bxgy_t ext_2/104-3151861-7826339 Visual Explanations : Images and Quantities, Evidence and Narrative http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0961392126/ref=pd_sim_bo oks/104-3151861-7826339 By Karen Schriver Dynamics in Document Design: Creating Text for Readers http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0471306363/qid=100575536 9/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_2_1/104-3151861-7826339 By Marlana Coe Human Factors for Technical Communicators http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0471035300/ref=pd_sim_bo oks/104-3151861-7826339 By Charles Kostelnick, David D. Roberts Designing Visual Language: Strategies for Professional Communicators (Part of the Allyn & Bacon Series in Technical Communication) http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0205200222/ref=pd_sim_bo oks/104-3151861-7826339 ============================================================== 2) *HOW TO CREATE EFFECTIVE TABLES* ============================================================== by Luigi Canali De Rossi Creating effective tables is often a highly underestimated task. Many of you have certainly ventured before in trying to accommodate a professionally-looking table into a PowerPoint slide, only to find out that: a) the information is too much to be readable, b) it always looks too crowded and busy to make immediate sense to viewers, c) it is very hard to make ANY table look good, unless you have some specific design experience or design model to work from. If you identify with any one of the above I have a few simple recommendations to help you design effective tables, that look professional and that are easy to read. 1) Use the rule of seven. Do not ever use more than six rows or columns in one table. Research shows that human beings can at most grab six to seven concepts/ideas presented together. Adding more rows and columns also inevitably compromises size of text and consequent readability. More columns and rows demand more space and decrease the white space available for margins and separation among items. The work will then look more crowded and difficult to understand. 2) Use Serif fonts. Due to the fact that most presentation tables allow only for short, basic caption words or brief phrases, the use of Serif fonts like Arial, Verdana, Helvetica, Univers, lends itself to better readability in most situations. At small sizes Verdana works particularly well as its design offers apparently much bigger-looking characters while using the same point size of other fonts (a small text written at 9pts. will look much bigger and more readable in Verdana than in Arial). 3) Create "breathing" space among all rows and columns. By possibly utilizing white space or the background color keep always a sensible empty margin between each row and column of your table as to guide the eye in to orderly reading without the unnecessary use of gridlines and borders. Creating a table that can visually stand without the use of any of its initial default border lines it's a major achievement in information design. In the best designed tables graphic lines are only kept to define the title space or the starting and ending area of the table, without becoming too redundant in spelling out the obvious separation of all rows and columns. 4) Format titles for immediacy. In a table, columns and row titles are essential in the fact that they spell out our initial and immediate understanding of the table contents. By formatting titles with emphasis (bold) and by providing titles that are short and easily understandable one ensures that the first information component that will be read is optimized for immediacy and clarity. 5) Align with precision. It is essential that all content elements in a table are precisely aligned and that each column appears to the eye by virtue of its perfect alignment with its neighbouring elements and not by need of vertical lines showing where items belong to. If your table cannot survive without gridlines and borders something is wrong with it. Work at improving alignment, spacing and margins until it looks good without any lines. Then add back a few formal lines where emphasis or area definition may be needed. Think readability and comprehension before "nice-looking" and "cool". Luigi Canali De Rossi ============================================================== 3) *CHART TYPES - HOW TO SELECT APPROPRIATE CHART TYPES* ============================================================== I would like to take this opportunity to explain how PowerPoint utilizes another Microsoft program when you request it to create a chart for you all "behind the scenes"! First, it is important to understand the differences between these two applications. Any time you insert a chart in PowerPoint, or you select one of the layouts that contains a placeholder for a chart, PowerPoint automatically opens up another Microsoft program called "Microsoft Graph". This application is the same one that allows you to transform a spreadsheet into a statistical graph in Microsoft Excel. MS Graph is part of the Office suite. In PowerPoint, you might notice that something changes when you insert a new chart or double-click on an existing one. All of your typical PowerPoint toolbars and menus are subtly replaced by different ones. It is also true that as soon as you click outside of the chart area you are working on, PowerPoint takes over again and the toolbars and menus switch again. Let me clarify all of this for you. It should be evident that any time you want to edit or transform an existing chart, you need to double-click on the chart itself in order to open the Microsoft custom tool for charting. Though you do not actually see it (unless you pay attention to the above-mentioned details) you are actually working with a different application with its own characteristics and peculiarities. The chart style offered by default when using this application, called Microsoft Graph, is called "column". Once you are in the editing mode (that is, after double- clicking on the chart) you can change the chart style simply by clicking on "Chart" in the Menu bar and choosing "Chart types..." A dialog box will appear, with two tabs: "Standard types" and "Custom types". While I will describe in detail the "Custom types" in the December issue of MasterView, I will review here the most useful standard types explaining when they can be used. -> COLUMN CHARTS: This is the default format any time you create a new chart in PowerPoint. Column charts use vertical bars (called columns) to display different values of one or more items. They are used to compare values across categories. They are ideal for showing the variations in the value of an item over time (e.g. budget). According to symbolism and graphic principles, they better suit the visualization of data which are related with height. For example, if I want to compare the volume or quantity for any product or item, I would use this format. -> BAR CHARTS: Bar charts are almost the same type as column charts. The difference is that they use horizontal bars instead of vertical ones. Bar charts compare values across categories and are ideal for showing the variations in the value of an item over time, or for showing the values of several items at a single point in time. They can be used to compare different distances or speed, since the horizontal layout helps the human eye to better imagine what they represent. For example: you want to show how Lamborghini performs compared to Ferrari and Lotus. You want to display their performance related to maximum speed, acceleration and gasoline usage. The better chart type to use in this case is a bar chart. It can visualize all the data through its horizontal bars, giving your audience a symbolic representation of their performance. Another good reason to use bar charts is when you realize that the number of data series better fits in a horizontal format. PowerPoint prints and displays the slides in landscape orientation. So if you have long gaps between different values and you have also many items to compare, the bar chart type is the best one to use. -> LINE CHARTS: Line charts do not perform very well in PowerPoint. Even though you set the thickness of the lines to the maximum size, the lines will still be too thin to produce an effective design. Nevertheless, these charts are very useful to show a temporal trend over time and are often used to show variations in the value of more than one item over time. Imagine you want to compare the grades of your students over their college career. You may want to use the line chart since it will show, with different line colors and styles, the values of the single grades each student obtained during a lapse of time. In this case, you will have different points in your plan showing the different grades corresponding to the different years of study. The line chart will just connect for you these points using straight lines. -> PIE CHARTS: Pie charts are a very effective way to display information when you want to represent the different parts of a whole, or the percentages of a total. Pie charts display the contribution of each value to a total Pie graphs can represent only one data series (one row or column of data only). Many examples can be found for this chart type: when you want to display how the parliament of one country is divided into the different political parties (each political party will be assigned either with the number of seats or with its percentage. Each slice or sector of the pie will show this value. All the values for all the slices, together, will make the total). For instance, you can use the pie chart to compare the different countries of origin of a class of students, or the allocation of the yearly budget to different sectors of your company. The pie chart, both in 2-D and 3-D, gives you the useful option to extrapolate a single slice from the pie to better stress its value by displaying it separated from the other slices. An option that you will find for almost all of the chart types is the "stacked" version of charts. Using this method, values that are compatible or similar can be added on the same column or bar. In the example about Lamborghini and Ferrari, you can have only one column or bar for each model of car, and within the specific column you will see three different values, the maximum speed, the acceleration and the gasoline usage. In a few words, you have a comparison between the contribution of each value to a total, across time or categories. ============================================================== 4) *HOW TO ANIMATE A CHART* ============================================================== Animated charts? What does this mean? Well, an animation is a visual effect applied to any item (text box, drawing, picture) in our slides. The typical chart animation will allow you to reveal each component of your chart one at a time, ensuring the audience to focus only on what you are showing at the moment. Similar to when you have a bulleted list, and you want to get the attention on the bulleted point you are explaining by displaying it alone, you can do the same with charts. Imagine you have a standard bar chart, or a column chart, and you want to explain one by one the data represented by each column. You can decide to apply an animation effect to the single columns or bars so that the audience will focus his attention only on the column or bar displayed at that time. How can you do this? One method is the "pseudo-animation" trick you have seen in MasterView Issue #1, art. 6: In this case, to hide the columns you don't want to appear, you need to cover them by drawing, on top of them, a rectangle that you will fill with the same color as the background. The other method is to use the "Animation effects" feature in PowerPoint 2000. PowerPoint 97 has some differences, but I explain them at the end of this article. Let's see how it works. Once you have created your chart, do the following: 1) Click outside of it in order to go back to the normal PowerPoint interface 2) Ensure you are in Slide View mode 3) Click on "Slide Show" 4) Select "Custom Animations..." A dialog box will appear. It will look quite complex, but do not be afraid, I am going to explain it in detail. On the top left side you have listed all the elements you have in your slide that can be animated. For a standard chart you can animate the title and the chart. By clicking with your mouse, put a tick mark beside the item you want to animate: in our case, the chart. On the lower part of the dialog box you will find some tabs: in the first, "Order and Timing", you can actually tell PowerPoint in what order you want the items to appear. Usually the title should be first. You can use the up and down arrows to change or modify the order in which elements will be displayed on the slide. On the right side of the same tab, you can even decide how you want this animation to be started: only when you click with your mouse, or automatically after a certain number of seconds. Let's move now to the third tab, "Chart Effects" and explore it. On the left side of this tab you can select how to introduce the chart elements. a) all at once b) by Series c) by Categories d) by Element in Series e) by Element in Categories Selecting any of these option, but the first, will let you display the elements in the chart one at a time at every mouse click you make. There's an additional option to even animate the grid and legend in your chart. If you tick this option, the background gridlines will not appear until you click with the mouse, then the elements of the chart will appear according to the option you have selected. Once you have selected how you would like to show the elements of your chart, move into the right hand side of this tab and select now the animation effect. You have plenty of choices, and you may want to try a few of them (by using the preview pane on top of the dialog box) in order to choose the best one. I would also suggest you to use of elegant and pofessional- looking animation effect called "Wipe". As soon as you select it, you will also be able to choose what direction you would like the effect to be displayed: Up, Down, Left or Right. For a column chart, since the columns are based on an horizontal line at the bottom of your chart, it would be appropriate to apply a "Wipe Up" animation, so you actually see the columns growing from their bottom line. A bar chart, for instance, has horizontal bars that start on the left side of the chart (at least if you are in a country with left-to-right reading). You may want to apply a "Wipe Right" animation effect and have your bars appearing from left to right (otherwise the opposite may apply - see Arabic). The last option I am going to cover here is the "Dim" effect. Applying this effect will actually "dim" the elements that have already been displayed, so that they will not distract your audience. You can choose a light color such a gray to dim the previous elements, so the audience will be "forced" to focus on the colored items you are currently displaying. A few words for PowerPoint 97 users: the "Custom Animation" dialog box will appear a bit different, even if it will give you the same options. As soon as you have the dialog box displayed, you will have first to: 1) select, from the "Timing" tab, which elements you want to display. You will do this by clicking on the object description on the left side (in case of a chart you will see "chart 2" - usually item number 1 is the title) and by selecting, on the right hand side, "Animate" (where you can choose if on mouse click or automatically). Having done this, 2) you move into the top left side of the dialog box and set the entrance order of the items in your slide by using the up and down arrows. Then, after selecting the element you want to animate where it says "Animation order", 3) move into the "Chart Effects" tab. From this point onwards, there are no relevant differences between PowerPoint 97 and 2000 for the chart animations. ============================================================== 5) *IS IT BETTER TO USE 2-D OR 3-D STATISTICAL GRAPHS?* ============================================================== by Luigi Canali De Rossi When first confronted with the option of adopting 3-D graphs styles most presenters jump on board without even thinking about it. 3-D graphs look cool, more modern and fancy and they can offer strong visual impact to the presentation of otherwise boring statistical graphs. 3-D graphs are those statistical charts in which bars, pies and columns are all set in a three-dimensional look and feel. Bars protrude, perspective is exaggerated, colors change depending on which side of an object they are displayed on. The look of "computer graphics", the perception of cutting-edge visuals produced by a great interaction between humans and technology is all there. Only few people actually stop and look beyond the surface. People seldomly complain and despise your design choices. Only few really read or try to understand what your 3-D graphs are telling them. Most, like you, are simply enthralled by technology for technology's sake and simply get off by the idea of creating "three-dimensional" statistical graphics with a computer. Most have forgotten that to communicate is to bring out information from data and to simplify it, clarify it, emphasize it. Glorifying it in the beauty of 3-D, enriching it with exaggerated perspectives and shadows have what roles in effective communication? What is your audience looking at? Is it looking to be mystified by a glamorous presentation or does it want to know more about the profit increase you have made this year? Is it inundated by an avalanche of colors and visual components all set up to attract attention, or is it served with a visual synthesis of what the data say? How much time does it take for your ausience to make sense of the whole graph and be able to describe its core message to others? What is the gain in having people drop their lower jaw while looking at your presentation graphs if they can't understand easily and rapidly what the information in the graphs is telling them? The moment they forget about the design of the graph and they can tell at once what they are looking at and what story is being told, the statistical graphs reach the apex of their scope and mission: creating immediately understandable information designs. In conclusion, use 3-D sparingly, and only when specific situations warrant its use and when readability of all components of the graph is not compromised or significantly modified. The choice of 2-D versus 3-D should not be based on visual impact factors but on criteria leading the users to more easily read and understand the information presented. There are appropriate situations and opportunities for both. But do not think that 2-D is inferior in some way to 3-D. After much experience in designing statistical graphs and charts, I have come to appreciate the effective greater usability and legibility of graphs created at the simplest 2-D level. 3-D should be used in situations where the data is made up of few and very identifiable elements, like in a pie or in some bar and column charts. If the chart contains a lot of categories and items 3-D may be able to give a better overall picture while sacrificing legibility of some detail. Thus, there is no absolute better choice. It always depends. But again, think readability and comprehension before "nice- looking" and "cool". ============================================================== 6) *HOW TO KEEP DATA IN STATISTICS ALWAYS UPDATED* ============================================================== PowerPoint and Excel can exchange data quite easily. Furthermore, both can be used to create charts. If you have to display a chart in a presentation, and you already have created this file in Excel, there are several ways to import it into PowerPoint: the first three I mention below will allow you to import a chart from Excel into PowerPoint, but there will not be any active link between the two files. Your presentation will not update automatically reflecting the changes you will eventually make in the future to the original Excel file. The fourth method is a bit more complicated, but will do what the other two methods will not: you will not need to worry about your PowerPoint presentation, since it will update automatically any time you will modify the Excel file. Let's see the three traditional methods: 1) BY COPYING THE EXCEL SPREADSHEET: a) You can open your Excel spreadsheet b) Select and copy all the cells with the data you need c) Open a PowerPoint presentation d) Choose the chart layout d) Paste the data into the PowerPoint datasheet This way, PowerPoint will automatically create a new chart that will reflect the data you have imported from Excel. The disadvantage is that by default PowerPoint will create a standard column 3-D chart using the default colors, so you may need to modify and format it again to reflect the original chart look and feel you had in Excel. 2) BY IMPORTING THE CHART INTO POWERPOINT: a) You can open PowerPoint and choose a chart slide layout b) Double-click on the chart placeholder and obtain a standard chart c) Go to "Edit" >> "Import File..." and browse to search your Excel file. d) Select it and choose "Open". By doing this, your standard PowerPoint chart will be transformed into the one that contains the data imported from Excel, but still, the appearance of this chart will be different from the one you have in Excel for the reasons explained above. 3) BY COPYING THE CHART AND PASTING IT INTO POWERPOINT: a) You can open Excel and display the chart you want to export to PowerPoint b) Click on the chart to select it c) Right-click on it and choose "Copy" d) Open your presentation file e) Paste your chart in a new slide or in an existing one This chart will look exactly the same as the one in Excel. To notice that, in this case, your Standard Toolbar in PowerPoint will change, and will look like the one of Excel. All of these three options will not give you the possibility to keep your presentation up-to-date. If you make changes to your Excel file, your presentation file will not reflect those changes. In other words, it will not update automatically. Instead, using the following method will resolve for you the problem of the automatic update: 4) BY USING THE "PASTE SPECIAL..." FEATURE a) Open your Excel file b) Select the chart you want to export c) Right-click on it and choose "Copy" d) Open the PowerPoint presentation where you want to insert the chart e) Select the slide where you want to insert the chart f) Click on "Edit" >> "Paste Special..." g) Select "Paste link" and click on "Microsoft Excel Chart Object" h) Click "OK". By inserting an existing chart with this method, your Excel chart will be actively linked to the presentation file. Every time you modify your existing Excel chart, either replacing the data or editing the chart itself, these changes will reflect on the PowerPoint presentation, which will always be up-to-date. This happens any time you close your presentation file and open it again: PowerPoint is going to check all the links it contains, and will actually warn you, before opening the file, that the presentation contains links. It will ask you whether you want to update them or not. If you click "YES", the chart displayed in PowerPoint will be modified according to the new data in the Excel file that had been previously modified. The only important thing you have to remember is this: if you decide to link presentations to charts, you must always have with you the original source file (that is the Excel file) any time you run the presentation. *TIP*: If you link to files, and then move these files (e.g. you copy them on a floppy disk and then copy them back in another computer) your links will not work. In this case, when you open the document that contains links (in our case the PowerPoint presentation), go to "Edit" >> "Links..." and change the path to the source file, just browsing the new location and selecting the Excel file again. Then you can update the links, and your chart will be automatically updated. ============================================================== Next Issue Theme: *INFORMATION DESIGN FOR PRESENTATIONS* - Part II (December Issue) 1) Information Design data-ink ratio 2) How to integrate legends into your statistical graphs 3) How to move and position 3-D graphs 4) How to save a custom chart template 5) Adding images to charts 6) Smallest Effective Difference _______________________________________________________________ In the last 5 issues we have looked at: Issue 1 - Jun 2001 "HOW TO RUN A POWERPOINT PRESENTATION ON ANY COMPUTER" 1) Saving a presentation in HTML format 2) Utilizing Microsoft PowerPoint "Pack and Go Wizard" 3) Exporting to Adobe Acrobat PDF file format 4) Integrating transitions in Acrobat-based presentations 5) How to create simple animation effects that work everywhere (on the web, in a pdf file) http://masterview.ikonosnewmedia.com/masterview1.htm Issue 2 - Jul 2001 "MANAGING PRESENTATION SIZE" 1) Microsoft BackUp 2) Compressing files using WinZip 3) Easy and automated file-splitting with Chainsaw 4) Native "Save As..." feature in PowerPoint and options in file's properties 5) YahooGroups - online storage and collaboration http://masterview.ikonosnewmedia.com/masterview2.htm Issue 3 - Aug 2001 "IMPROVING THE LOOK OF YOUR PRESENTATION" 1) Step-by-step guide to modify standard templates and more 2) Tips and suggestions on how to customize Clip Art in unique ways 3) What you need to know to be able to use images as backgrounds. How to apply a background image captured from a Web site 4) A review of the best Web sites where you can download free additional templates 5) 12 fundamental design commandments to create professionally-looking presentations http://masterview.ikonosnewmedia.com/masterview3.htm Issue 4 - Sep 2001 "RUNNING YOUR PRESENTATION LIKE A PRO" 1) Learn how to run your presentation unattended by recording all of your slide show settings and timing 2) Find out the secret advanced keyboard commands that allow you to do near-magical tasks while running your show 3) Discover the PowerPoint "hidden slide" functionality which can help you take out your magic slide, just when you need it 4) Master how you can link any Web page, Word document or other application file to any slide in your presentation 5) Learn how to link presentations that have different layouts (vertical and horizontal), by doing what the professionals do 6) Discover the experts' approach to open and close presentations in a memorable way. Learn from films and theatre how this has been culturally developed and why therefore some visual solutions are better than others http://masterview.ikonosnewmedia.com/masterview4.htm Issue 5 - Oct 2001 "SHARING YOUR PRESENTATION WITH COLLEAGUES FOR REVIEW AND FEEDBACK" 1) Learn how to use the PowerPoint Reviewing toolbar See how you can use Microsoft Word to track your changes in the PowerPoint Outline Become familiar with saving your files using progressive numbering 2) Take advantage of "Online Broadcasting" 3) Learn all of the different print options available for producing handouts and print materials 4) Discover what saving a presentation as a .pps file (PowerPoint Show) can do for you Learn how to set the presentation file properties as "Read-only" Save individual slides as .gif or .jpg files and re- assemble a new presentation Save the presentation as a Web page (HTML) 5) See how you can send a slide in the body of an email without sending the entire presentation 6) Take advantage of Yahoogroups and other online collaboration and exchange services http://masterview.ikonosnewmedia.com/masterview5.htm ______________________________________________________________ To read MasterView past issues, go to http://masterview.ikonosnewmedia.com ______________________________________________________________ -------------------------------------------------------------- Send your presentation questions in: ask-masterview#yahoogroups.com -------------------------------------------------------------- MasterView is a free monthly newsletter focusing on designing and managing effective PowerPoint presentations for international audiences. Directed to communicators, managers, trainers, presenters and lecturers, it provides selected solutions, how-to techniques and resources on effective presentation-making. MasterView is an open discussion forum for many of you having specific questions about making presentations. These can be addressed to: ask-masterview#yahoogroups.com. I and everybody at IKONOS New Media will be happy to provide you with best advice, tools and resources. Who am I? I am the Executive Editor of this electronic publication, my name is Simone Luchini and I am a presentation specialist and trainer for IKONOS New Media (http://www.ikonosnewmedia.com) We specialize in empowering international organizations, grow and prosper online through the effective use of new media and ICT (Information & Communication Technologies). Founded in 1988, IKONOS New Media is an electronic publishing and distance learning company serving education, research and development organizations. If you would like to know something more about me, come and check out my page at: http://www.ikonosnewmedia.com/people/simone.htm Sincerely, Simone Luchini - Executive Editor Presentation Specialist, Trainer IKONOS New Media Rome | Washington (Simone.Luchini#ikonosnewmedia.com) * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Feedback Direct feedback: simone.luchini#ikonosnewmedia.com IKONOS New Media Via P. Giannone 10 - 00195 Rome, Italy .............................................................. MasterView Editorial Staff Luigi Canali De Rossi - Editor-in-Chief luigi.canali#ikonosnewmedia.com Simone Luchini - Executive Editor simone.luchini#ikonosnewmedia.com Mihai Alexandru Bocsaru - MasterView Webmaster mihai.bocsaru#ikonosnewmedia.com Jamie Kim - Online Editor jamie.kim#ikonosnewmedia.com .............................................................. Subscription Information To subscribe to request your free copy, simply go to the following URL: http://masterview.ikonosnewmedia.com, type your email in the box and click the "Subscribe" button .............................................................. (c) 2001, Simone Luchini IKONOS New Media http://www.ikonosnewmedia.com ______________________________________________________________ Extend your reach with cutting-edge new media technologies: MasterMind Explorer - for communicators http://www.masternewmedia.org
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