Sometimes getting started with a new application can be a little bit daunting. I may be surprised, but I’d think just about everybody over the age of 16 these days has probably spent some time in Microsoft Word, maybe Microsoft Excel and PowerPoint.

I find that when I’m staring at a blank canvas or a nice and blank “new document” I don’t have a good idea of what direction I could be heading with my thoughts or needs. If you start with a template and see what other people have done with the tool you’re using, it can help get your …read more

I was sitting in a conference today and the speaker was talking about a new presentation tool he was using called Prezi. In his presentation he talked about grabbing screen shots of PowerPoint presentations to then use in Prezi.

I immediately wondered if he or if it was known by everyone else that you can save any PowerPoint slide or entire slide deck as an image file.
Depending on what you’d need to use an image of a slide for, PowerPoint provides the ability to save it in just about any format you’d like or need.
Currently you can save images in the …read more

SlideShare, the online community for presentations, noticed that in order to upload your PowerPoint presentations to the site, you had to take several steps. Save, compress, log in, upload etc etc… something that takes that many steps is something I’m not likely to do if I’m in the middle of a hectic day.
To combat that, SlideShare has created a Ribbon for PowerPoint 2007 to make uploading your presentation a one-click “Publish” feature.
Meet the SlideShare ribbon for PowerPoint
View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: powerpoint microsoft)

Not only can you upload your presentations quickly and easily, you can also download other’s …read more

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Microsoft has confirmed that they will be releasing web based versions of Word, Excel and Powerpoint that will run on any browser, including Firefox and Safari. This new service will allow for creating, editing, collaborating, and sharing documents using the web.
Microsoft won’t say when the new version of Office, known as Office 14, will arrive, but Microsoft Business Division President Stephen Elop said that a technology preview of the browser-based products will come later this year and that a beta version will be released in 2009.
There’s a full Q&A with Microsoft Blogger, Sarah Perez here, including a discussion about whether …read more

I have been asked by my friend if I know how to embed Adobe Flash Movies to a Powerpoint presentation. He wants to play a short animation embedded in his Powerpoint when his delivering the report. So, what I did was went to Google.com and typed “embed flash to powerpoint”. Then I found this link and shared it to him. Here’s the steps on how to do:

Open PowerPoint and create a new slide, and choose View>Toolbars>Visual Basic
Click “Control” Toolbox icon on the Visual Basic Toolbar.
Click to show more Controls on the “Control” Toolbox and then choose Shockwave Flash Object.
Draw out …read more

Developed by Microsoft Office Labs, pptPlex is a research prototype in discovering new ways to present Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007 presentations.
This plug-in allows you to arrange slides on a canvas then zoom between the slides during the presentation. You can move around the canvas and show groups of slides, individual slides, or even zoom in to show a particular section of a slide.

For more detailed and clear instruction on how to go around pptPlex, visit their FAQ page.
[ via NetworkWorld ]

When we create presentations using PowerPoint, by default, it shows a blank slide – without design, plain and white. And, if you are using it every time when creating slides, it would waste your time in looking for some presentation theme or design. But, no worries coz I will teach you how to setup a default theme ( for both 2003 and 2007 PowerPoint).
Using Microsoft PowerPoint 2003:

Create a New Presentation.
Right-click on the slide and select Slide Design.
Notice that a lists of slide design is visible at the right side.
Now, select your favorite slide design that you wish to use every …read more

A friend of mine asked me if I know how to save a Powerpoint Template, and then I assisted him.
If you have downloaded some Powerpoint file and liked the design, you might then want to save the design as a template for later use. To do that, please do the following:

Open your Powerpoint file that you wish to save it as template.
Click ‘View’ menu.
Click the ‘Slide Master’ submenu in the menu bar.
Notice that the master slide is now active.
Having the master slide active, click ‘File> Save as > Select Powerpoint Template as the File Type’
After saving the design, click ‘Close …read more

A couple of exciting features for Google Docs Presentation was released last week. Now, Google Presentation can have speaker notes that will serve as a guideline for presenters, keeping them guided throughout their presentation. You may print the notes or use it during the presentation.
Also, you can embed YouTube Videos to your presentation, adding more visualization to attract more audiences. Below is an example of an embedded YouTube Video in Google Presentation.