PowerPoint Info

Happy Holidays

2011-12-23T05:30:00.000-08:00

Wishing PowerPoint Info readers all the joy of the Holidays - filled with love, fun and blessed by peace.

Happy holidays!

More PowerPoint presentations from thanh

Happy Holidays

More PowerPoint presentations from Minh Anh Nguyen

How to embed, record, insert, edit audio in PowerPoint?

2011-12-02T04:06:00.000-08:00

We all love and admire presentations jazzed up with multimedia elements. Who would not love a custom PowerPoint greeting having audio message from someone you love or a PowerPoint photo album with right blend of sound and music?

Even a business presentation can have long lasting effect with right kind of music or sound appearing at right point. However, many of us find it difficult when it comes to adding music, sound or record our own voice. PowerPoint has different ways and properties to handle audio files. Let us discuss them one by one.

Recording your own voice in a PowerPoint slideshow (Narrations)
If you just want to record audio on one slide or when audio sync is not that important with animations or slides this can be a good option:

Click on insert tab on PowerPoint 2010 ribbon and then click on audio drop down.
Select "Record Audio" option. A dialog box with option to record will appear
Click record button to record audio. Recored audio will get embedded on current active slide

If you want to record narrations in 2010 synced with animations and slides (in slideshow mode): This video tutorial will help you understand the steps involved in recording narration:

Record narrations in 2007

Insert music

Inserting music or audio file in PowerPoint is quite easy.

Click on insert tab on PowerPoint 2010 ribbon and then click on audio drop down
Select "Insert from file"
Select the audio file from you system and click insert to add it to slide
You can set different properties for this audio file by double clicking the sound icon
Click on playback tab and set the options as desired

Play across slides and loop small audio until last slide

If you want to play some music or sound continuously when slideshow is in progress, you can set the audio property to loop until last to play it across slides.

Edit audio inserted in slide
Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 lets you trim the audio files inserted so that you can set the start and end time for a audio file which is quite long and just a smart portion of it make sense for your audience:

Google adds animations and transitions to presentations

2011-10-19T22:35:00.000-07:00

Google today released an upgraded version of Google presentations. Google presentations now support most of the basic animation effects like fly, appear, zoom, spin in addition to slide transitions. With this release Google has narrowed down the feature gap between Google presentations and other online or desktop presentation applications.

What's new in Google presentations?
Google has added more than 50 new features including real-time collaboration:

Transitions to move between slides with simple fades or spicier 3D effects
Animations to add emphasis or to make your slides more playful
New themes to create beautiful presentations with distinct visual styles
Drawings to build new designs, layouts, and flowcharts within a presentation
Rich tables with merged cells and more options for adding style to your data

Google presentations are now as good as Microsoft PowerPoint
Since most of the people use just the basic animation effects like fly,appear, disappear this release will certainly eat the market share of other online presentation creation tools and my be PowerPoint too. Google presentations now has a option to download the presentations as PPTX. A presentation created with Google presentation work just fine in Microsoft PowerPoint along with animation effects.

The day, Google adds option to add audio and record narrations, the competition for Microsoft PowerPoint will really be tough considering the free versus paid scenario.

How to enable new presentation features?
Most probably you will see an alert to enable new presentation on Google docs home page but if you don't see that, you can enable it from Documents and settings.

Click the setting icon(Gear icon on top right).
Select "Documents and Settings".
Click Editing tab.
Tic the check-box "Create new presentations using the latest version of the presentation editor" and save.

Newly added features will only work for new presentations you create.

A presentation created with Google presentations

PowerPoint presentations with animations on iPad with SlideShark app

2011-10-18T22:32:00.000-07:00

Online presentation company Brainshark, Inc., today announced SlideShark app (www.slideshark.com), available for free in Apple’s App Store. Probably this is the first app available from any presentation sharing platform that can replicate all animations, fonts, graphics (etc.) used in your PowerPoint slides on iPad. Recently presentation and document sharing platform SlideShare too released HTML5 version of their website along with a new mobile website targeted for iPad and other tablet users but that's mere a slide by slide drag of static images.

Since most of you know that Apple iPad doesn't support flash and the only way to get the flash content is via AIR app, SlideShark will go a long way. Now, with Brainshark’s free SlideShark app, users can:

Preserve animations, fonts, graphics and colors in their presentations
Swipe or tap to advance animations and slides
Project their slides from an iPad 2 by connecting to a TV or VGA projector
Download presentations and play them locally – no Internet connection required

Some of the features which are not supported by this app are hyperlinks on slides, embedded videos or animated gifs, slide transitions, triggers, and 3rd party components. There are also some advanced animations that may not be supported.

Here is how you can convert and view presentations on iPad with animations and other effects:

Upload your PowerPoint files to your account at www.slideshark.com
The files will automatically get converted to an iPad-optimized viewing format
Using the SlideShark app, download and view your presentations on your iPad or project them on TV or projector.

Add special effects to your videos in PowerPoint

2011-10-17T03:39:00.000-07:00

Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 offers great deal of features related to images and videos which were otherwise available only in adobe Photoshop or Adobe premium. You can edit the videos and define the start and end of the video file, recolor the video, add special effects, give a shape to video and can set triggers on video timeline.

Recolor a Video inserted in slide
Just like an image, videos inserted in PowerPoint slides can have different shapes, color and effects. By using these advance effects you can show the video in oval shape or can apply a transparent green layer, set the video border to be grey and much more. See video below to learn more about recoloring a video:

A recolored video:

Add special effects to videos inserted

Effects like shadow, relection, glow can also be applied to videos inserted. Just double click the video and select the desired effect from the video tools under video effects drop down.

SlideShare on HTML5: more devices, more views for your presentations

2011-09-27T23:33:00.000-07:00

Presentation sharing platform SlideShare is now using HTML5 tags to deliver the content. SlideShare presentations on HTML5 will now work on any device; be it any iOS (iPad,iPhone) Andriod or any other device which does/doesn't support Flash. As per SlideShare, presentations will now load 30% faster as compared to flash version. All this should result in more and more views for your presentations on SlideShare.

Slideshare is html5 now

View more presentations from Amit Ranjan

Record and share synchronized presentations online with Present.me

2011-09-10T22:50:00.000-07:00

Present.me is another product which lets you create synchronized multimedia presentations and share it online. Using Present.me you can create presentations with audio/video of presenter playing along with slides. There are already products like Articulate Presenter, authorPOINT from authorSTREAM and Microsoft Producer which lets you record and share synchronized presentations.

The major difference between Present.me and other products is that Present.me lets you do all the recording, synchronization and editing online on Present.me website. The whole process from uploading the PowerPoint presentation, recording, synchronizing the video or audio to sharing is quite simple.

Few shortcomings:

You can't synchronize pre-recorded audio or video with PowerPoint slides
You can't download the output and share it via DVD
Maximum 90 minute limit to recording even in paid account which costs $100 /month

Though the idea of creating synchronized presentations online is superb, yet it seems to bit costly as far as monthly subscription is concerned. You can get life time access of Articulate Presenter for $699 or authorPOINT for just $299 with an option of $99 for education use. Present.me should also come up with pay as you go payment model say $3 per such recording.

By and large authorSTREAM + authorPOINT seems to be a better option since it allows you to create synchronized presentations with live or pre-recorded media both and also lets you share the synchronized output via DVD, email or through authorSTREAM.com. You should give a try to Present.me and decide yourself depending upon your own user experience.

Convert PowerPoint presentations to video

2011-08-25T02:31:00.000-07:00

Converting your PowerPoint presentation to video format will add wings to your content. Not only you would be able to share your presentations online but also on the devices which have no PowerPoint software to play slideshows (TV).

PowerPoint presentation along with audio and animation effects can easily be converted in video formats like WMV, AVI, FLV, MP4 with the tools available in the market. The video version of slideshow is almost similar to the slideshow mode of the presentation.

Why convert PPT to video?

Converting PowerPoint presentations in video has numerous benefits

PPT to video softwares have made the task of creating those videos with photos, music and effects so easy that was once so cumbersome to be done using windows movie maker or via other means.
Video version of PowerPoint slideshow can be played on devices like iPhone, iPad and any of those which can play video but not the presentation.
Video of a PowerPoint presentation will get your content more audience since it can be shared on video sharing websites like YouTube or Vimeo.
Video of a PowerPoint presentation can be played on a TV/LCD via DVD player whereas it's not easy to play a presentation on such devices.
It's not easy to temper video version of your PowerPoint slideshow

A PowerPoint Slideshow in video format:

How to convert PowerPoint slideshows to videos?

There are lots of free and paid PPT to video conversion tools available in the market. Some of the PPT to video conversion softwares are available online while some are available as desktop applications.

Free PowerPoint to video solutions

authorSTREAM.com: Online PowerPoint sharing platform authorSTREAM allows you to convert PowerPoint files to video formats like WMV, AVI, MP4 or FLV. You can convert PowerPoint presentations below 5 minutes duration for free but only in MP4 format. To convert your presentation in file type other than MP4 or to convert a presentation above 5 minutes duration you have spend $2 per PowerPoint to video conversion. Learn more about authorSTREAM's PowerPoint to video feature.

Brainshark: The on-demand presentations service and content marketplace also lets you convert PowerPoint presentations in video with “Brainshark for YouTube”.

WonderSlide: WonderSlide is another online web platform to convert PowerPoint presentations to FLV, AVI, WMV or MP4 for free. Maximum file size allowed is 50 MB.

E.M. Free PowerPoint Video Converter: It's a desktop application which lets you convert PowerPoint presentations in video formats like WMV, Ms Mpeg4 AVI, MPEG. Output in few formats might have watermark in the video output.

Xilisoft: You can convert PPT in video formats like WMV, MPEG2,FLV,AVI and in 800*600 resolution only for free. For more video formats or resolutions more than 800*600 you need to buy personal or business version of the software.

Paid PowerPoint to video solutions

Microsoft PowerPoint 2010: PowerPoint 2010 lets you convert any presentation in WMV video format.
Wondershare PPT to video
http://www.acoolsoft.com/
http://bytescout.com/ppttovideoscout.html
http://www.ppt2video.com/

The list of PowerPoint to video conversion softwares is quite long. You can search for these tools in search engine and use the one that suits your needs.

PowerPoint quiz: Add audio in PowerPoint slides

2011-08-08T21:28:00.000-07:00

Test your PowerPoint knowledge by taking this test on audio in PowerPoint slides. Quiz is based on PowerPoint 2007 and few things might not be applicable to PowerPoint 2010.

Insert Vimeo, Youtube videos in PowerPoint slides with authorSTERAM Desktop 2.0

2011-07-21T04:32:00.000-07:00

authorSTREAM the online presentation sharing platform has released the second version of their free PowerPoint add-in called authorSTREAM Desktop. As compared to authorSTREAM Desktop 1.0 which was launched almost two years back, the latest version lets you search and insert videos from Vimeo in addition to YouTube. It also lets you search images from Flickr and Bing right from within the PowerPoint.

Most amazing thing which authorSTREAM has done is its advance search and filters. authorSTREAM not only allows you to search images on different parameters like color, size or type but also on the basis of licensing information. You can search creative commons stuff from Flickr and that too without leaving the PowerPoint. authorSTREAM also inserts the attribution text in the slides along with the images to help users get rid of some of the copyright worries.You can also create a collection of selected images or videos to be used later in the slides.

authorSTREAM Desktop with the addition of more video and image search APIs should help PowerPoint users create effective presentation with just few clicks.

How to share presentations on LinkedIn?

2011-06-23T23:04:00.000-07:00

Image via CrunchBase

There are two ways to share your presentations on Linkedin; 1) Using SlideShare 2) Google Presentations. In order to share presentations either via SlideShare or Google presentations you need to install SlideShare or Google presentations application. To add a presentation to your Linkedin profile, follow the steps below:

1. First sign in to your Linkedin account
2. Either go to' Edit My Profile' and add an application from there or click 'Add an
   Application' box on the right.
3. In the Applications section, click Add an
   Application and select Google or Slideshare
   Presentation.

You need to have a SlideShare or Google account to use respective applications. Login to your SlideShare/Google account to link your SlideShare/Google account with your Linkedin profile.These Linkedin applications not only let you share your presentations with your connections but also let you see what people in your network are sharing, viewing and commenting.

Google presentations Linkedin App
Though you can upload and share a new presentation from your desktop or share an existing presentation in your Google account yet you still have to go to Google docs to create a new presentations.

SlideShare Linkedin App
Slideshare app lets you share all presentations from your Linkedin account or upload and share new presentations from within Linkedin. SlideShare has recently released Linkedin share button as well which means now you can share any SlideShare presentation on LinkedIn with a press of button.

Compare two versions of a PPT file with PowerPoint 2010

2011-06-01T00:02:00.000-07:00

There are situations in organisations when more than one person has to work on same presentation. Company CEO or VP sales might have to add details to their respective slides for an upcoming meeting with stakeholders. In such scenario two version of same presentation get created; one having the information added by CEO and other version having details added by VP sales. Now if you are the one who has the responsibility to create the final version out of these two PowerPoint files, it might take too much of your time to manually figure out the new information added or other changes done to different slides and chances are that you end up creating a presentation having either critical sales information missing or a major typo included which was corrected by CEO in his version of PowerPoint file.

Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 comes in handy in such situations. PowerPoint 2010 has a nifty 'Compare and merge' feature which lets you compare two versions of same PowerPoint file and let you accept or reject the changes.

Here are steps to compare and merge two versions of a PowerPoint file:

1) Open the first version of PowerPoint file
2) Click on Review tab on Ribbon
3)Click on Compare
4)Open the version 2 of PowerPoint file

You will see a 'Revisions' pane on right side which will display the text changes and any slide additions done to the presentation.

While moving across the slides, you can accept or reject text or slide changes and create a final updated presentation.

Here is a nice video from Microsoft explaining "Compare and merge" feature:

View this video as a WMV

Free PowerPoint 2007 tutorials

2011-05-19T01:42:00.000-07:00

There are numerous free resources available for PowerPoint 2007on the internet using which not only you can learn the basics like "How to create your first presentation?" but also the advance things like "How to use advance animation effects?".

Here are some of the presentations which cover some of these topics and may help you in big way in the use of PowerPoint 2007.

What is PowerPoint 2007?

How to use ribbon in PowerPoint 2007?

PowerPoint Keyboard Shortcuts

Learn PowerPoint 2007 Animation Effects

What's the difference between embedded and linked media

Also see "How to switch from 2003 to PowerPoint 2007?" and "PowerPoint 2010 free learning resources".

Create cool presentations with VisualBee

2011-04-08T02:05:00.000-07:00

VisualBee is a Microsoft PowerPoint plugin (add-in) which helps you create awesome presentations with cool graphics and stunning templates with much ease and in less time.The plugin not only lets you select style and templates for free but also smart enough to analyze the text of slides and automatically enhances it with relevant graphics. The biggest advantage is that you need not to go outside of PowerPoint software to search for pictures, templates etc.

Once you are done with your presentation, just click the VisualBee addin in PowerPoint ribbon and click 'Enhance Presentation'. After this step, "Enhance presentation' wizard will just take few seconds to enhance your presentation. See demo below for details:

Though visualBee takes care of most of the things a presenter would need, yet of late audio and video has also become an integral part of the presentations. As of now, VisualBee has no video or audio library available. There is a workaround for this problem too. For image and video search you can use authorSTREAM desktop- a free add-in for PowerPoint. authorSTREAM desktop lets you search and insert images from Bing and videos from YouTube from within the PowerPoint.

VisualBee do have a premium plan which allows users access to wide range of exclusive templates and graphics. Download VisualBee here and start creating great content.

authorSTREAM re-launches premium plans

2011-03-29T10:02:00.000-07:00

The presentation sharing platform, authorSTREAM has re-launched its premium plans. New plans known as Pro and Business are priced at $29.95 /Year and $299 /Year respectively.

With this launch authorSTREAM has gone very aggressive against Slideshare. authorSTREAM is offering more features and better presentation output (authorSTREAM retains animations, sound etc) for a price which is 80% less than that of SlideShare's.

authorSTREAM Pro ($2.5/month compared to SlideShare's Silver plan at $19.95/month)
authorSTREAM Business ($39.95/month as compared to SlideShare's Platinum plan at $249.95/month)

authorSTREAM has done very nice job by creating a authorSTREAM Vs. SlideShare comparison page which provides full insight into the features and pricing being offered by two PowerPoint sharing giants.

authorSTREAM Pro vs. SlideShare Silver

Feature	authorSTREAM	SlideShare
Unlimited Private uploads	Yes	Yes
Analytics	Yes	Yes
Webinars (Conferencing tool)	Yes	Yes
Convert PPT to Video	Yes	--
Download presentation as Flash	Yes	--
Price	$2.50/month	$19/month

authorSTREAM Business vs. SlideShare Platinum

Feature	authorSTREAM	SlideShare
Unlimited Private Uploads	Yes	Yes
Presentation Analytics	Yes	Yes
Branded channels	Yes, (5 Channels)	Yes, (1 Channel)
Ad free	Yes	Yes
Webinars (Conferencing tool)	Yes	Yes
Turn off commenting and Transcript	Yes	Yes
Full Branding	Yes	Yes
Secure embeds (Allow on selected domains)	Yes	--
Own branding in embeds	Yes	--
Private sharing with selected people	Yes	--
Download presentation as flash	Yes	--
Unlimited PowerPoint to video	Yes	--
30 day free Trial	Yes	--
Price	$39.95/month	$249/month

authorSTREAM - There's just no competition

More PowerPoint presentations from AdminauthorSTREAM

Presentation meeting solution from SlideShare

2011-02-17T00:49:00.000-08:00

Image via CrunchBase

SlideShare the presentation and document sharing platform today announced the launch of their web conferencing tool- Zipcast. It's a presentation meeting solution where you can chat, control navigation of slides and stream live video.

Slideshare has been testing this feature for quite sometime in the form of Meet Now and has been strengthening the webinar keyword. Below are the features available to free members:

Personalized meeting rooms
Use any presentation: yours or someone else's
Streaming live video
Group chat
No downloads
Unlimited meetings & participants
Facebook & Twitter integration
Private or Public

As a pro member you can password protect the Zipcast session or dial in a conference number. Presentation players like authorSTREAM, Zoho, Google, MightyMeeting along with others like WebEx, GoTo meeting and WiZiQ also offer similar conferencing tools. authorSTREAM's Present Live and WiZiQ's Virtual Classroom are also free to use and require no download at user end to start a web meeting. It's will be interesting to see how SlideShare makes its presence as a webinar service?

Brainshark released App for the iPhone and iPad

2011-01-27T01:53:00.000-08:00

Brainshark, Inc., the on-demand presentations service and content marketplace has released App for the iPhone and iPad, downloadable for free from Apple’s App Store. With this new application, Brainshark users will be able to view Brainshark presentations on iPhone and iPad. The Brainshark App provides an enhanced mobile viewing experience for users of these devices.

“Being ‘reachable by cell phone’ while out of the office is no longer enough. Today’s information workers need to remain connected, productive and in-the-know at all times,” said Ira Weinstein, senior analyst and partner, Wainhouse Research. “The new Brainshark App for the iPhone and iPad brings the power of the Brainshark platform, and more importantly, access to their company’s library of on-demand rich media presentations, to iOS users around the world without sacrificing manageability or the user experience.”

After installing the free app, users can take advantage of capabilities designed to optimize viewing, sharing, learning from and accessing mobile presentations:

Enhanced Viewing – Brainshark App users can:

· Use the table of contents – containing thumbnails, titles and the duration of each slide – to easily and efficiently navigate presentations. By clicking on different areas, users can skip directly to the portions of greatest interest.

· Access presentation attributes, including the description, length, author information and more.

· Download any attachments associated with a presentation onto their mobile device.

Instant Sharing – Viewers can:

· Click to share links to presentations via e-mail.

· Post links to presentations on social media sites, including Facebook, Twitter and Delicious.

On-the-go Learning – Users have:

· Instant access to a searchable and growing library of free eLearning content, created by the myBrainshark community of subject matter experts.

· The ability to browse more than 1,000 titles on a diverse set of topics relevant to businesspeople.

To download the Brainshark App for the iPhone and iPad, visit http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/brainshark/id412495352?mt=8.

Now pay for private uploads on SlideShare

2011-01-24T02:34:00.000-08:00

SlideShare, world's largest presentation sharing platform which adopted fermium model with the launch of premium pro plans couple of months back has been experimenting different things to monetize SlideShare. Latest in the list is private upload and sharing. Now one has to go pro in order to share presentations privately. Private sharing was launched by SlideShare in 2007 declaring it absolutely free. In past SlideShare experimented with Job broad as well.

To pitch Pro accounts, SlideShare now has two different upload buttons for private and public uploads.

authorSTREAM, SlideShare's competitor still offers 50 private uploads to free members.

Happy New Year

2010-12-31T04:04:00.000-08:00

Wish you all a very happy and joyful year ahead.

Former Microsoft MD invests in authorSTREAM

2010-12-16T01:17:00.000-08:00

authorSTREAM the world's second largest online PowerPoint sharing platform and a Slideshare competitor has closed its first round of funding. This funding round was led by Rajan Anandan, former Managing Director of Microsoft India, and one of India’s most active angel investor. Rajan Anandan has also joined authorSTREAM’s Board of Directors.

authorSTREAM which is far ahead of Slideshare in terms of presentation output and provide unique features like PowerPoint to video, Present Live with a support for narrations, videos and animations has once again stressed that their main focus is on presentations and this funding will help them achieve near 100% replica of PowerPoint slideshow on the web. "This funding will help us grow authorSTREAM bigger and faster, provide seamless PowerPoint sharing experience on desktops and mobile devices, both asynchronously and in real-time. It will also help us engineer near 100% replica of PowerPoint slideshows on the web - the way their authors intended them to be with animations and multimedia elements.", said authorSTREAM CEO – Harman Singh.

In term of numbers, every month more than 100,000 presentations are uploaded on authorSTREAM. Read full press release here.

Royalty free PowerPoint templates

2010-11-29T23:44:00.000-08:00

If you are looking for royalty free PowerPoint templates to create those stunning Christmas and New Year greetings, here is a website which has over 900 royalty free templates. The website fppt.com is having too much of advertisements and it may take some time for you to figure out actual template download link but that's fair enough for a website which is offering free stuff.

Search slides on your desktop with Slideboxx

2010-11-23T21:35:00.000-08:00

At times you must have find it cumbersome to search for a specific PowerPoint slide or content to be reused in a new presentation. It's always a time consuming task to open PowerPoint presentations one by one and go through all the slides to find a piece of information or a slide which you intend to use for an upcoming presentation.

If you run into such issues frequently or you are the one who create PowerPoint presentations frequently, Slideboxx is the tool for you. Slideboxx helps you find slides from PowerPoint presentations saved on your desktop (For searching slides from the web, use SlideFinder). Once installed, Slideboxx indexes all the PowerPoint presentations of your system in the same fashion as Google desktop indexes all the files of your system. SlideBoxx's search interface is flash based and opens in a web browser. You just need to enter keywords for search and Slideboxx will display the result set in the form of slide thumbnails which you can drag and drop in your PowerPoint presentation using the right pane of search interface.

Key features of Slideboxx include:

Quick keyword based search: Quickly find slides, then drag and drop to reuse in another presentation.
Hide duplicate or similar slides: Use the Slide Clustering slider to hide similar slides on the fly to focus, reduce clutter, and find slides fast.
Group slides from any presentation: Manage slides with custom text tags, grouping them or customizing search results; great for image-based slides too!
Discover forgotten or unknown slides: Search PowerPoint presentations and find slides you forgot or did not even know!.
Automatic indexing: Slideboxx automatically builds and manages your PowerPoint slide library. Indexing may slow down your system a bit.If it slows down your system, you should pause the indexing and resume when you are not using the system.

Slideboxx is not a free tool though it has a free trial. Slideboxx is quite expensive and priced at $119. You can download a trial here and if you see it's worth the price and saves your time, go ahead and buy a copy for you.

Learn PowerPoint for free

2010-11-18T02:40:00.000-08:00

If you are looking for free PowerPoint training classes, here is one. Shivali, one of our readers and PowerPoint enthusiast is conducting a free PowerPoint training class for beginners.

PowerPoint 2007 Introduction Course for Beginners- Class 1 by Shivali Gupta

Get your own Virtual Classroom

Two contests side by side on Slideshare

2010-10-13T23:47:00.000-07:00

SlideShare is back with world's best presentation contest 2010. SlideShare has also announced another contest called "presentation horror story contest" along with world's best presentation contest.

WBPC

View more presentations from Amit Ranjan.

Prizes for World's Best Presentation Contest 2010 winners

1. 1st Prize MacBook (worth $999) + 3M™ PocketProjector MP180
2. 2nd Prize iPad (worth $499) + 3M™ PocketProjector MP180
3. 3rd Prize iPod Touch (worth $229) + 3M™ PocketProjector MP180
4. 6 Category Prizes iPod Shuffles (worth $49)

Prizes for 3M™ Presentation Horror Story Contest winners

1. Top 10 Presentation Horror Stories win a 3M™ PocketProjector MP180

Working with pictures in PowerPoint 2010

2010-09-18T23:30:00.000-07:00

Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 has quite rich picture tools. If used effectively, it's none less than a professional image editing software like Photo-shop. Apart from regular features of image editing like cropping, adjustment of brightness, picture effects, PowerPoint 2010 also offers some advance features like Artistic effects, Background removal and picture layouts.

Artistic effects

With PowerPoint 2010, you can apply different artistic effects to your pictures to make them look more like a sketch, drawing, or painting so that they blend well with the theme of your presentation. Some of the new effects include Pencil Sketch, Line Drawing, Chalk Sketch, Watercolor Sponge, Mosiac Bubbles, Glass, Cement, Pastels Smooth, Plastic Wrap,
Glow Edges, Photocopy, and Paint Strokes. Select an image and click Artistic effects button on Pictures Tool menu. Just move the mouse over the effects and click when you find one fit for your presentation.

Background removal

PowerPoint 2010 also offers a cool new 'Background removal tool' which makes image editing quite a fun. As per Microsoft "Unlike similar tools, the Office Background Removal tool doesn’t just select color ranges or trim to a border you draw. Read more>>

Picture layout

Love creating storyboards or comic series in a PowerPoint? If your answer
is yes then Picture Layout is the perfect tool for you.
There are different type of SmartArt graphics layout where you can tell your story with pictures. There are also other new SmartArt graphic layouts. Even better, if you have pictures on your slide you can quickly convert them to a SmartArt graphic, just like you can do with text.

Using this layout to create a SmartArt graphic is simple:

Insert the SmartArt graphic picture layout.
Add your photograph(s).
Write descriptive text.

Try out image editing capabilities of PowerPoint 2010 and you will find that you no more need to leave PowerPoint to get that perfect picture.

Brainshark announces PowerPoint to video

2010-09-08T03:27:00.000-07:00

Brainshark, the on-demand presentations service and content marketplace has announced “Brainshark for YouTube” – a new capability enabling users to easily share their Brainshark presentations as YouTube videos for free. This functionality is available to Brainshark’s enterprise customers, as well as users of the free myBrainshark.com site. Brainshark for YouTube allows users – with only a PowerPoint deck and phone in hand – to immediately create high-impact business content that’s ready to post on YouTube.

After authorSTREAM, Brainshark is the second presentation sharing platform to offer online PowerPoint to YouTube functionality for free.

Here is a sample PowerPoint video on YouTube.

PowerPoint 2011 for MAC

2010-08-24T04:07:00.000-07:00

After Robert Gaskins conceived the idea of PowerPoint in 90's, there is no looking back for PowerPoint software. As of today, Microsoft PowerPoint is one of the most popular presentation tool with more than 500 million users worldwide. Microsoft PowerPoint has an estimated 95% share of the presentation market.

The first version of PowerPoint was created only for MAC users which later got more popular among PC users as compared to MAC. Since then Microsoft has been continuously adding new features every now and then. Latest game changing offering from Microsoft is PowerPoint 2010. PowerPoint 2010 came loaded with features like PowerPoint to video, advanced image editing, co-authoring, broadcasting and web apps to name a few.

Now it's the turn of MAC users. Microsoft will be releasing PowerPoint 2011 for MAC by the year end. PowerPoint 2011 too has lots of new features like co-authoring, web apps and cool new MAC Ribbon.

Here are few videos which will give you more insight into PowerPoint 2011 for MAC.

Win an Apple iPad every week

2010-08-16T23:03:00.000-07:00

PowerPoint sharing platform authorSTREAM has crossed the magic number of 1 million registered users. To celebrate this big time achievement, authorSTREAM has launched a gala contest - 'Win an iPad- Every week'.

authorSTREAM will be giving away an iPad every week for four weeks as prizes. To participate in this contest, the members just need to sign in and upload spectacular presentations and tweet them with #authorSTREAM and # PowerPoint. A draw of lots will be held every week for all uploaded outstanding presentations.

You can find more details like eligibility and rules at authorSTREAM's contest page. authorSTREAM has also released some interesting stats.

SlideShare Pro accounts now available

2010-08-16T22:27:00.000-07:00

While PowerPointInfo users got to know about Slideshare's Pro accounts almost two months back, the news is now public with all major tech blogs covering the details of same. Slideshare has gone freemium with the launch of Pro account subscriptions. Major features include presentation stats, advertisement free content, branding, more control over transcript and commenting.

Brainshark, the on-demand presentations service and content marketplace

2010-08-10T00:23:00.000-07:00

Brainshark, which has been providing the on-demand presentations service to businesses for quite long, last year with the launch of my Brainshark entered into the domain of free PowerPoint sharing- an area which already have players like authorSTREAM and Slideshare. Brainshark's main use case is content selling and not the content sharing. You can buy licencing rights for the presentations you like. Brainshark's latest stats are quite impressive. They have got worldwide adoption of their services and

Nearly 90 years’ worth of Brainshark content viewed by users and their audiences worldwide in the first half of 2010
1 Brainshark presentation viewed every 3.5 seconds; Brainshark presentations were viewed more than 4.3 million times
New offerings and updates, including support for more than 100 video file types
111 new enterprise customers

Like authorSTREAM, Brainshark also retain the animation and sound inserted in your PowerPoint slides. So your PowerPoint file works the same as it would be in the slide show mode of PowerPoint.

Brainshark has also released Brainshark Mobile, enabling smartphone and iPad users to view Brainshark-delivered communications on their mobile devices. The other PowerPoint sharing platform, authorSTREAM too has gone iPad compatible recently.

Brainshark presentations combine voice narration, PowerPoint slides, video and more for a multimedia experience that is proven to maximize knowledge retention and viewer interest. The presentations play as streamed video files when viewed on mobile devices. Through Brainshark’s analytics capabilities, users can see when their presentations were viewed, who viewed them, if content was viewed on a mobile device and what type of device was used. Platforms and devices supported by Brainshark Mobile include the BlackBerry, Palm Pre, iPhone, iPod touch, iPad and Android; all must support streaming video.

A Quick Tour of myBrainshark

Keeping all aspects in mind, my Brainshark is worth trying. For those who were looking for a content marketplace to monetize their presentation content, Brainshark can be a better option.

Free Add-ins for PowerPoint

2010-07-20T06:20:00.000-07:00

Microsoft PowerPoint software is rich enough in features and functionally and fulfill almost all needs of PowerPoint users. However, there are few use cases which Microsoft has missed. Thankfully, there are few free or moderately priced Add-ins or Plug-ins available from Microsoft MVPs or independent software venders which will make your PowerPoint creation experience more enjoyable and hassle free.

Narration Timing Tweaker
PowerPoint's narration tool offers an easy feature to record audio narration to go along with the slide show. However, if you need to fine tune any of the event times in the recorded show, you have to redo the whole slide again. Narration Timing Tweaker is a free add-in which eliminates that need altogether.

Fotolia Ribbon
With Fotolia PowerPoint add-in you can instantly add high-resolution photos, vectors, and illustrations using your free Fotolia account without leaving PowerPoint. You can Insert royalty free images in PowerPoint slides using Fotolia's PowerPoint add-in.

Insert web pages in PowerPoint slides with PowerPoint Web Browser Assistant
PowerPoint Web Browser Assistant addin assists you in inserting live web pages on slides on your presentation. It uses Microsoft Internet Explorer to display the web pages.

PptPlex
Microsoft's lab product pptPlex is the coolest PowerPoint add-in which lets you give presentations in a quite astonishing way.

Embed media
Microsoft Office PowerPoint does not provide a way to embed video and audio files (with a small exception that you can embed small .wav files). OfficeOne ProTools Embed Media works around that limitation and allows you to embed media files into the presentation. Since the media files are within the presentation, you no longer have to worry about breaking links to the external video files when you move or copy the presentation. PowerPoint will play your files as it would normally do. OfficeOne ProTools Embed Media is not required for playing the video and audio files.

Microsoft Producer
Microsoft Producer allows you to get an existing presentation file, capture and synchronize video and audio narration, add additional media content, and produce a unified set of content ready for viewing in a browser on your intranet , on the web or on a DVD.

Add progress bar with Thermometer
Adding a progress bar to your PowerPoint will let your audience know at any given point that how much has been covered and how much still left. Thermometer for PowerPoint is a free add-in from Indezine that creates a thermometer style bar in the bottom area of the slide that shows how much of a presentation has progressed and how much more is remaining.

YouTube Video Wizard (YTV)
YTZ wizard lets you easily insert YouTube videos into a PowerPoint slide. All you need to do is to provide the YouTube video URL that appears in the browser address bar, the rest is taken care of by the YTV Wizard.

Mouse Mischief
Mouse Mischief integrates into Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 and Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007, letting you insert questions, polls, and drawing activity slides into your lessons.

Students can actively participate in these lessons by using their own mice to click, circle, cross out, or draw answers on the screen.

Flashback PowerPoint Add-in to rewind Flash movies in PowerPoint automatically
FlashBack will rewind the Flash movies inserted using the Shockwave Flash control automatically. Click here to read more and download.

authorSTREAM Desktop
authorSTREAM desktop lets you search and insert YouTube videos and images in your PowerPoint file from within PowerPoint.

authorPOINT Lite
authorPOINTTM Lite is a free PowerPoint to Flash Converter for converting PowerPoint files in Flash. authorPOINT Lite also lets you share your presentations online on the web through authorSTREAM.

iSpring
Similar to authorPOINT Lite, iSpring is a free PowerPoint to Flash converter which can handle animation effects, slide transitions, audio narrations, video and Flash objects in output.

Slide Finder
SlideFinder Add-in for PowerPoint 2007 lets you search the web for presentations and slides from within PowerPoint.

This is not the comprehensive list of free add-ins for PowerPoint. You can find more information about add-in and other PowerPoint resources at links below:

http://officeone.mvps.org/products.html
http://www.indezine.com/products/powerpoint/links.html#addin

PowerPoint 2010 free learning resources

2010-07-02T07:03:00.000-07:00

Software upgrade always involves a learning curve and many a times we don't upgrade to latest version of operating system or software package just because of this learning curve.

There are users who are still using PowerPoint 2003 or XP and have no plans to upgrade to PowerPoint 2010. Here are few links to tutorials which will help you learn PowerPoint 2010 and make your decision to upgrade.

Microsoft Tutorial: Make the switch to PowerPoint 2010

Titan Tech PowerPoint 2010 Training videos

About.com: Beginner's Guide to PowerPoint 2010

PowerPoint 2010 for Dummies By Doug Lowe

Why use PowerPoint 2010 to insert videos?

2010-06-14T23:17:00.000-07:00

If you've ever inserted videos in your PowerPoint, you must have felt the pain when your friends or audience reported that video didn't play in the slide show you shared on email. Those who are well versed with PowerPoint know that video files are always linked. This means that PowerPoint always play the video file from the path it was lying when it was inserted. Smart PowerPoint users have been following the practice of keeping the PowerPoint file and videos in a common folder, zip it and share the zip file on email. This way the video inserted always refer to the path of the folder.

Lately, PowerPoint users have started using online PowerPoint sharing websites to share their presentations. Tools like authorSTREAM Desktop, which automatically ship video/audio along with PowerPoint file to their servers make sure that the online version of PowerPoint (Flash output) plays the video and audio. However, original PPT if downloaded, still fails to play the video inserted.

PowerPoint users have always longed for video embedding feature, similar to audio embedding. Finally, Microsoft has fixed the video insertion issue in PowerPoint 2010. With PowerPoint 2010, you need not to worry about the video file path or annoying "Cannot find the specified file.." errors at audience end.

Embed video files in PowerPoint 2010

In PowerPoint 2010, videos inserted from hard-disk are embedded directly into the presentation unless you deliberately choose to link. You just need to insert videos and forget about the rest. PowerPoint 2010 has also got some nifty features of optimizing and editing videos inserted.

Compatibility and Optimization of the file size

As the video files are contained in PowerPoint itself so PowerPoint size can be a major issue when it comes to sharing on the web. Also the non availability of video codec at audience end can be an issue. Optimize Media Compatibility feature of PowerPoint 2010 and Compress Media button takes care of codec and file size issues. Click optimize media compatibility on the backstage to get rid of codec issues. The compress media button available on backstage compresses the media file(s) thus reducing the total size of the PowerPoint file.

Video editing in PowerPoint 2010

PowerPoint 2010 provides many ways and means to edit the video. You can recolor videos, change brightness and contrast, set the bookmarks, change the shape and design of the video inserted. You can also trim unwanted portions of a video which you don't want to show up in the slide show.

Simply insert a video, and select the “Trim Video” option on the Playback tab. Set the “Start Time” and “End Time” either from the time-line or enter the values in respective text boxes. Trimming helps you crop unwanted stuff from the video.

Trim video

So now no more zip folders, no more video file missing errors. No matter how you insert, what's the file size, what video codec you used, with PowerPoint 2010, your videos are gonna play everywhere for sure.

PowerPoint 2010 also lets you insert Flash embeds of video sharing websites like YouTube, Vimeo. Such embeds just store the reference of path and player they are hosted on and require Internet connection to play during sideshow.

SlideShare launched Pro accounts!!

2010-06-09T06:52:00.000-07:00

SlideShare the online document and video sharing platform has launched Pro account subscriptions. SlideShare is yet to announce it officially on their blog. However, SlideShare users can see an upgrade banner on their profile page. SlideShare already offers two premium services for businesses; LeadShare and AdShare. Users with pro account will be able to view stats like visitor geo locations, how many users viewed their SlideShare content?, what search keywords and referrers made them land on their content?, how many people embed/download/comment on their presentation?

Pro users can customize channels and can upload unlimited videos. Unlike authorSTREAM, which also offers premium service, Pro offering of Slideshare has nothing special for PowerPoint users and is just focused on businesses.

Slideshare has kept the monthly subscription fee for the basic plan as $19.99. Pricing for the custom plan is not disclosed yet. Opening same link in Internet explorer 8 reveals that Slideshare also intends to offer some special discount if yearly payment is done, though the price displayed is $49.95. May be the pricing was initially decided to be $49.95 a month which might have been re-fixed to $19.99 at a later stage.

Best video of the week contest @Slideshare

2010-06-02T00:03:00.000-07:00

Image via CrunchBase

Slideshare has come up with yet another contest but this time it's for videos. Slideshare has recently allowed video uploads on their website. The contest is open for Professional videos only (e.g., talk presentation, screencast, demo, webinar) in a category such as Business, Technology, Education, Health or Non profit.

Slideshare will give away one iPad every week to the Professional Video of the Week.

How to enter the contest

To participate in the ‘Best Professional Video Of The Week Contest’, your presentation* should have been uploaded to SlideShare after Monday, 31st May 2010, 00:01 AM PST and entered into the contest by Tuesday, 29th June 2010, 11:59 PM PST. The decision of SlideShare regarding eligibility of contest presentations* will be final and binding for all.

Upload a professional video (e.g., talk presentation, screencast, demo, webinar) in a category such as Business, Technology, Education, Health or Non profit.

Entertainment or humor videos are not qualified to enter. You should own the copyright to the video or have permission from the owner.

Step 1: Choose the dropdown “Enter Best Professional Video contest” while uploading.
Step 2: Tweet out the short URL to the video that you will receive by email.

"I am entering “Video URL” to the video contest on @slideshare. Vote for me by retweeting this. "

You can find more details at contest page on Slideshare.

* Seems a typo. Guys @Slideshare, shouldn't it be 'video' ?

How to create synchronized multimedia PowerPoint presentations?

2010-05-18T00:11:00.000-07:00

Do you want to create multimedia enriched PowerPoint presentations or want to sync a PowerPoint presentation with live audio or video stream so that output can be viewed and shared online or on a DVD? Are you looking for a tool using which you can create class lectures comprised of video synced with PowerPoint slides and animations? Here are two awesome tools; authorPOINT and Microsoft Producer which let you do exactly the same.

authorPOINT

authorPOINT is a PowerPoint plugin from authorGEN. authorPOINT lets you create presentations with live audio or video from devices like webcam, handy-cam, or any other USB or fire wire based device. You can also use pre-recorded audio/video files (AVI, WMV, WAV and WMA) and sync them with PowerPoint.

Output plays video or audio side by side with PowerPoint slides. authorPOINT also lets you annotate on slides. Capture process of authorPOINT is pretty simple. authorPOINT is capabale of creating Flash as well as HTML output which you can host on your server and embed on your website or blog. authorPOINT retains all animation and sound affects in Flash as well as HTML output.

authorPOINT not only lets you create multimedia enriched presentations but also provides free online hosting and sharing on it's PowerPoint sharing platform, authorSTREAM. authorPOINT is compatible with Microsoft Windows 2000, 2003, XP and Vista and runs on 32 Bit OS Versions only.

authorPOINT presentation uploaded on authorSTREAM

See more presentations by aplite | Upload your own PowerPoint presentations

Price and discounts

authorPOINT costs $299 for a single copy. If you are a education customer, you can apply for a special educational discount of $99 on their buy now page.

Player branding

If you want to get a custom player for output created by authorPOINT, you need to shell out $200 more. authorPOINT's Unbranded player has no logo or any other reference to authorGEN. You can buy it for $ 200 from authorPOINT's Buy Now page. You can also send your own logo in gif, png or flash (recommended) format, and they will put that in custom player instead of theirs.

Microsoft Producer

Like authorPOINT, Microsoft Producer allows you to get an existing presentation file, capture and synchronize video and audio narration, add additional media content, and produce a unified set of content ready for viewing in a browser on your intranet , on the web or on a DVD.

Producer is powerful tool for e-learning, corporate communications and sales. You can use Producer to capture video, audio, and still images from a Web camera, a video camera (digital or analog), or from your computer screen. You can also use Producer to import existing Microsoft PowerPoint presentations, Windows Media files, still images, and HTML files, and then synchronize narrations with your video and PowerPoint presentations. You can learn more about Microsoft Producer here. Microsoft Producer can be used with PowerPoint 2007 or PowerPoint 2010 and on Windows 2000 Service Pack 3; Windows 7; Windows Vista and XP.

Unlike authorPOINT which can create Flash output, Producer gives you output only in HTML format.

Pricing
It's absolutely free. You can download Microsoft Producer here.

Using authorPOINT or Microsoft Producer you can create high quality, engaging, Rich-Media business, training or sales presentations.

Both authorPOINT as well as Microsoft Producer may require you to download 'MS Office Animation Runtime' to view the output. However, authorPOINT' s Flash output do not require 'Animation runtime' but do need Flash player.

Create and Share PowerPoint presentations online with Docs

2010-05-11T02:44:00.000-07:00

After Google presentations, authorSTREAM, Zoho Show, Slide Rocket and Slideshare, Docs is the new entrant in the list of online PowerPoint sharing platforms. Docs is the document sharing service from Microsoft Fuse Labs.

Docs not only lets you upload, but also the online creation of PowerPoint presentations. As the Docs is in beta phase so the PowerPoint creation has very limited set of tools and options. For now you can't add animations, sound or other formatting online. However, if you upload a PowerPoint presentation having animation effects, the converted online version retains all the animation effects which most of the online PowerPoint sharing platforms barring authorSTREAM fail to do. Only downside is that you need to have Silverlight browser plugin installed to view the animations. You just need a Facebook account to login and try out Docs.com. Docs.com is so closely integrated with Facebook that at most of the places it looks like a Facebook app instead of independent website.

Beta version of Docs.com lacks in sharing options and post to social network buttons except the one provided for sharing on Facebook. Non availability of embed code is also one of the drawbacks. Hopefully Microsoft will be adding these features soon.

SlideShare is going to announce video uploads!

2010-05-04T23:17:00.000-07:00

Update: As was guessed earlier today, SlideShare has released the video upload feature and joined the elite league of websites like YouTube and Vimeo. Here is the announcement video by Jonathan Boutelle, CTO of Slideshare:

video on slideshare

View more videos from Jonathan Boutelle.

It seems that document sharing website Slideshare is going to announce video sharing in next few hours or sometime later. Though nothing has been mentioned on their official blog, yet Slideshare users can see video upload link with a link to FAQs. Slideshare will allow following video formats:

mp4, m4v (ipod)
wmv (windows media video)
mpeg
avi (windows)
mov (apple quicktime)
mpg
mkv (h.264)
ogg
asf
vob
3gp, 3g2 (mobile phones)
rm, rmvb (Real)
flv (Flash)

You can find list of supported video codecs here. Slideshare has mentioned at their support fourm

Slideshare's new video feature allows you to upload and share videos. This is an experimental feature SlideShare is launching in response to demands from the community. So now, apart from presentations, documents & webinars, you can upload videos to your SlideShare account.

Users will be able to upload videos of size up to 500 MB.

Photoshop like image editing in PowerPoint 2010

2010-05-03T04:07:00.000-07:00

PowerPoint 2010 offers editing options both for video as well as images. With images, quite common editing is removing the background or getting a small piece of a big picture suitable for your slide. Till now Adobe Photoshop is the widely used software for removing the background or other image editing related stuff.

Remove the background from an image in PowerPoint 2010
PowerPoint 2010 offers a cool new 'Background removal tool' which will make image editing quite a fun. As per Microsoft "Unlike similar tools, the Office Background Removal tool doesn’t just select color ranges or trim to a border you draw. Background Removal uses new capabilities and algorithms from the Microsoft Research in Cambridge, UK to achieve better results automatically with very little effort or fine tuning from the user."

The new Remove Background tool as claimed by Microsoft is intelligent enough to identify background and forground thus making the task of background removal easy. You just need to select the area(marquee selection area ) of the picture which you want to keep or use on the slide. For refinemnet you can mark the areas you want to keep or remove manually.

You can find more information about image editing in PowerPoint 2010 on Microsoft blog.

Add progress bar to a PowerPoint slide show

2010-04-29T22:35:00.000-07:00

Adding a progress bar to your PowerPoint will let your audience know at any given point that how much has been convered and how much still left.

See more presentations by PowerPointinfo | Upload your own PowerPoint presentations

If you want to add a progress bar similar to one shown above, follow the steps provided below.

Make progress bar using shapes in PowerPoint

Insert two rectangular shapes of same dimensions(Height*Width).
Fill one with some color(color you want to use for progress bar) and the other one matching the background color of your PowerPoint.
Make sure both have same outline color. Place filled shape on the one matching the background color so that both give a impression of a single shape.
Now, on slide 1 re-size the filled shape so that both shapes give an impression of single shape filled somewhat.
Select both shapes with Ctrl key and paste on all slides at same co-ordinates on each slide. Increase the size of filled shape on subsequent slides and make it completely filled on last slide.

Using VBA code to add shapes

As mentioned on a PowerPoint community, you can also add a progress bar using VBA code. You just need to enable Macros and add a new Macro to your PowerPoint. You can find Macros under developer tab
in PowerPoint 2007. Once you have added the Macro either click Visual Basic icon under developer tab or press Alt+F11 keys. Paste follwoing code:

Sub AddProgressBar()
On Error Resume Next
With ActivePresentation
For X = 1 To .Slides.Count
.Slides(X).Shapes("PB").Delete
Set s = .Slides(X).Shapes.AddShape(msoShapeRectangle, _
0, .PageSetup.SlideHeight - 12, _
X * .PageSetup.SlideWidth / .Slides.Count, 12)
s.Fill.ForeColor.RGB = RGB(127, 0, 0)
s.Name = "PB"
Next X:
End With
End Sub

Close the VBA code and return to PowerPoint. Click Macro, select the one you created and click run. A progress bar will get added to your slides.

You can download sample presentation from authorSTREAM.

View PowerPoint presentations on your iPad or mobile

2010-04-16T23:54:00.000-07:00

authorSTREAM, the PowerPoint sharing platform which recently launched win-iPad contest has come up with an iPad compatible version of presentation output. As mentioned on authorSTREAM blog, all latest presentations are iPad compatible and loads in a HTML player.

This means that now authorSTREAM presentations can be viewed on any non flash browser running on iPad, iPhone or other mobile devices.

Only downside is that iPad output don't have any animations or sound. authorSTREAM claims that they will be adding animation and sound capabilities to iPad output soon.

Zoom your presentations with pptPlex

2010-04-08T07:15:00.001-07:00

Image by Jinho.Jung via Flickr

Microsoft's lab product pptPlex is the coolest PowerPoint add-in which lets you give presentations in a quite astonishing way. pptPlex with zoom in and zoom out effects is quite similar to Prezi which offers similar functionality online.

pptPlex uses Plex technology to zoom in and out of slide sections and move directly between slides that are not sequential in your presentation. You can arrange all slides on a stunning canvas and can zoom in or zoom out slides during presentation besides navigating in a non-linear fashion. You need not to go slide by slide, just double click any slide thumb on the canvas and slide will appear with smooth zoom effect.

pptPlex also lets you add live content from other Office documents(Word, excel) in your PowerPoint presentations. Live content means if you have added some excel sheet and source data gets changed, your presentation will always have the updated data as will read the data from excel sheet itself.

You can download pptPlex from Microsoft labs. You would also require to download and install XPS or Save as PDF add-in in order to use pptPlex on PowerPoint 2007.

pptPlex is quite easy to use and for sure it will add some seasoning to the way you give presentations.

Win an iPad contest from authorSTREAM

2010-04-02T23:01:00.000-07:00

PowerPoint sharing website authorSTREAM has come up with "Tweet and win an iPad" contest. The contest came just in time with the scheduled launch of Apple iPad on April 3rd.

You just need to tweet any of the tweets mentioned on their contest page or your own tweet having #PowerPoint and @authorSTREAM keywords to be eligible for draw of lots.

Prizes

1st Prize - An Apple iPad Wi-fi, 16 GB model and authorSTREAM Premium membership for one year

1st Runners up - iPod and authorSTREAM Premium membership for one year
2nd Runners up - iPod Nano and authorSTREAM Premium membership for one year

All participants will get authorSTREAM Video Credits worth $4!

Contest starts on 3rd April, 2010 and ends on 17th April, 2010. authorSTREAM has one more offer on the platter. If you have any feedback or just want to see authorSTREAM guys, here is an offer.

Create Interactive PowerPoint Presentations with inter slide hyperlinks and action buttons

2010-03-16T03:40:00.000-07:00

By using inter slide hyperlinks and action buttons in PowerPoint you can turn your presentations into interactive games or quizzes quite easily. No doubt that such PowerPoint presentations are more engaging.

Don't you think students will find presentations below more interesting?

Tip: Click on shoes

See more presentations by TechGuy

How to insert inter slide hyperlinks in PowerPoint 2007?

Create a hyperlink to a slide in the current presentation

Select the text you want to represent the hyperlink, right click on it, click hyperlink option. Under 'Link to', click Place in This Document or

1. Select the text or object that you want to represent the hyperlink.
2. Click on Insert tab
3. Click 'Hyperlink' button.
3. Under 'Link to', click Place in This Document.
4. Link to a slide in the current presentation, Select the slide you want
to go to.

Same way action action buttons can be inserted from 'Shapes' button under Insert tab.

Animation Painter

2010-02-18T05:20:00.000-08:00

You must have used format painter at times to copy settings such as font, color, and size to apply it on some other text. Format painter feature not only saves our time but also ensures that all the text in a presentation has same font, color and size.

PowerPoint users were always in need of something like format painter to transfer animation effects from one object to another. "Animation Painter" in PowerPoint 2010 lets you transfer all the animations and settings to another object thus saving your time to replicate the animation effects. It works similarly to the Format Painter. Like video triggers, 3D slideshows and PowerPoint to video, Animation Painter is a brand new feature which isn't available in PowerPoint versions prior to 2010. Just select an object with animations, select the “Animation Painter” button on the Animations tab, and with a single click you can transfer all the animations and settings to another object. Double-click on painter button will let you paint multiple objects sequentially. PowerPoint creation is gonna whole lot easy with PowerPoint 2010.

Triggers in PowerPoint

2010-02-09T05:33:00.000-08:00

PowerPoint offers wide range of features like motion path animations, action buttons, inter slide hyperlinks to create interactive and engaging presentations.

PowerPoint executes all the animations as sequence of events. Any object (text/image/shape) can be made appear, fly in as a result of click or after effect of some action. Any action for example a click results in next animation or slide.

You can't just jump on to a particular event of your choice or repeat an action again and again. For example what if you want to stay on same slide and display an image again and again on click on a text say "Who is founder of Microsoft". In such scenarios where you have to bypass sequencing or repeat actions while staying on the same slide, PowerPoint triggers is the best option available. Triggers can only be set on some animation effect.

Select any text/object, apply some custom animation effect.
Either double click or right click the animation effect applied(on custom animation sidebar).
Click on 'timings' tab, click Triggers button and select the radio button "Start effect on click of".
Select the event on whose click you want selected animation to execute.

Either visit Microsoft 's website or watch video below to understand use of triggers in PowerPoint.

Video triggers in PowerPoint 2010

PowerPoint 2010 offers Video Triggers; a feature with which one can mark locations in a video (i.e. set bookmarks), and then trigger animation sequences upon reaching those bookmarks on playback of the video. In simple terms you can set some specific animation to run when a particular scene appears in video inserted in PowerPoint.

Image via Microsoft PowerPoint Blog

Now conduct presentation web meetings from your mobile

2010-01-19T01:07:00.000-08:00

MightyMeeting, a new entrant in online PowerPoint meeting domain, unlike other presentation meeting tools like Present Live from authorSTREAM , SlideLive, Zoho Show or Google presentations, lets you conduct PowerPoint presentations on the go even from your smart-phone. Using MightyMeeting you can conduct presentations remotely via its web interface or iPhone and Android applications. Despite the fact that animation effects seems missing on MightyMeeting, running a synchronized slide show from mobile phone has its added advantages.

The only presentation meeting tool which retains animation effects is Present Live from authorSTREAM though they don't have any app for mobile yet. MightyMeeting could come in handy when you have to start a presentation meeting at a moment’s notice.

Create PowerPoint presentations which keep audience attentive and awake

2010-01-05T04:29:00.000-08:00

An effective PowerPoint presentation can leave long lasting impact on audience. A PowerPoint can do more than what a blog post or document can.

Don't just fill your presentation with tons of text, bullets, images and annoying animations. Your PowerPoint should be a balanced combination of text, images and animation effects. PowerPoint presentation can also have narrations or background music if you intend to put it on some online presentation sharing website. A little planning, great script, cool design and sincere hard work will certainly pay you. There is such a abundance of bad presentation that PowerPoint expert and author Ellen Finkelstein has to start a campaign named " death by PowerPoint".

Image by kurafire via Flickr

Here are few resources which you should refer to if you really want your audience to pay attention to what you want to convey:

Microsoft

Guy Kawasaki's 10-20-30 rule

wikiHow

Concordia University

Christmas & New Year PowerPoint Presentations

2009-12-22T21:15:00.001-08:00

This holiday season, few good PowerPoint presentations have come up on authorSTREAM and SlideShare.

Slide Rocket launches record audio feature

2009-12-18T02:51:00.000-08:00

Image via CrunchBase

Online presentation creation tool, Slide Rocket now allows you to record audio in your presentations online. 'Record audio feature' is somewhat similar to record narration feature of PowerPoint. You just need to create the slide, click on record your audio narration on the slide and record the voice over.

The feature was certainly a most sought after feature for any online presentation tool. More and more such features which are otherwise available only in PowerPoint will boost the usage of online presentation tools.

Free PowerPoint templates for Holidays

2009-12-14T21:24:00.000-08:00

Christmas and new year are around the corner. This is the time when we share our love, emotions and warm greetings with our near and dears. For PowerPoint users this is the time to carve their deep emotions and feeling on a PowerPoint and share it with their loved ones.

To create a stunning PowerPoint presentation, an appealing template is a prerequisite. Those who are well versed with PowerPoint software, create these templates themselves. Those who are not that skilled to create a terrific PowerPoint template or background themselves need not to despair. There are numerous websites and blogs who offer free PowerPoint templates for Christmas and New year.

You can download these free templates; add music, animations and your very own PowerPoint greeting will be ready in no time. Here are few good websites from where you can download free PowerPoint templates for Christmas, New Year and Holidays:

Microsoft Website
Indezine
Brainy Betty
Presentation Magazine: Presentation magazine also let you create custom image backgrounds using card maker which you can use as a template in PowerPoint:
Christianppt

PowerPoint as a marketing tool

2009-12-03T05:15:00.000-08:00

Image by DavidErickson via Flickr

In last five years PowerPoint has gone a long way and so the PowerPoint software and websites. PowerPoint which was a traditional desktop thing is now more like a web product. More and more online products are being added to the ever growing list of PowerPoint resources and tool s everyday. From PowerPoint creation to PowerPoint sharing, all has gone a complete makeover. Now only handful of people use email attachments as a way to share PowerPoint presentations. Most of the PowerPoint geeks are hooked to online PowerPoint sharing websites like SlideShare, authorSTREAM or are using online presentation creation tools like Google Presentations, Slide Rocket, slide 280 etc. Microsoft too will join the league of online PowerPoint sharing and collaboration websites with the launch of PowerPoint 2010 early next year.

Like video embeds, presentation embeds have become inevitable for bloggers. All such online and offline PowerPoint products have made PowerPoint presentations a great marketing tool.

You can upload your PowerPoint presentations either on SlideShare, Scribd or authorSTREAM and share it with your friends, family or clients in more easy and convenient way. Advantage of using Scribd or Slideshare is that your content gets more viewers while authorSTREAM is excellent in retaining animations, sound and video. In a nutshell, all will help you spread the word using a PowerPoint presentation. Get the flash embed and post it on your blog/website and anywhere where flash embeds are allowed.

PowerPoint to video

We all know that if a picture is worth than thousand words, a video is worth thousand picture. Creating a great video is not everyone's cup of tea. A great video requires excellent video shooting skills besides an awesome storyboard whereas PowerPoint is so flexible and easy to use
that even a grade III student can use it without much hassle.

With so many offline and online tools for PowerPoint to video conversion, it's just a matter of will that you convert your PowerPoint in video and share it on popular video sharing websites.

Online Free PowerPoint to video tools

authorSTREAM: Converts PowerPoint presentations to FLV, AVI, WMV or MP4. Maximum file size allowed is 1 GB and presentations below 5 mins are converted for free. authorSTREAM also lets you send converted videos to YouTube directly.

WonderSlide: Converts PowerPoint presentations to FLV, AVI, WMV or MP4. Maximum file size allowed is 50 MB.

Desktop PowerPoint to video tools

PowerPoint 2010
E.M. PowerPoint Video Converter
Wondershare PPT to video
http://www.acoolsoft.com/
http://bytescout.com/ppttovideoscout.html
http://www.ppt2video.com/

Create an appealing marketing PowerPoint presentation. Jazz it up with videos- Youtube embeds or videos from file, animations and sound. Upload it on authorSTREAM, Slideshare or any other PowerPoint sharing website, convert it to video using offline or online PowerPoint to video converters and let your marketing stuff go viral. All these presentation sharing websites have social bookmarking and post to network buttons which will help you share your stuff more easily.

SlideShare "Holiday Spirit Contest 2009"

2009-11-29T21:10:00.001-08:00

PowerPoint and Document sharing website, Slideshare has announced "Holiday Spirit Contest 2009". Contest has started from November 27th and will last till 2nd January, 2010.

The Prize:

Image via Wikipedia

1. 1st Prize: Amazon Gift Certificate worth $250
2. 2nd Prize: Amazon Gift Certificate worth $150
3. 3rd Prize: Amazon Gift Certificate worth $100

The Holiday Spirit Contest 2009

View more documents from SlideShare Help.

How to Enter the Contest?

* To participate in the The Holiday Spirit Contest 2009, your presentation should have been uploaded to SlideShare after Friday, 27th November 2009, 00:01 AM PST and entered into the contest by Saturday, January 2nd 2010, 11:59 PM PST. (The decision of SlideShare regarding eligibility of contest presentations will be final and binding for all)

* To enter, create a SlideShare account (or login if you already have an account) and add your presentation to the contest. You can enter your presentation in two ways:

1. Upload your presentation to SlideShare (single or bulk upload). Check
the "Enter Contest" checkbox and select "The Holiday Spirit Contest 2009".

2. Alternatively, upload the presentation as usual. Later, you can enter
the contest by going to the presentation's "Edit" page.

Read more at contest Page here.

Motion Path Animations

2009-11-23T03:24:00.000-08:00

Motion paths offer such a wonderful PowerPoint animation effect that in slide show mode, for a moment you might mistake the presentation to be a video. Don't believe it? See it for yourself:

Sample motion path

See more presentations by aplite | Upload your own PowerPoint presentations

A motion path is a custom path that an object(text/image) follows. Either you can pick from preset paths like line, up, down or may create your own custom paths. Motion Paths let you create your own animation effects which are otherwise not available in PowerPoint.

Just follow steps below to add awesome Motion Path animations to your PowerPoint presentation:

Select the object(text or image).
Click on the animation tab.
Click on Add Effect>Motion Paths.
Select motion path you want to use and click OK.
Run slide show to verify and save.

Microsoft has good training material with voice over for Motion paths. You can have this free training here.

Online PowerPoint meeting tools

2009-11-18T04:57:00.000-08:00

PowerPoint cloud meeting or presentation meeting is not a new concept; SlideLive, authorSTREAM and Google presentations have been doing this since long.

These PowerPoint meeting web applications allow presenters to deliver presentations, live over the Internet where slide navigation is being controlled by presenter. In today’s world, many a times we need to communicate with people at different Geo locations who can’t get together at same place. That is where these presentation meeting applications come in handy.

Image via Wikipedia

Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 has also come up with a similar feature called broadcasting where presenter can click through the slides and everyone attending will be on the same slide. Animations also work the same way as in PowerPoint file. Only thing seems missing is chat which Microsoft must have planned with Microsoft communication server.

Here is a video demo of broadcast feature from Microsoft.

Insert videos in PowerPoint using authorSTREAM desktop

2009-11-16T21:19:00.000-08:00

Sharing PowerPoint presentations having videos has always been a big issue with normal PowerPoint users. People always wonder why and how video or movie file inserted in PowerPoint which plays well on their computer disappears when they run slide show on their office system or any other computer.

Most of the PowerPoint users are unaware of the fact that videos are always linked in PowerPoint slides and will not play on the system other than where the linked file resides. Few technical users keep PowerPoint file and video in same folder and share the zip file so that video plays irrespective of where you run Slide show.

For those who don't want to share bulky zip files or who don't know technical details related to video insertion in PowerPoint, authorSTREAM has come up with a promising solution. authorSTREAM desktop (a free PowerPoint plug-in from authorSTREAM) which lets you insert YouTube videos, can now take care of videos inserted in PowerPoint slides. You just need to upload PowerPoint presentation having linked audio or video using authorSTREAM Desktop and its inbuilt mechanism will take care of rest.

Presentation output on authorSTREAM will play inserted videos as they play in PowerPoint slide show on your machine and you only need to share authorSTREAM presentation link with your friends and family. So now besides inserting YouTube videos, you can insert videos from your desktop in your PowerPoint slides.

Funny Videos

See more presentations by aSGuest31176 | Upload your own PowerPoint presentations

More details at authorSTREAM blog.

PowerPoint to Silverlight

2009-11-06T05:38:00.000-08:00

Image via Wikipedia

Do you know that more than 250 million people around the world use PowerPoint and not less than 30 million presentations are created daily? There is huge list of resources and tools related to PowerPoint. Lately more and more companies have come up with software's like PowerPoint to Flash SDK, PowerPoint Add-ins/ Plug-ins, PowerPoint to video conversion tools and websites for online sharing of PowerPoint presentations. Most of the products out of these deal with PowerPoint to flash conversion.

Today, PowerPoint to flash conversion is the most popular way of sharing PowerPoint presentations on the web. But, now trend seems to be changing with more products coming in for PowerPoint to Silverlight, a web application framework from Microsoft that provides functionalists similar to those in Adobe Flash. Initially released as a video streaming plugin, later versions brought additional interactivity features and support for .NET languages and development tools. The current version, 3.0, was released on July 9, 2009. It is compatible with multiple web browser products used on Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X operating systems

There has been buzz around Microsoft Silverlight since Microsoft came up with the technology. Silverlight's awesome web capabilities and brand association of Microsoft has encouraged more and more people to use Silverlight as a designing tool for creating rich media content.

Electric Rain, 3D and multimedia solutions company has announced a new product called Convexion, a PowerPoint to Silverlight converter. Convexion converts PowerPoint 2007 slideshows to Microsoft Silverlight based presentations while retaining the animation scheme and accurate slide layout. The Add-in enables users to publish their PowerPoint slideshows to the Microsoft Silverlight and WPF (Windows Presentation Foundation) formats for sharing and viewing on the web, in blogs, and as a live desktop presentation player.

Will PowerPoint to Silverlight conversion be a popular technology for sharing presentations on the web in near future?

Happy Halloween: Join the party

2009-10-30T05:08:00.000-07:00

Join Halloween party at awesome venue:

Watch more cool animation and creative cartoons at Aniboom

Insert royalty free images in PowerPoint using new PowerPoint add-in from fotolia

2009-10-28T22:32:00.000-07:00

Images and video marketplace, Fotolia has released FREE Add-in for PowerPoint 2007 & Word 2007. With Fotolia PowerPoint add-in you can instantly add high-resolution photos, vectors, and illustrations using your free Fotolia account without leaving PowerPoint. See video below on how to use Fotolia Add-in.

You can download Fotolia Add-in for PowerPoint 2007 here.

Add-ins like authorSTREAM desktop which lets you insert YouTube videos and images from Bing, SlideFinder which lets you search the web for presentations and slides and Fotolia ribbon are going to give a new direction to creation of content and media rich presentations.

Using PowerPoint presentations as Greeting card

2009-10-22T07:06:00.000-07:00

This post on feisublog which showcase a Diwali greeting from authorSTREAM, shows a perfect and innovative way of sending personalized greeting card digitally crafted with your own hands to your loved ones.

PowerPoint gives you immense power and freedom to use your imagination, creativity to create a great greeting card for any occasion. With typical greeting card websites it's way difficult to pick the correct card which can express your deep emotions. Animations, sound, your own narration in PowerPoint will help you ponder your inner emotions in a PowerPoint slide show in a much better way.

So just build up a theme or story and start creating your own very special card. Get some cool pictures, templates, music or record narration if you want to send more personalized card. Make sure to time it with cool animations and transitions.

Image via Wikipedia

Why not create your own Halloween greeting card, full of bats, jack-o'-lantern, ghosts, skeletons, witches, devils and some scary music. Have a look on Halloween cards on Slideshare and authorSTREAM, read Microsoft's step by step guide on How to Create a multimedia greeting card in PowerPoint and get started.

Update: authorSTREAM already has a greeting card section which has user submitted presentation cards for different events and festivals. Either you can use greeting cards available on authorSTREAM or upload your own PowerPoint presentation, add some background theme, message and share it with your loved ones.

Healthcare Napkins won SlideShare's contest

2009-09-29T23:57:00.000-07:00

Slideshare has announced results of World's best Presentation contest'09. Presentation Healthcare Napkins All has won the first prize.

Healthcare Napkins All

View more documents from Dan Roam.

See complete results at SlideShare.

Huge discount for educators and students from authorSTREAM

2009-09-22T04:29:00.000-07:00

Online PowerPoint sharing website authorSTREAM is offering 90% discount on authorSTREAM's Premium Pro service for teachers and students. authorSTREAM premium pro will let you upload up to 500 presentation as private, unlimited PowerPoint to video conversion, presentation stats etc. You can see complete feature list here.

Teachers and students can apply with their official(school/college/university) email address and get Pro membership for $24.95(yearly), which otherwise costs ~~$300~~ (yearly). Students and teachers will continue to renew their premium pro membership for $24.95 every year until 2014! Sounds a good deal :).

This special education discount offer expires on 30th September, 2009.

Easily migrate from PowerPoint 2003 to PowerPoint 2007

2009-09-15T23:31:00.000-07:00

Most of PowerPoint users still prefer to use PowerPoint 2003 or XP because of learning curve involved. It's bit difficult to locate your favorite menus, commands in 2007 as Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 has different interface and few commands and options have been relocated under different menus.

That being said, PowerPoint 2007 is much rich in features as compared to PowerPoint 2003 or XP and migration to 2007 is easy with the help and tutorials available online.

Go through PowerPoint 2003 to PowerPoint 2007 interactive command reference guide from Microsoft. This interactive flash content will help you locate Microsoft PowerPoint 2003 commands in PowerPoint 2007.

Keyboard shortcuts available in PowerPoint 2007 will help you start easily.

Keyboard Shortcuts in PowerPoint 2007

Command	Keyboard Shortcut
Open new blank presentation	Ctrl+N
Insert new slide	Ctrl+M / Enter key
Open existing PowerPoint	Ctrl+O
Slideshow
Start Slideshow	F5
Next animation/ Slide	Spacebar/ Enter
Return to the previous slide	Backspace
Go to a slide number	number + Enter
Return to first slide	1 + Enter
Jump to the first (or last) slide	Home (or End)
Change pointer to a pen	CTRL+P
Display the shortcut or right click menu	SHIFT+F10
Go to the first or next hyperlink on a slide	TAB
Change pointer to an arrow	CTRL+A
Erase the screen annotations	E
End Slideshow	ESC
Formatting
Justify a paragraph.	Ctrl + J
Centre a paragraph	CTRL+E
Right align a paragraph.	Ctrl + R
Left align a paragraph.	Ctrl + L
Copy formats (Format painter)	CTRL+SHIFT+C
Paste formats(Format painter)	CTRL+SHIFT+V

See complete list on Microsoft website

PowerPoint 2010 to offer 3D slidehows

2009-08-30T23:33:00.000-07:00

Microsoft is all set to change the way you use animation effects in PowerPoint slides. Everything in 2010 slide show (text, shapes, animations, and more) is rendered in full 3D using your machine’s graphics card. This was announced by Microsoft PowerPoint team on their blog.

PowerPoint's graphics engine is completely rebuilt using DirectX and will offer:

· Fully hardware-accelerated rendering engine
· New transition effects and an updated user interface
· Revamped animation effects and a brand new UI (timelines!)
· Animation Painter (copy your animations between objects)
· Choreograph animations with multimedia

Here is one video showing 3D capabilities of PowerPoint 2010

PowerPoint presentations: a new way of showcasing your resume

2009-08-20T23:23:00.000-07:00

If you believe that document(Doc) and PDF is the only way of sharing your resume online then you are totally wrong. More and more people are now using PowerPoint presentations for creating their CV. Resume on a PowerPoint presentation not only lists your experience and academic skills but also show your creative and innovative thinking. Have a look on some quality resumes below:

My Visual Resume

Uploaded on authorSTREAM by venkoos | Upload your own presentation

Anthony's PowerPoint Resume

View more presentations from Career Corps.

Do you think that any employer would not like to call such candidate for an interview? Share your thoughts through comments?

PowerPoint resources, tools and communities

2009-08-11T07:15:00.000-07:00

There are numerous blogs and websites having tutorials and help available for new as well as advance users of PowerPoint. These web resources not only cover PowerPoint 2000, 2003, XP and 2007 but also yet to be released PowerPoint 2010.

Here is a compiled list of few good resources, software and PowerPoint communities which should answer all your questions related to PowerPoint:

Tutorials

Bay City Public Schools
About.com
Microsoft
Microsoft Online Help
Baycon group
The PowerPoint Blog
PowerPoint in classroom
PowerPoint Heaven
Ellen Finkelstein

Video tutorials

Google Videos
About.com videos
YouTube

Groups/ Communities

Microsoft PowerPoint Community

WiZiQ PowerPoint Community

Microsoft Google newsgroup

Blogs/ Websites

Microsoft
Indezine
The PowerPoint FAQ
PowerPoint Ninja
PowerPoint MVPs

Online PowerPoint Sharing Websites

Slideshare
authorSTREAM

Online PowerPoint creation

Google presentations
Google presentations
280Slides
Slide Rocket
Zoho Show
Preezo
Adobe Acrobat

Online PowerPoint meeting and collaboration tools

Google presentations
Present Live
Slide Live
Zoho
Slide Rocket

Free PowerPoint Templates

Microsoft Office Online
Sonia Coleman
Presentation Helper
Indezine
Templatewise
Powered Templates

Convert PowerPoint presentations to video/pdf online

PPT to video

authorSTREAM

PPT to Pdf

http://www.zamzar.com/

Search PowerPoint files online

SlideFinder, SlideWorld,PowerPoint-Search

Free PowerPoint plug-ins(PowerPoint To Flash, Search slides, Insert videos)

Download.com
authorPOINT Lite
SlideShare Ribbon
iSpring Free
authorSTREAM Desktop
SlideFinder
Indezine

Synchronized Audio/video presentation tools

Articulate

authorPOINT

iSpring

Flash SDK

iSpring
Wondershare
Conaito

Slideshare announces World's Best Presentation Contest'09

2009-08-04T03:46:00.000-07:00

Presentation and document sharing website Slideshare has announced World's Best Presentation Contest'09 in collaboration with Adobe Acrobat.

SlideShare World's Best Presentation Contest 2009

View more documents from Amit Ranjan.

To increase presence on social networks, Slideshare has a new rule this year. To choose the finalists, Slideshare will look at tweets and shares on social networks. Hashtag for the contest is #bestpreso.

Prizes

World's Best Presentation Contest

1. Apple MacBook Pro 13-inch worth $1199
2. Amazon Kindle DX worth $489
3. Apple iPhone 3G S worth $199

And 5 Category Prizes: Adobe® Acrobat® 9 Pro software

Special Prizes for Best Acrobat 9 Presentation Details

Grand Prize: HP TouchSmart® laptop and Adobe® Acrobat® 9 Pro software
Runner-up: Adobe® Photoshop® CS4

Judges

Judges are Julie Hansen, COO of Business Insider, Scott Belsky, founder & CEO of Behance, Harry McCracken editor of Technologizer , Guy Kawasaki, David Armano,Padmasree Warrior.

For details visit contest page.

Video support in PowerPoint 2010

2009-08-03T04:22:00.000-07:00

Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 offers great support for videos. Besides letting you insert video files, PowerPoint 2010 has in built facility to let you insert embeds of video sharing websites. Also, with PowerPoint 2010 you will be able convert PowerPoint files in WMV format video files.

Embed videos in PowerPoint 2010

You need not to go go through complex steps of adding shockwave flash object. Just copy video embed from some video sharing website(say YouTube) and click video option provided under insert tab in PowerPoint 2010. Select " Insert video from online video site", paste embed and click insert.

Besides video embeds you can also use some other flash embeds; just try embeds of PowerPoint sharing websites and those embeds will play just like they play on some blog or website.

Convert PowerPoint to video

Video has become one of the most powerful content formats lately. Video content provides you wide range of audience. In today's scenario, if you have to convert your PowerPoint to video, either you have to purchase some PowerPoint to video software or use some online PowerPoint to video website. This all is going to change to some extent with PowerPoint 2010.

PowerPoint 2010 will let you convert your PowerPoint presentations with timings(rehearsed or narrated) in WMV video format. PowerPoint 2010 even converts PowerPoint presentations without timing. You just need to select "Time to spend on each slide". If some slides are having animation effects then total duration of those slides in video will be sum total of animation timings.

Funding time for online presentation websites

2009-07-21T02:31:00.000-07:00

We all have seen success of video sharing websites and now it seems to be turn of presentation websites. There are so many online presentation creation and sharing websites. Most of them have pretty good content as well as user base. SlideRocket and Prezi are two such presentation players who have raised quite good funding over the period.

Prezi lets you break away from the slide-by-slide approach of most presentations. Instead, it allows you to create non-linear presentations where you can zoom in and out of a visual map containing words, links, images, videos, etc. Prezi is quite similar to pptPlex, a Microsoft Office Labs project . Prezi has raised an undisclosed amount in Series A financing from Scandinavian VC firm Sunstone Capital and is adding Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey to its roster of company advisors.

SlideRocket, the online presentation creation solution, announced it received $5 million in Series B funding and that Chuck Dietrich, a former General Manager & Vice President at salesforce.com, has joined the company as CEO.

SlideRocket, similar to 280Slides and Google presentations is a cloud based service which lets you create slideshows online without the need of PowerPoint software. It also lets you collaborate and work in sync with your colleagues. Easy collaboration is also a main highlight of Microsoft PowerPoint 2010.

It will be interesting to see how much market share Microsoft will be able to grab with so many presentation players already in market with ample user base.

Can PowerPoint 2010 jeopardize online presentation creation business model?

2009-07-15T01:44:00.000-07:00

With three main objectives of 'Work anywhere with Office Web applications', 'Collaborate better with co-authoring' and 'Bring ideas to life with video and picture editing', Microsoft is all set to launch office 2010 next year.

Microsoft office along with Microsoft SharePoint 2010/ Windows Live account and Office Communicator 2007 R2 and Office Communications Server 2007 R2 will be a great tool offering almost all features being offered by online presentation creation websites. Google presentations seems to stand nowhere against PowerPoint 2010. Can PowerPoint 2010 be a threat to online presentation creation websites? Though the question makes some sense yet it will be too early to look for an answer.

As per Microsoft

Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 delivers more new and exciting ways to create and share dynamic presentations with any audience. Improved audio and visual capabilities help you tell a crisp, cinematic story that’s as easy to create as it is powerful to watch. New, easy-to-use tools help you polish your presentations to help you keep your audience’s attention even longer. Almost-anywhere access to PowerPoint 2010 from your Smartphone or the Web allows you to simultaneously work on presentations with other people. Simply put, it’s never been easier to express your ideas with PowerPoint 2010. Its Backstage view replaces the file menu, a co-authoring capability streamlines collaboration, and the ability to broadcast slideshows doesn't require viewers to have PowerPoint installed.

Embedding video in PowerPoint

With PowerPoint 2010, you can effectively engage your audience by embedding and personalizing videos within your presentation. The embedded video file can be customized by adding video triggers and styles directly within PowerPoint 2010 using inbuilt basic video edit tool, saving your time and money. You can also save your PowerPoint files in wmv, compress them and share.

Awesome visual effects

PowerPoint 2010 has new Smart art graphics, more animation effects, and advance transition effects. With PowerPoint 2010, you can easily create powerful visuals and apply professional-looking designs to photos and text, and to videos in PowerPoint. From new and improved picture-editing effects such as saturation and watercolor to video editing and formatting capabilities such as trimming, fades and reflections, Office 2010 opens up a world of design options to give life to your ideas.

Here are few videos demonstrating features and capabilities of PowerPoint 2010:

PowerPoint 2010

Uploaded on authorSTREAM by Slideshows | Upload your own presentation

Insert YouTube videos in PowerPoint with authorSTREAM Desktop

2009-07-14T01:19:00.000-07:00

Online PowerPoint sharing website authorSTREAM, today released authorSTREAM desktop, a plugin for PowerPoint 2007 (ribbon). Similar to SlideFinder which lets you search and insert PowerPoint slides, authorSTREAM desktop lets you search and insert YouTube videos and images in your PowerPoint file from within PowerPoint. So now with authorSTREAM desktop you don't have to remember and follow complex steps to Embed videos in PowerPoint files.

authorSTREAM desktop is pretty simple to use and contrary to SlideFinder their image and video search interface seems to be a part of PowerPoint software itself. Here's a video, in which Harman Singh the CEO of authorGEN(Company behind authorSTREAM) demonstrates authorSTREAM desktop:

Using authorSTREAM Desktop

Uploaded on authorSTREAM by authorSTREAM | Upload your own presentation

authorSTREAM's closest competitor SlideShare too allows you to embed YouTube videos in presentations uploaded on their website. You have to edit your presentation after your presentation gets converted on SlideShare. This video is inserted as a separate flash file after slide number selected by you. So if you download the PowerPoint file from SlideShare, there will be no slide having YouTube video.

YouTube videos embedded using authorSTREAM desktop not only play fine on authorSTREAM but they even work fine in PowerPoint slide show. This means you can share PowerPoint presentations having YouTube embed inserted using authorSTREAM desktop, through emails too. You can have text as well as YouTube video on same slide and next/ back arrows on player also work fine. See it yourself below:

Justin Ezarik

Uploaded on authorSTREAM by caliber | Upload your own presentation

You can insert YouTube videos in PowerPoint files manually too as explained here and authorSTREAM handles that too.

authorSTREAM recently changed their tagline to "Do More with PowerPoint" and their recent updates for PowerPoint to video, Channels, and authorSTREAM desktop validates that.

Search PowerPoint presentations from within the PowerPoint

2009-07-09T04:37:00.000-07:00

PowerPoint search engine SlideFinder has released Add-in for PowerPoint 2007 which lets you search the web for presentations and slides from within PowerPoint. The SlideFinder Add-in also enables you to add the slides you find to your current presentation.

Download Add-in from http://tools.slidefinder.net/addin-en.aspx and follow steps below to search PowerPoint presentations and insert slides from search results to your presentation.

Install SlideFinder Addin on your machine

Click on search for Slides. A warning message about copyright will appear. Presentations are searched from web so they may be copyrighted. Make sure that slides which you download and insert are not copyright protected.

Clicking ok will open a new window to search PowerPoint files which doesn't seem to be a good idea. SlideFinder should have kept search box somewhere within PowerPoint window. Opening a new window is as good as searching in a browser. On the top of that Google ads make the search experience more unpleasant.

Search for any keyword and SlideFinder will display PowerPoint presentations available on the web for download. Select the slide(Tic the check box) which may fit in your presentation and click "Add Slide to presentation" button.

SlideFinder will download and insert slide in current presentation. Certainly SlideFinder has brought web within PowerPoint. There is still room for improvement in Add-in but the idea of PowerPoint search within PowerPoint is brilliant and will help PowerPoint users a lot.

authorSTREAM now lets you convert PowerPoint files in WMV, AVI ,FLV or MP4

2009-07-08T22:09:00.000-07:00

authorSTREAM the only online PowerPoint sharing platform converting PowerPoint files in video today updated its PowerPoint to video conversion engine. Now you can convert your PowerPoint presentation with timings(set to advance at its own) in different video formats like WMV, AVI, MP4 or FLV.

PowerPoint presentations below 5 minutes duration can be converted for free only in MP4 format and will have authorSTREAM watermark on it. To convert your presentation in file type other than MP4 or to convert a presentation above 5 minutes duration and without authorSTREAM watermark, you have to purchase video credits. One video credits costs $2 and can be used to convert single PowerPoint presentation to video of maximum 45 minutes duration. You can find more details at authorSTREAM blog or FAQs.

Insert or embed videos in PowerPoint files

2009-07-05T05:22:00.000-07:00

Similar to audio, video can be inserted in two ways in PowerPoint. Either you can insert video from your computer or you can use flash embed of some video sharing website like YouTube, Vimeo, Revver etc. Contrary to audio, embedding of video file is not possible in PowerPoint. Video files are always linked and play from the path stored in PowerPoint slide.

Steps to insert movie file/video in PowerPoint

1. In Normal view, click the slide to which you want to add a movie.
2. On the Insert tab, in the Media Clips group, click the arrow under Movie.

3. Do one of the following:

Movie from File, locate the folder that contains the file, and then double-click the file that you want to add.

Click Movie from Clip Organizer, scroll to find the clip that you want in the Clip Art task pane (task pane: A window within an Office program that provides commonly used commands. Its location and small size allow you to use these commands while still working on your files.), and then click it to add it to the slide.

For more details visit Microsoft office online help.

Embed YouTube, Vimeo or Revver videos in PowerPoint
Problem with inserting video in PowerPoint is that when you share such PowerPoint files; video don't ship with PowerPoint file until you send a zip file containing video file and zip file having a video is always so big in size that sharing it through email is almost impossible. In most cases users are not aware of the fact that video file which plays fine in PowerPoint sideshow on their machine will never play on other machines until video file is sent along with PowerPoint and is saved on same path(say c:\desktop\video\abc.wmv) to which slide refers to(i.e. the path from where original video was inserted by creator of presentation).

Solution:

Upload videos to be used in PowerPoint on some video sharing websites like YouTube, Revver, or Vimeo. Get the video URL from video sharing website and insert in your PowerPoint as described in Presentation below and share:

Embed Videos in PowerPoint Presentations

Uploaded on authorSTREAM by Slideshows | Upload your own presentation

Alternatively you can use authorSTREAM Desktop to embed YouTube or Vimeo videos in slides. authorSTREAM desktop works well with PowerPoint 2007 and PowerPoint 2010.

PowerPoint presentations on Michael Jackson

2009-06-29T21:51:00.000-07:00

Such was the impact of Michael Jackson's sudden death that Google stopped responding for a while. Twitter has to remove 'Trending Topics'. Every website, blog, TV channel was just talking about MJ.

PowerPoint creators also paid tribute to MJ in their own style by creating some great presentations. Few presentations embedded below will let you have glimpse of MJ's life.

Michael Jackson Life and Times

Uploaded on authorSTREAM by islides | Upload your own presentation

Michael Jackson (August 29, 1958 – June 25, 2009) – YOU are my life

View more documents from Krudang Krangdu.

SlideShare now let you import Google docs

2009-06-26T04:26:00.000-07:00

Online PowerPoint and document sharing website SlideShare today released a new feature of importing your Google presentations and documents into SlideShare account. You just need to click on the “Import from Google Docs” link on the upload page, enter your Google username and password, select the file and click “Import to SlideShare”. See more details at SlideShare blog.

Creating icons/logo using PowerPoint 2007

2009-06-22T02:58:00.001-07:00

Many a times, you may have felt helpless when it comes to get an appealing icon/logo for your website/blog/profile etc. Major concerns are: you don't know Adobe Photoshop, you can't afford buying Photoshop license or your budget don't allow you to hire a professional designer.

Well, in all such situations Microsoft PowerPoint can come to your rescue. You can create professional looking icon/logo using PowerPoint and Paint. Here is the video which demonstrates how you can create awesome icons using PowerPoint and Microsoft paint.

Icon thus created was used on http://www.youtube.com/user/yutubemedia

Embedding or linking audio files in PowerPoint

2009-06-18T05:48:00.000-07:00

Do you always wonder why audio inserted in your PowerPoint presentation disappear when you play presentation on a computer other than the one where it was created? Do you fail to understand why online PowerPoint sharing websites like authorSTREAM, slideboom or slideshare (BTW they don't support audio inserted in PowerPoint file) fail to play audio inserted in your Presentation?

Answer to these questions lie in the way audio was inserted in PowerPoint. There are two methods of inserting audio files in PowerPoint presentations. Either you can embed audio in PowerPoint itself or link the audio file.

As per Microsoft

"Main differences between embedded (embedded object: Information (object) contained in a source file and inserted into a destination file. Once embedded, the object becomes part of the destination file. Changes you make to the embedded object are reflected in the destination file.) sounds (objects) (object: A table, chart, graphic, equation, or other form of information. Objects created in one application, for example spreadsheets, and linked or embedded in another application are OLE objects.) and linked (linked object: An object that is created in a source file and inserted into a destination file, while maintaining a connection between the two files. The linked object in the destination file can be updated when the source file is updated.) sounds are where they are stored and how you update them after you put them in your presentation. Embedded files are stored within the presentation, and linked files are stored outside the presentation."

In case of linked files, PowerPoint always play audio from the linked location of file( say "c:\my Documents\test.wmv"). When you play PowerPoint file having linked audio on some other machine, PowerPoint file tries to locate and play audio file from linked path i.e. "c:\my Documents\test.wmv". As there is no such audio file at the path specified on new machine so audio fails to play. Embedded audio file is contained in PowerPoint itself so audio will play on online presentation sharing websites or on other computers.

Audio file of size more than 50 MB will always be linked. You may have to set audio file size from advance options so that audio file below 50 MB is always embedded. Follow steps below:

See videos on how to insert audio in PowerPoint file.

You can visit links below to understand difference between linked and embedded audio:

Office 2003

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/powerpoint/HA010348231033.aspx

office 2007

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/powerpoint/HA012303071033.aspx

Is online presentation creation better than Microsoft PowerPoint?

2009-06-11T22:34:00.000-07:00

In the last few years a number of products have been launched to create presentations online. Google presentations, 280Slides, Slide Rocket, Zoho Show and Preezo to name but a few. Latest in the list is Adobe Acrobat Presentations. With so many products in the market, it's difficult to decide which one you should use? Chris Pirillo has something to say on "What's better than Microsoft PowerPoint?"

Searching downloadable PowerPoint files is now easy

2009-06-10T09:37:00.000-07:00

Do you find it difficult to search PowerPoint files using populor search engines like Google, Yahoo or Bing because you don't know exact search operator to use? Now it's time for you to cheer up because there are search engines dedicated to PowerPoint. So no more search operators to remember, just type your search creteria and download your favourite PowerPoint file.

PowerPoint-search.com searches PowerPoint files as per keyword enetered. You can also see last 10 searches.

Slide Finder not only searches PowerPoint files as per keyword enetered but also provide you information about file size, thumbnail preview of all slides and presentations similar to your search keyword.

SlideWorld let you rate any PowerPoint presentation and displays total number of downloads for that particular presentation.

You can give a try to all of these PowerPoint search engines and choose the one which finds best PowerPoint according to keywords used in search.

Some other resources from where you can download PowerPoint files

http://www.nebo.edu/misc/learning_resources/ppt/
http://www.authorstream.com/tag/download/
http://www.Slideshare.net
http://xibyshows.blogspot.com/
http://powerpointfun.blogspot.com/
http://powerpointshows.blogspot.com

Add audio to your PowerPoint file

2009-06-08T06:21:00.001-07:00

Addition of audio or video to your PowerPoint can have amazing effect on your target audience. Here are few embeds demonstrating 'how to add narration?' to your PowerPoint.

Help with narrations

Uploaded on authorSTREAM by TechGuy | Upload your own presentation

Adding Audio Narration to PowerPoint

View more OpenOffice presentations from delhionlineeducation

Replace PowerPoint feature from authorSTREAM

2009-06-04T23:54:00.000-07:00

authorSTREAM, the online PowerPoint presentation sharing platform today released a new feature called 'Replace PowerPoint. Now you can replace your current PowerPoint file with a new one. Big relief to those who want to replace few slides of presentation or complete presentation altogether due to some typo or outdated information. Feature comes in handy when you have embedded presentation on your website or blog. As soon as your re uploaded presentation gets converted, embeds will start showing new content or slides.

You just need to click the ‘Replace PowerPoint’ option provided under Actions on Dashboard or on ‘Your Presentations’ and click on the link marked ‘Replace PowerPoint’ available beside the presentation thumbnail and upload the updated presentation. Best part is that during the conversion process your presentation will work fine on authorSTREAM or in embeds. Also comments, views, tags, favorites, likes, presentation URL etc will remain same. As your presentation may have new slides,content so you need to recreate video of your presentation or send it to YouTube again after successful replacement so that you can reach wide range of audience.

See more details at authorSTREAM blog.

SlideBoom now allows Open Office Documents

2009-06-04T17:23:00.001-07:00

SlideBoom, a PowerPoint sharing platform similar to authorSTREAM and Slideshare now supports Open Document Presentation (ODP) files. ODP format is used in free office suites like OpenOffice, NeoOffice or IBM Lotus Symphony and proprietary software packages like Sun Microsystems’ StarOffice.

They recently also launched presentation statics feature for premium users very close to authorSTREAM's Presentation Analytics feature offered as a part of premium membership.

Make flowcharts in PowerPoint

2009-06-03T20:35:00.001-07:00

With Powerpoint you can create effective presentation materials but most users are not familiar with the fundamentals of creating flowcharts. Flowcharts are good for showing step by step process using different kinds of labeled boxes and arrows.

Below are the steps on how to make a flowchart:

Step 1: Create a new slide where you want to make your chart (right click on the slides tab and then choose “New Slide” on the menu... read more here

[via http://www.online-tech-tips.com/ms-office-tips/how-to-make-flowcharts-in-powerpoint/]

Preserve memories using PowerPoint

2009-06-01T13:59:00.001-07:00

If you are a big preserver of memories like me, you may also want to make scrapbook based on photos. Involved in such a digital era, photos are usually stored in a digital way. So, digital scrapbooks become a new fun to us.

If you're a beginner and you have PowerPoint, you can easily create digital scrapbook based on digital photos and video footages with it.

A family reunion or any other holidays for that matter can be recorded with such a digital scrapbook....................[via digitalmediaonlineinc.com]

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