Good Design in PowerPoint

1. Good Design in PowerPoint The Cain Project in Engineering and Professional Communication ENGINEERING SERIES

2. Making Use of Design Elements • Design elements allow reinforcement • Strategic choices create interest • Practice develops judgment • Analyze what you like • Borrow with what you like • Use choices coherently

3. Templates Design rules Colors Fonts Effects and transitions Text Graphics Special effects Your Design Options

4. Choosing a Good Template • What is the mood/image you want to convey? • Very dark or very light backgrounds work well • Simple backgrounds work well

5. Select Design Template Click OK To Choose an Existing Template Step 1:

6. To Choose an Existing Template Step 2: Select the one you want to use Hit “OK”

7. To Design Your Own Template • Write down words to suggest the image you want your choices to convey • Such as “technical,” “professional,” “strong” • Choose a background color appropriate for the room and lighting • Choose a font and colors that • match your image choice • yield strong contrast and legibility • Follow basic design rules

8. Palatino or Times New Roman suggests Financial Business Accents Helvetica suggests Process Industries Accents Futura suggests Environmental Firms Accents Typical Font and Color Combinations

9. Basic Design Rules Rule 1: Use blank space to group or separate items Rule 2: Use visual balance to please the eye Rule 3: Create contrast to make objects stand out

10. Organize with Blank Space Identify groups of items separated by Blank Space in this Web Site • Blank Space: An empty area • Directs viewer’s eyes • “Pushes” or groups items and separates them from others

11. Use Contrast to Group, Emphasize Contrast by font, color, or size Contrast occurs when 2 elements are different Engineering contrast should be functional, not decorative

12. Choose Colors for Legibility Well-lit room use light background/ dark text and visuals Dimly-lit room use dark background/ light text and visuals Strong light reduces contrast on dark background

13. Avoid Vibrating Colors Bright complementary colors that are close to each other in intensity “vibrate” or reduce legibility

14. Learn Color Basics at Poynter! http://www.poynterextra.org/cp/

15. Good for print E Serif (“tail”) Such as Times New Roman Good for projecting E Sans Serif (uniform shaft width) Such as Arial Choose Easy-to-Read Fonts

16. Font Aspects Affect Legibility • Contrast between background and text • Uniform shaft width • Size of font • Type treatment of font S S 32 pts Times Arial Drop Shadows Reduce Legibility

17. Crawl in Choose Effects to Support Points • Avoid slow moving or fancy effects: • Swivel • Spiral • Effects should have a point / support your concept • Don’t overuse special effects • Keep effects and transitions consistent

18. Use Text Properly • Use keywords and phrases instead of sentences • Avoid “orphans” • This is an example of an “orphan” • Be consistent in your capitalization • Use grammatical parallelism

19. Your audience... Skims each slide Looks for critical points, not details Needs help reading/seeing text So you . . . Use only essential info Guide their eyes with hierarchy, color Use big. legible fonts and framing blank space Design to Match Audience Action

20. Displaying Text Bullets Short phrases Grammatical parallelism

21. Bullets Help Audience • Skim the slide • See relationships between information points • For example, this is Main Point 1, which leads to... • Sub-point 1 • Sub-point 2 (To get back to previous level: use “promote” or “demote” arrows at top)

22. To Use Bullets • Select the “bulleted list” or “two-column list” slide (from the 12 pre-designed slide formats) • Type a phrase then hit “return” • Type a second phrase, hit “return” then hit “tab” to indent • OR use “promote” or “demote” arrows at top to create a bulleted hierarchy

23. Matching Bullets to Your Image • Go to “format” and then “bullet” • Select the style, color, and size of the bullets you’ll use • OR highlight text you wish to bullet and select the bullet button at top

24. Text Display Tips • Use vivid, concise phrases or imperatives • Write complete sentences only in certain cases: • Hypothesis • Questions

25. Use Parallelism • Put similar ideas in similar forms • Same part of speech • Same type of clause or phrase • Complete sentences • Reinforce with color, type treatment, place on screen

26. Parallel: Use keywords Avoid wordiness Opt for bullets Not Parallel: Use keywords Wordiness is bad You should opt for bullets VERBS Use Parallelism Equivalence • Each verb expresses an action of equivalent importance. • List similar items in the same grammatical form.

27. Revise for Grammatical Parallelism • Not Parallel: Criteria to Assess Alarm System • Price • Effectiveness • How easily the alarm could be installed • Parallel: Criteria to Assess Alarm System • Price • Effectiveness • Ease of installation

28. Parallelism: Your Turn • Make the following list of sub-points parallel: • Reliable data collection relies on • Consistent use of techniques (pipetting, making solutions) • Correctly calibrated equipment, such as balances and pipettors • Researcher bias is minimized (expecting data to fit model; conflict of interest)

29. That was purely gratuitous! Displaying Visuals • Insert needed visuals • Use color • Resize appropriately • Draw attention

30. Resize Images: How to . . . • Click on the visual you wish to resize • Go to “format” and then “object” or “autoshape” • Select “size” • Change size and scale • OR simply click and drag the corners of the image

31. Simplify and Draw Attention http://www.indstate.edu/thcme/mwking/tca-cycle.html

32. Animating: Tips • Custom animation allows you to animate text, visuals, or line work • Custom animation should be used purposefully (and sparingly!) • Animating should help audience comprehend your message • Don’t animate solely for aesthetic purposes

33. Offer Familiar Images First • Offer figure or image familiar to audience first • Technical image next • Water treatment example simplified for government officials

34. Give Technical Images Next • Build toward technical understanding • Sequence: Photo / diagram/ schematic/ cross-sections/other technical drawings • Technical water treatment example

35. Present Images Realistically Don’t distort images

36. Use Legible Graphics • Don’t stretch Web images to the point of graininess • Don’t shrink them to be too small to read

37. Avoid Overused, General Clip-Art

38. Make Choices Work Together • Blank space and balanced items create meaningful organization • Color, contrast, and point size indicate importance and direct viewers’ attention • Text reinforces speaker’s voice but should not overload or distract • Special effects and images indicate relationships and emphasize aspects

39. Rehearse with a Coach • To evaluate how well your visual choices work with your spoken presentation • To make sure images are legible • To test visual aids under expected room conditions

40. Lead through Excellence in Engineering Communication • More resources are available for you • under “Engineering Communication” at Connexions at http://cnx.org • at the Cain Project site at http://www.owlnet.rice.edu/~cainproj • in your course Communication Folder in OWLSPACE.