Posts Tagged ‘PowerPoint 2010’

Getting Started With Video Backgrounds

Tuesday, November 29th, 2011

A new Getting Started video tutorial exploring how to use our video backgrounds.

Note: Due to limitations in older versions of PowerPoint, video backgrounds are designed to be used in PowerPoint 2010, or PowerPoint 2011 (Mac) or Keynote 09 (Mac).

Covered in this video:

  • Download and Insert a Video Background in PowerPoint
  • Using the Selection Pane to select or hide items on a slide
  • Using the Animation Pane to control the visibility of items on a slide over time.

View all our video backgrounds for PowerPoint.

Create a Video from your Presentation

Tuesday, October 25th, 2011

We often receive the question, what is the best way to deliver my animated presentation to someone on another computer who doesn’t have PowerPoint or Keynote?

While there are several options available for converting a PowerPoint presentation into a format that can be watched anywhere. Probably the best option when dealing with a presentation containing animation, video or sound is to convert the entire presentation to a video file.

PowerPoint 2010 makes this easy with a Save As Windows Media Video function directly as an option when you save the presentation.  Many of the videos on our website were originally saved as .WMV files from PowerPoint 2010.  Keynote 09 also has an Export feature that allows you to save your presentation as a easily watched Quicktime video.

Here is a sample video from PowerPoint 2010:

After you have the final video, you could easily use a service like YouTube to display your final presentation video.

If you are using a different version of PowerPoint, you can still save your final presentation as a video by using a screen capture program.  I use Microsoft Expression Encoder 4′s Screen Capture program to record my video tutorials. If your presentations are less than 10 minutes long, you can get by with the free version of Microsoft Encoder 4.

For Mac users not using Keynote 09, TechSmith, the makers of Camtasia, has a nice screen recorder called Jing.  You can record up to 5 minutes with the free version.

Here is more on creating a video of your presentation from Microsoft Office’s blog.

PC and Mac Cross-Platform Templates.

Monday, November 29th, 2010

We’ve had several questions about  creating an animated PowerPoint on Mac computer and then playing it on a PC and vice-versa.   There has been a long running compatibility problem with video formats playing consistently across both platforms.  PowerPoint on the PC favored Windows Media Video (.WMV) and the Mac liked Quicktime (.MOV).  This was always a big drawback to using video in PowerPoint.

Enter a cool free plug-in for Quicktime on the Mac.  Flip4Mac enables WMV files to be played by Quicktime on a Mac.

Flip4Mac is free and distributed by Microsoft.  Here is the link:

Download Flip4Mac Here.

The Flip4Mac wmv plug-in will allow PowerPoint 2008 and 2011 users the ability to use our PowerPoint 2007 and 2010 templates.  This is a great way to make cross-platform compatible presentations and retain the animations for both PC and Mac users.

Combine Slides from Multiple PowerPoint Templates

Wednesday, November 3rd, 2010

We’ve had questions about the possibility of combining several of our templates into one presentation.  Essentially, how do you mix and match slides from different animated templates?

It’s actually very easy to do if you are using PowerPoint 2007 or newer.  I’ve put together a video tutorial about how to use the “Reuse Slides” function in PowerPoint 2010 and PowerPoint 2007 to combine slides from various templates.

Click Play to watch Video Tutorial

Note For Combining Several Animated Templates Together.

Remember that the more animated templates you combine the larger your presentation will become.  A number of video files will make your presentation quite bulky.  This could be a problem if you are distributing the completed presentation.

Please leave a comment if you find this tutorial helpful or have any questions.

You can download the templates used in this video here.

Mac PowerPoint 2008 and 2011 instructions.

In Mac PowerPoint, inserting slides from other presentations or templates work pretty much the same way but the command is labeled differently.  The function is located under the “Insert” menu.  Look for Insert/Slides From/Other Presentations.  See screen shot below:

Insert slide from other presentation Mac PowerPoint

Insert Slides from other presentations in Mac PowerPoint 2008 and 2011

In the slide finder, be sure to check “Keep Design of Original Slide” to retain the formatting, animations and other graphic elements.  Otherwise PowerPoint will only copy the text and not slides design.

Insert Slides from other Presentations

Check Keep Design of Original Slides

Templates Won’t Open in PowerPoint 2010

Wednesday, October 6th, 2010

This post addresses a bug some people are having with PowerPoint 2010 and presentation files and templates which have been downloaded from the Internet.

Behavior:

A .PPT or .PPTX file downloaded from the Internet will not open up in PowerPoint 2010.  PowerPoint 2010 gives the error: “PowerPoint found a problem with content”

This error occurs because some browsers flag a file downloaded from the Internet as potentially dangerous and set a security block on it.  In some cases, PowerPoint 2010 does not know how to handle the security block.

If this is affecting you , the good news is there is an easy work around.  After you have downloaded the file, follow these quick steps.

1.Find the icon for the downloaded file, right click on it and choose “Properties” from the menu that appears.

Right-click on PowerPoint file and choose Properties

2. In the Properties Dialog Box that appears, look at the bottom of the window to see if there is a security block present.  Click “Unblock” and then Apply.

Click Unblock to remove the security block

3. Open the file in PowerPoint 2010 and enjoy!

From what I can tell this affects only some PowerPoint 2010 users, and I would think that the bug will be fixed in a future update for PowerPoint 2010.  A special thanks to PresenterMedia member Jason N. for bringing this to our attention.

Download animated templates for PowerPoint 2010.