PowerPoint lessons from a toilet paper ad

I am learning a lot from print advertising. I am learning a lot from the adgoodness blog.

Especially in fund raising presentations I design for startups that are going to pitch to potential investors, I am spending a lot of time/effort in finding that one image or visual concept that really nails down the idea in one big bang. Almost to the extent that the following slides are not required anymore.

Consumer marketing is all about focus on one single and clear consumer benefit. Here is a(nother) great example. Food for thought when designing your next presentation.

Exception: some conceptual stock images can be useful

I am not a big fan of conceptual stock images. Compositions you can do yourself. There are exceptions. See the example below.

3D smoke 'n mirrors - making things disappear from an image in PowerPoint

Stretching part of a picture cannot only be used to create white space, you can also let things disappear pretty much like David Copperfield does:

I used this concept to show how a new technology solution of one of my clients can save a lot of server costs. The zapped servers live on in the reflection in their opposite neighbours though...

More 3D in PowerPoint - obstacle course!

I am continuing to experiment with 3D effects. Here is an alternative idea to visualize a number of obstacles on the road ahead. The last image (click it for a larger picture) contains some explanations on how I did it. If things are not clear feel free to as in the comments.

Does anyone know how to add a smooth moving animation to this, motion paths and re-sizing of objects do not go together?

(Apologies for the image quality as I converted to JPG instead of PNG to improve load times)

Chart concept - rip those PowerPoint shapes apart

A concept I often use to visualize things that are torn apart by opposing forces in PowerPoint presentations.

• Copy a shape (with text)
• Paste special as PNG (4 times, or even more)
• Start cropping the copies

How to strip web text of its formating

Especially for sources in footers I often want to avoid re-typing a complicated title of a document that I found on the web. Copy-paste of the text also copies some of the text formating. Solution: copy the text, paste it into "Note pad" (the standard text editing utility that comes with Windows), select the text again and paste it into a PPT text box. I would be interested if other people have faster solutions for this.

UPDATE: Remy got the solution in the comments: copy any text, then select Edit and "Paste Special" and select unformatted text. Thank you!

UPDATE 2: Glen Turpin recommends PureText (see the comments).Thank you!

Chart concept - distorting text under a magnifying glass in PowerPoint

For when you want to make the point that it is important to pay attention to the small print, or make sure that you did not skip over important hidden information, you can use this concept.

In PowerPoint 2007:

• Get a picture of a magnifying glass from any stock photography site
• Set the font to a Times Roman-like serif font that looks like a book/newspaper
• Cut the sentence in 3
• Increase the size and apply a "can up" distortion to the text inside the magnifying glass (select the text, go into format, text effects, transform, in "warp", 3rd from the left, 4th from the top.

Creating more white space in a picture

Many stock images lack sufficient white space for text. Stretching an image distorts the proportions.

A trick to get around this problem:

1. Copy the image
2. Crop a small strip at the top of the image
3. Flip the strip
4. Stretch the strip only

Experimenting more with typography

I am creating a presentation for a client today that provides a very simple solution for a very complex problem. While moving around the letters in the words I saw an usual pattern:

• completely different meanings
• very similar words...

I need to find more of these.

Humor in your presentation - Add Letters

Add Letters is a site full with image generators. I noticed that they've added a few new images. My personal favorites are those related to The Simpsons. 

(Snow) white space to the extreme

Don't fill up your slides to the last square inch. Instead: leave white space (or negative space). Have the courage to write nothing, take a visual break. This ad for a ski resort takes it to the extreme, but makes its point brilliantly (large image here). Via Ads of the World.

"Open source funding" - business plan competition

I am a bit late in discovering this blog post by Mark Cuban. To enter the competition, post your business plan (presentation) in the open for everyone to steal, and Mark will select one for funding. It will be interesting to see the candidates and ultimately the winning presentation/idea.