Add Pictures to Slide

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PowerPoint supports multiple content types including images or pictures. With regards to pictures PowerPoint classifies them into two categories −

• Picture − Images and photos that are available on your computer or hard drive
• Clip Art − Online picture collection that you can search from the clip art sidebar

Although their sources are different, both these types can be added and edited in similar fashion. Given below are the steps to add picture to a slide.

Step 1 − Go to the Images group in the Insert ribbon.

Step 2 − Click on Picture to open the Insert Picture dialog and add a picture to the slide.

Step 3 − In this dialog, you have three sections: to the left corner, you have folders that can be browsed, the section in the center shows the subfolders and files in the selected folder and to the right, you can have a preview of the selected image.

Step 4 − Select the image you want and click Open to add the picture to the slide.

Step 5 − To add online pictures, click on Clip Art and search for keywords in the Clip Art sidebar.

Step 6 − Once you have the clipart you want to use, double-click on the image to add it to the slide.

Save Design Template

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One of the best features of PowerPoint is that you can create slide masters and then save them as templates to be reused later. There are different aspects of a design which can be created and saved to ensure you can reuse the hard work you spent on creating the first copy.

Given below are the steps to save design templates.

Step 1 − Create a new design template from the Slide Master view. Depending on your needs, this template can have different colors, images, logos or symbols included in the master slide and the layout templates.

Step 2 − Go to the Edit Theme group under the Slide Master ribbon.

Step 3 − Navigate to Edit Themes > Themes > Save Current Theme…

Step 4 − In the Save Current Theme dialog, enter the Theme name and click Save.

Step 5 − This template is now saved and available on your PowerPoint design template view to be applied to any presentation.

Using Slide Master

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Slide master is simple way of applying changes to the entire slide. Every presentation has at least one slide master, but you can have more than one. Using features like copy/ paste and format painting you can make changes to different sections within the presentation to make them look similar, however, if you want to use a theme and background throughout the slide, using the slide master is a simpler and more graceful way of approaching it.

Given below are the steps to customize your slide master.

Step 1 − Go to the Master Views group under the View ribbon.

Step 2 − Click on Slide Master to open the Slide Master Ribbon. The top most slide in the left sidebar is the Master slide. All the slides within this master template will follow the settings you add on this master slide.

Step 3 − You can make changes to the master slide in terms of the theme, design, font properties, position and size of the title and other content using the remaining ribbons which are still accessible.

Step 4 − While PowerPoint provides some default slide layouts, you can create your own layouts by clicking on the "Insert Layout" in the Edit Master section of the Slide Master ribbon.

Step 5 − You can add content placeholders to the slide layouts using the "Insert Placeholder" in the Master Layout group under the Slide Master ribbon. Under the Placeholder dropdown, you can either create a generic content placeholder or specify the kind of content you want in that placeholder.

Step 6 − You can apply different themes, background and page setup settings to all the slides from the master slide

Step 7 − You can also customize individual slide layouts to be different from the master slide using the menu options available with the layouts.

Apply Formatting

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One of the most powerful tools in Microsoft Office is the application of formatting feature. This feature basically lets you define the right format once and apply the same to a series of objects in the rest of the presentation or any other file. While working with large presentations or just working on slides for a long time, if you ever need to make a change in the style and want it applied across multiple content this is the tool to use.

The following are the steps to apply formatting to your presentation −

Step 1 − Select the content you want to copy the formatting from.

Step 2 − Go to the Clipboard group under the Home ribbon.

Step 3 − Click on the Format Painter icon.

Step 4 − Select the content you want to format.

Here are some key aspects about the Format Painter −

• If you click on the Format Painter icon just once, the formatting will be copied just once.

• If you click on the Format Painter icon twice quickly, you can copy the formatting multiple times.

• If you want to copy just the text formatting and not the paragraph features, ensure that you select just the sample text and not the entire paragraph.

• If you want to copy paragraph and font formatting, you must select the entire paragraph.

Borders and Shades

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One can change the borders and shading for most of the content in PowerPoint 2010. Let’s see how it is done

Applying Borders

The following are the steps that will help you apply borders in your presentation.

Step 1 − Select the object (text box, image, chart, picture, etc.) to which you want to apply the border.

Step 2 − Go to the Drawing group under the Home ribbon.

Step 3 − Click on the Shape Outline to choose the border settings.

Step 4 − Use the color palette to choose the border color. You can choose More Outline Colors to get access to additional color choices

Step 5 − Use the Weight dropdown to define the thickness of the border.

Step 6 − Use the Dashes option to define the border style.

Applying Shades

The following steps will help you apply shades to your presentation.

Step 1 − Select the object (text box, shape, chart, etc.) to which you want to apply the shades.

Step 2 − Go to the Drawing group under the Home ribbon.

Step 3 − Click on the Shape Fill to choose the shade settings.

Step 4 − Use the color palette to choose the shade color. You can choose More Outline Colors to get access to a choice of colors.

Step 5 − Use the Picture to add a picture as the background rather than a color.

Step 6 − Use the Gradient option to add color gradient in the background. You can use the pre-defined gradients or click on "More Gradients…" to customize the shading with gradient colors.

Step 7 − Use the Texture option to add a pre-defined texture instead of a color shade.

Set Line Spacing

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While dealing with a lot of textual content, especially during projected presentations, it is a good idea to space the lines further apart to improve the readability of the overall content. PowerPoint offers line spacing options to help you change the spacing between lines in the text. Like the indentation, these settings apply at a paragraph level. Given below are the steps to set the line spacing in PowerPoint.

Step 1 − Select the text content to be spaced. You can either select the entire paragraph or just place the cursor within the paragraph.

Step 2 − Go to the Paragraph group under the Home ribbon.

Step 3 − Select one of the line spacing option from the dropdown list to apply one of predefined spacing options.

Step 4 − To customize the spacing, you can click on "Line Spacing Options…" This will launch the Paragraph dialog.

Step 5 − The spacing section in the Paragraph dialog has two settings. The Before and After are the spacing for paragraph as a whole, while Line Spacing is the spacing for lines within the paragraph itself.

Indent Paragraphs

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Relatively long paragraphs can get monotonous to read and this effect is accentuated in slides where the area is smaller and the contents are usually projected. Paragraph indentations can help ease the strain on eyes and also help present the content in a visually appealing way. This chapter will discuss the paragraph indentations available in PowerPoint.

Step 1 − Select the text content to be indented. Unlike most other settings, indentation works at a paragraph level, so regardless of what text you select the indent settings will apply to the entire paragraph. However, if the text box has multiple paragraphs you can have different indentations for different paragraphs.

Step 2 − Go to the Paragraph group under the Home ribbon.

Step 3 − Select one of the indentation options. You will notice that by default the text is set at the lowest indentation level, so you will not be able to decrease it further. You must increase indentation the first time you use it.

Step 4 − Once you have increased the indent, the decrease indent option is enabled.