Adding Shapes to Slide

---

PowerPoint supports the addition of shapes in presentations. It also includes Shapes like basic geometric shapes, flowchart components, arrows, callouts, lines and other predefined special shapes. These shapes also double up as text boxes as they support adding text to them directly. Besides, you can also use these shape to crop pictures to shape.

Given below are the steps to add a shape in PowerPoint.

Step 1 − Go to the Illustrations group under the Insert Tab.

Step 2 − Click on the Shapes dropdown to view the available shapes.

Step 3 − Select the shape you want to insert. This will change the cursor to a + sign.

Step 4 − Click and drag on the slide to create the shape. As you drag, the shape will show up on the slide. Continue to drag and adjust the size and the symmetry of the shape.

Inserting a Screenshot

---

One of the interesting features about PowerPoint is that you can insert a screenshot of one of your applications into your presentation without having to use any other program. Given below are the steps to insert a screenshot.

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

Step 2 − Click on the Screenshot dropdown to look at full screen snaps of all the applications running on your computer’s desktop.

Step 3 − Select one of the screenshots to add it directly on to your presentation.

Step 4 − If you do not want the entire screen and just a portion of it, you can use the Screen Clipping option.

 

The Screen Clipping option will automatically move the focus to the program immediately below PowerPoint. So while using this option, ensure that you have the right screen behind the PowerPoint program.

Format Added Pictures

---

PowerPoint offers many image formatting features that can help shape the image to suit your needs. The picture formatting features in PowerPoint can be accessed from the Format ribbon once the picture is selected. The formatting features are grouped under the Arrange and Size section in the Formatribbon.

Picture Arrangement Features

The following table describes various picture arrangement features available in PowerPoint.

S.No	Feature & Description
1	Bring Forward Moves the picture layer up. Bring Forward moves the picture up by one layer, Bring to Front makes the picture layer the topmost
2	Send Backward Moves the picture layer down. Send Backward moves the picture down by one layer, Send to Back makes the picture layer the bottommost
3	Selection Pane This opens up the Selection Pane sidebar where you get a better idea of the layers and can work with arrangements better.
4	Align Aligns the picture with various references in the slide.
5	Group Allows multiple images to be grouped together to create on single object or ungroup them to split them into individual pictures.
6	Rotate Rotate picture by a specific angle.

Picture Sizing Features

The following table describes various picture sizing features available in PowerPoint.

S.No	Feature & Description
1	Crop Allows you to crop the image. The cropping can be freehand, based on aspect ratio or any of the predefined shapes.
2	Shape Height/ Width Used to change the height and width of the image. When you edit these parameters from the ribbon, the aspect ratio is always maintained.

Editing Added Pictures

---

PowerPoint supports images or pictures as content and offers some standard image editing features. The picture editing features in PowerPoint can be accessed from the Format ribbon once the picture is selected. The editing features are grouped under the Adjust and Picture Styles section in the Format ribbon.

Image Adjustments

The following table describes various picture adjustment features available in PowerPoint.

S.No	Feature & Description
1	Remove Background Automatically removes the unwanted sections in the image. This is similar to the magic tool in some of the other photo editing programs. You can click on different regions on the image to define the area to be removed.
2	Correction Allows you to change the brightness and contrast on the image and also change the image sharpness.
3	Color Allows you to change the color on the image by changing the saturation or tone. You can also make the image monochromatic based on different hues to match the theme of your presentation.
4	Artistic Effects Adds artistic effects to the image like plastic wrap, glowing edges, etc.
5	Compress Picture This can change the image resolution to manage the file size.
6	Change Picture Replaces the current picture with a different one.
7	Reset Picture Removes all the adjustments done on the image.

Picture Styles

The following table describes various picture style features available in PowerPoint.

S.No	Feature & Description
1	Picture Border Manages the picture border - color, weight and style.
2	Picture Effects Adds effects to the picture like reflection, shadow, etc.
3	Convert to SmartArt Graphic Transforms the picture into the selected SmartArt.
4	Quick Styles Pre-defined styles with different picture borders and effects.

Add Pictures to Slide

---

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

---

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

---

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.