The PowerPoint® Blog

I work with PowerPoint on a daily basis and I am very honored to be a Microsoft PowerPoint MVP. We have a talented team of presentation designers at TLC Creative Services and ThePowerPointBlog is our area to highlight PowerPoint tips, tricks, examples and tutorials. Enjoy! Troy Chollar

Resize From Center: PPT vs. Photoshop

A great feature is resizing (enlarging or shrinking) images and autoshapes from their center point.

This feature is available in PowerPoint and Photoshop, but using different key combinations.

PowerPoint: CTRL + SHIFT + adjust with mouse

Photoshop: CTRL + ALT + adjust with mouse

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-09-16T11:10:30-07:00January 23rd, 2009|Tutorial|

Change Photoshop Ruler Measurement

I have been using Photoshop since version 2 (the dark ages of computer design) and just had Lori point out a cool feature I never knew existed!

I know PowerPoint is our topic, but I work in Photoshop virtually everyday preparing images for templates and presentations. In this case I was moving back and forth between PPT images that are measured in pixels and a print layout that was measured in inches. So, I was constantly going into the preferences and changing the rulers until Lori came over and pointed out a better way.

If you RIGHT-CLICK the ruler in Photoshop, it can instantly (and easily) be changed!

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-09-16T11:10:49-07:00January 21st, 2009|Tutorial|

“Just Rename It To .PPSX”… (doesn’t work)

In the old days (PPT 95 through 2003), the only difference between a presentation and a show was the extension. So if you had a presentation and wanted it to open in slideshow view, just the file extension had to be renamed. But in the new world (now 2 years old) of PPT 2007 that does not work.

1. Here is our test file – a .pptx (PPT 2007 presentation)

2. Manually change the file extension (.pptx), changing the “T” to an “S”, and Windows gives this confirmation dialog

3. The icon changes to the PowerPoint Show icon and the extension is .ppsx

4. But when you try to open the file you get this error

5. Why? Because any Office 2007 file with an “x” in the file extension is really a .zip file with lots of individual files inside it. Changing the extension does not directly change the file any longer, so the quick fix of ‘just rename it’ no longer works…

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-09-16T11:11:15-07:00January 19th, 2009|Tutorial|

Group to Adjust Line Length in PPT 07

Okay so the ‘little’ bug in PPT 2007 is driving you crazy! The fix is on the way with SP2 for Office 2007 (really), but you need to adjust the length of your straight lines today.

Here is a PPT 07 line

To adjust length AND maintain same angle you hold down the SHIFT KEY + CLICK on end of line and it zooms out to infinity

One solution is to duplicate the line, group the 2 lines together, then adjust the length of the group

The original line stays in the same position, the length was adjusted, the angle was maintained! Now ungroup and delete the duplicate line leaving you with the adjusted line (made shorter in this example)

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-11-17T12:03:05-08:00January 15th, 2009|Tutorial|

Really Mobile Presentations with the Logic Bolt Projector Cell Phone!

This may make the ‘elevator speech’ and sales presentations even more engaging. T-Mobile will be carrying the Logic Bolt cell phone which looks to have a fully functional projector built into it!

It is being shown at CES this week and features a touch screen interface, quad band GSM, support for Powerpoint, Excel, Word as well as the ability to connect directly to most video sources, and built-in projector that casts images 36-64″+.

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-11-17T12:04:57-08:00January 13th, 2009|Resource/Misc|

The 2009 Christmas Lights

Christmas is a big deal around our house – full of family events, traditions and lots of decorating!

But this is the weekend the holiday lights come down (there’s no snow in Southern California, so no need to wait until March)… 🙁

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-11-17T12:06:33-08:00January 11th, 2009|Personal|

Microsoft CES Keynote(s)

Microsoft is definitely changing the direction and strategies of their software development. I really think the changes will make team projects, asset management and presentations (very excited about the next/future version of PowerPoint!).

Click here to view videos of the major MS Keynote addresses.
27:40 – 44:00 = Demo of Windows 7, Windows Live and Windows Mobile
1:10:00 – 1:19:00 = Overview of key trends and future software demo

And the super-wide, multi-screen staging is really impressive too!

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-11-17T12:07:13-08:00January 9th, 2009|Resource/Misc|

InfoComm Presentation Survey

Each year InfoComm puts out an online survey where you can compare yourself with others in InfoComm International’s annual Presentation Professional survey.

This year it’s shorter, easier and faster to complete. Whether you’re one of many in a corporate setting, or a one-person shop wearing all the hats, see how you compare in the skills you have and the challenges you face. Best of all, all participants receive a report of the full survey results.

Click here to take the survey.

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-11-17T12:07:39-08:00January 7th, 2009|Resource/Misc|

Who Is Ric B ???

As we start off 2009 what better time to introduce one of the best people at Microsoft I interact with. For all that use PowerPoint you want to know and acknowledge at least one person at Microsoft – Ric B.

Ric Bretscheider has been at Microsoft for over 15 years with nearly all of that time spent on the PowerPoint development team (starting with the PowerPoint IV – PPT 2007 is version XII/12). He is the Lead Program Manager for PowerPoint and has been a huge influence in listening to end users and steering the program to address our real world needs (and if you don’t like PowerPoint – you would dislike it even more if it were not for the efforts of Ric B! )

Many contributed to his 15 year anniversary with presentations, notes and videos. This one is one of the few that made it to public domain and does a good job of giving a look at Ric B.

Click here to view.

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-11-17T12:08:18-08:00January 5th, 2009|Resource/Misc|
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