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

PFC Pro 2007

I have been fortunate enough to beta test and enjoy using the PFC Media add-ins since their inception. For those unfamiliar PFC stands for “Plays For Certain”. If you look at my top 10 recommended PPT add-ins on the TLC Creative website you will see PFC Media listed. The developer goes to enormous effort to assure this software works!

Just a few weeks ago the official 2007 compatible version of PFC Pro was released. If you add movies to presentations, I definitely endorse this as the best solution available. Click here for the PFC website.

Kathy Jacobs’ full review of PFC Pro 2007 is posted here.

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-11-17T15:59:51-08:00May 19th, 2007|Software/Add-Ins|

PointClips.com = Great PPT Images

Jeff Koke of PointClips recently emailed me a few samples of their PowerPoint images. Pointclips offers “hand-crafted artwork and icons, built in PowerPoint.”

What impressed me was that not only did I see good quality, but that all were made of grouped vector images (autoshapes) and could be resized and even re-colored as needed! Sure you could (maybe) create all of these images yourself, but why spend hours doing so…

The left image is from PointClips free downloadable sample. On the right is a number of the elements ungrouped – all editable autoshapes!

Individual images for $5 and collections of 50 images for $99. Check them out here.

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-11-17T15:59:28-08:00May 17th, 2007|Resource/Misc, Software/Add-Ins|

Solving PPT 2003 & Vista Problems

Here are the steps to solve the two usability problems with Vista and PPT 2003 described in the previous two posts:

1. Locate the actual .exe for PowerPoint 2003 (C: >> Program Files >> Microsoft Office >> Office 11)

2. Right click the POWERPNT.EXE

3. Go to the COMPATABILITY tab

4. Check the DISABLE VISUAL THEMES option

5. Click OKAY and launch PowerPoint 2003

So I can pass along others experiences with Vista, send me an email (link is on the right) letting me know if things do, or do not, work on your computer – or if things work with earlier versions (PPT 2000, XP, etc.).

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-05-11T11:25:02-07:00May 15th, 2007|Software/Add-Ins, Tutorial|

VIsta & PPT 2003 Jumping Objects

A problem I have encountered on Vista computers here (Vista Ultimate) and several others I have spoken with have experienced is truly frustrating. Note: this may be caused by Logitech or Wacom drivers, but I have not had time to test to verify.

In PowerPoint 2003 you go to click on any object – image, text box, autoshape, etc. – and it jumps up and to the right. It’s not your unsteady hand, but a Vista “incompatability.” There is an easy solution up next.

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-11-17T15:58:58-08:00May 13th, 2007|Tutorial|

VIsta & PPT 2003 Adv. Animation Pane

This one almost had me uninstalling Vista. this one invovles the Custom Animation pane open and set to view the Advanced Animation view (where the animations are shown on the timeline).

The problem (seen on multiple computers) is when you click and drag the animation bar to a new position, it basically disapears until you unclick. The result is loosing all ability to easily and accurately fine tune animations.

Again, there is a solution which is in the next post 🙂

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-11-17T15:57:58-08:00May 11th, 2007|Tutorial|

PPT 2003 and Vista

I am now feeling confident running Vista and all of my applications. But it may not be my recommendation for the person unwilling to research hacks and settings to overcome the many situations that come up. On my primary system I have all versions of PowerPoint installed. In many instances client needs determine the software used. Although PowerPoint 2007 is wonderful, I am living in a PowerPoint XP-2003 world.

So if you have upgraded to Windows Vista and use PPT 2003, I have a few fixes to problems. The next two posts will explain usability problems and the third will cure both!

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-11-17T15:57:26-08:00May 9th, 2007|Tutorial|

Informm Presentation Professional Survey

Infocomm is doing a follow-up to last years survey where they collected input from presentation professionals. I entered my info, which took about 6 minutes and the best part is this year they are making the results available to all that participate (must enter an email address at end of survey).

Click here to go to the survey.
Note: All submissions due by May 19th.

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-11-17T15:57:04-08:00May 7th, 2007|PowerPoint, Resource/Misc|

PPT 2003 to 2007 Commands

If you have installed PowerPoint 2007, you know the User Interface with its new Ribbon layout is very different! Keep this Microsoft website handy as you begin to relearn how to do everything.

This interactive Flash page allows you to click and choose almost any feature in a PPT 2003 simulation and then it shows where to find the same command in PPT 2007. Click here to try it.

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-11-17T15:56:05-08:00April 12th, 2007|Software/Add-Ins, Tutorial|

Backstage

On a recent project in Dallas (the one that took me 10.5 hours on the plane to arrive from San Diego (should be a 2.5 hr flight)), the event photographer took this photo and emailed it me – thanks Sal!

The nice side lighting is actually a combination of another laptop monitor and the 12×9 screen in front of me. Despite the great photo, I am as usual working in the dark…

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-11-17T15:55:24-08:00April 10th, 2007|Personal|
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