Power Point® All?in?One Desk Reference For Dummies®

Chapter 3. Putting Diagrams on Slides

In This Chapter

• Creating a diagram

• Repositioning and resizing diagrams

• Laying out and changing the look of diagram shapes

• Changing the appearance of a diagram

• Creating a diagram from shapes

• Using the Equation Editor to construct an equation

Along with charts and tables, diagrams are the best way to present your ideas to an audience. Diagrams clearly show, for example, employees' relationships with one another, product cycles, workflow processes, and spheres of influence. A diagram is an excellent marriage of images and words. Diagrams allow an audience to literally visualize a concept, idea, or relationship.

This chapter explains how PowerPoint diagrams are constructed from SmartArt graphics and how to create a diagram. It shows how to customize diagrams by changing the size of diagrams and diagram shapes, adding and removing shapes, and changing shapes' colors. You also discover how to change the direction of a diagram and enter the text. Finally, this chapter shows how to create a diagram from scratch with shapes and connectors and how to put an equation on a slide by taking advantage of the Equation Editor.

The Basics: Creating SmartArt Diagrams

In PowerPoint, diagrams are made from SmartArt graphics. These diagram graphics are “interactive” in the sense that you can move, alter, and write text on them. In other words, you can use them to construct diagrams. Because SmartArt graphics are based on the XML format (Book I, Chapter 2 explains what XML ...