Present Beyond Measure

Act II Intermission

You made it through Act II! I hope this phase has shown you exactly why PowerPoint (and other tools) are an unfortunate scapegoat for boring and ugly presentations and how to avoid blaming your slide deck for zombie disasters.

Let's review the steps you just learned in the “Design Slides” phase:

• Understand why well-designed slides are crucial to success.
• Familiarize yourself with preattentive attributes and the Gestalt principles.
• Learn how to organize your visual space.
• Declutter your slides of slide fluff and embrace white space.
• Create single ideas per slide and stop using walls of bullet text.
• Use the Story Point Solution in lieu of busy bullet slides.
• Create hype with your typography.
• Harness the emotional power of real imagery and learn how to use it right.
• Use simple animation techniques for strategic revealing of the story.

Saddle yourself up for the part you’ve probably been chomping at the bit to get to: data visualization and visual storytelling, woohoo!

Since I’m concluding a phase on new design practices and habits, it’s fitting to apply the idea of small moves to everything you’ve just learned.

As you begin to incorporate each practice into your toolbox, observe how challenging it was to apply and how it seemed to impact your presentation success. Don’t overwhelm yourself and go at a pace that suits your learning schedule and your sanity.

It’s important to remember that honing and perfecting your craft can be a long game.

Just keep it moving. ...