Captivate Accessibility Hints

Adobe’s Captivate application allows one to create Flash based interactive demos and presentations. PowerPoint materials can also be converted in Flash using Captivate. Captivate has a number of accessibility features in version 3 and 4.

SSB BART Group (2009). Articles>Presentations>Accessibility>Adobe Captivate

Presenting To Win: Top Ten Tips for a Winning Pitch

Top 10 tips for a winning pitch by David McDermott, MD of Edomidas. David McDermott is MD of edoMidas Ltd and is an advisor and international speaker on competitive pitching. His success is founded on thoroughly researched pitching strategies, drawing from experience of the most successful global business pitches.

McDermott, Eliza. Hello Article (2009). Articles>Presentations>Business Communication

Dumb-Dumb Bullets

PowerPoint is not a neutral tool — it is actively hostile to thoughtful decision-making. It has fundamentally changed our culture by altering the expectations of who makes decisions, what decisions they make and how they make them. While this may seem to be a sweeping generalization, I think a brief examination of the impact of PowerPoint will support this statement.

Hammes, T.X. Armed Forces Journal (2009). Articles>Presentations>Software>Microsoft PowerPoint

Rethinking the Design of PowerPoint Slides: Claim-Evidence Structure

One of the criticisms leveled against technical PPT slides is the overuse (perhaps abuse is a better descriptor) of the topic/subtopic organization structure. One of the simple ways PPT presentations can be improved is to follow the BLUF principle. Bottom Line Up Front.

Cuppan, Gregory. Brainery.net (2009). Articles>Presentations>Business Communication>Microsoft PowerPoint

Challenges of Multimedia Self-Presentation: Taking, and Mistaking, the Show on the Road    

One privilege enjoyed by new-media authors is the opportunity to realize representations of Self that are rich textual worlds in themselves and also to engage the wider world, with a voice, a smile, imagery, and sound. Still, closer investigation of multimedia composition practices reveals levels of complexity with which the verbal virtuoso is unconcerned. This article argues that while technology-afforded multimedia tools make it comparatively easy to author a vivid text, it is a multiplicatively more complicated matter to vividly realize and publicize an authorial intention. Based on analysis of the digital story creation process of a youth named 'Steven,' the authors attempt to demonstrate the operation of two forces upon which the successful multimodal realization of the author's intention may hinge: 'fixity' and 'fluidity.' The authors show how, within the process of digital self-representation, these forces can intersect to influence multimodal meaning making, and an author's life, in consequential ways.

Nelson, Mark Evan, Glynda A. Hull and Jeeva Roche-Smith. Written Communication (2008). Articles>Presentations>Education>Multimedia

How to Use Your Fear of Public Speaking to be a Better Speaker

I still get nervous when I have to present in unfamiliar situations. I’m very used to presenting to small groups of people on a course. That’s my comfort zone. But take me outside of that familiar situation, and I’ll get nervous. If I were to get upset about being nervous, I would make it worse. I don’t fight my nerves, I use them. Here are three specific ways in which you can use your fear of public speaking to make you a better public speaker and presenter.

Mitchell, Olivia. Speaking about Presenting (2009). Articles>Presentations

How to Break Your Public Speaking PowerPoint Addiction

Each time I sign up a CIO speaker, I hopefully suggest the option of going slide-free. From the reaction I get, you'd think I suggested walking on stage pants-free.

Johnson, Maryfran. CIO Magazine (2009). Articles>Presentations>Rhetoric

Ten Tips on How to Think Like a Designer

Below are 10 things (plus a bonus tip) that I have learned over the years from designers, things that designers do or know that the rest of us can benefit from.

Reynolds, Garr. Presentation Zen (2009). Articles>Presentations>Graphic Design

When Computers Leave Classrooms, So Does Boredom

A study published in the April issue of British Educational Research Journal found that 59 percent of students in a new survey reported that at least half of their lectures were boring, and that PowerPoint was one of the dullest methods they saw. "The least boring teaching methods were found to be seminars, practical sessions, and group discussions," said the report. In other words, tech-free classrooms were the most engaging.

Young, Jeffrey R. Chronicle of Higher Education (2009). Articles>Presentations>Education

Eleven Ways to Use Images Poorly in Slides

As digital cameras have become ubiquitous, and cheap (or free) photo websites plentiful, more people than ever are using images in presentations. Images are not appropriate for every kind of talk, but even when images are appropriate (such as keynote/ballroom style presentations), people are still making the same common mistakes. So here are some things to keep in mind if you use images in your next talk.

Reynolds, Garr. Presentation Zen (2009). Articles>Presentations>Graphic Design>Visual Rhetoric

Features of Success in Engineering Design Presentations: A Call for Relational Genre Knowledge    

This study explores design presentations that were graded by engineering faculty in order to assess the distinguishing features of those that were successful. Using a thematic analysis of 17 videotaped, final presentations from a capstone chemical engineering (CHE) course, it explores the rhetorical strategies, oral styles, and organizational structures that differentiate successful and unsuccessful team presentations. The results suggest that successful presenters used rhetorical strategies, oral styles, and organizational structures that illustrated students’ ability to negotiate the real and simulated relational and identity nuances of the design presentation genre—in short, they illustrated students’ relational genre knowledge.

Dannels, Deanna P. Journal of Business and Technical Communication (2009). Articles>Presentations>Engineering>Genre

Exploiting Verbal-Visual Synergy in Presentation Slides    

Describes the most challenging aspect of creating slides for an oral presentation. Presents two principles for creating informative and persuasive graphics. Explains how to use drawing tools to communicate the schema of the slide and to emphasize important portions of the images.

Markel, Mike. Technical Communication Online (2009). Articles>Presentations>Writing>Rhetoric