Forum Discussion
Favorite PowerPoint Features?
One of the reasons PowerPoint is so popular is because it's so easy to use - there isn't much you need to know to begin using it. That's probably why so many users often miss the newer features after upgrading.
So I thought it would be helpful to share our favorite and most-used features in PowerPoint 07 and 10. For those using 2003, this will be good ammo to make the case for upgrading
My top 3 features:
- Slide Masters - the ability to create my own text and image placeholders. Awesome for creating custom layouts.
- Selection Pane - there's no way to manage multiple animations and objects without it
- Change Picture - simple, but one of the most used features for me.
So, what about you? What are your top features or workflows in PowerPoint?
68 Replies
I love a lot of the 2010 graphic capabilities (I was a fan of Microsoft's old Photo Draw program and now they have moved a lot of that functionality into 2010). That being said - we do not use 2010 (yet) because of all of the training we do with people still in 2003 and even 2000 - we don't to be too many generations ahead of people we are leading. "When a general gets too far ahead of his troops, he’s often mistaken for the enemy." (some dead person said that a long time ago)
So what I like about any version of PPT is: (without trying to repeat too many of the features already mentioned in this thread)
- "Paste Special" feature or "save as picture" (the cut out feature in 2010 is way cool, but pasting as a png together with "set transparent color" is an easy work-around.
- The "End Position" tool for Motion paths (http://skp.mvps.org/) "I like it a lot!" Lloyd Christmas
- "Ctrl-D" - I use PowerPoints duplication feature maybe more than any other tool out there.
And the 2007/2010 feature of choice for me has to be "Selection Pane" - the ability to rename objects here is key.
And that's all I got to say about that.
Thanks for the assistance everyone.
We'll be playing with this and see what we can come up with.
I haven't used PPT 2010 for very long but my favorite thing so far is the 'Animation Painter'
LOVE, LOVE, LOVE it!
So I went through the listed features shared in this thread and compiled them into a single "course". Thought it might be a fun way to view the lessons in a course format. Total runtime is 80 minutes.
http://community.articulate.com/blogs/david/archive/2011/02/07/essential-powerpoint-features.aspx
Let me know what you'd add or remove from the "course"
Hi, I'm new to E-learning. Of numerous powerpoint options, I feel the ones like master template, picture or texture fill and the set transparent option are advantageous as far as an e-learning pro is concerned. Many other options including these three make Powerpoint a peerless one among the softwares of the same category, (if any exists)
Upgrading to 2010 next month. I can't wait.
Just discovered a really nice feature. The ability to record and save your Power Point Presentation in Windows Media Format. Now if Microsoft can come up with a decent video editor they will really have something.
Whatever happened to that feature that allowed you to right click during a presentation and jot 'action points' which automatically got converted to bullet points on a slide which magically was inserted AND displayed after the last slide?
Desperately, looking for that version of PowerPoint.
