slide presentation themes

slide presentation themes

Slide Presentation Themes

1. Introduction

*Transitioning clusters are like skating maneuvers. You show a greater level of control to the judges if you don’t just appear to “rattle” off a cluster seemingly randomly, but construct the layout deliberately with some visible strategy. For example, in transitioning to an armstand or other inverted position from the end of a circling skill, you should be able to explain (if asked) why you chose that particular circling element, what speed you need for the transition, what position your body should be in, and why. Then, the judge understands that it was a well-planned out transition and did not just happen by chance.*

*Assumptions:* The target audience for this document is students, staff, or faculty who will be creating the slides and giving a talk, but I’m sure you’ll find something useful with the info presented no matter what your role is. Also, let’s assume that in all cases, your talk has some kind of academic context and isn’t strictly a product sales or elevator pitch type talk, though some of the principles mentioned will certainly apply to more high-level talk types. My knowledge of industry/corporate types of presentations is minimal since it has been years since I’ve attended or given one personally, and they’ve always sorta scared me. Content from this is from my own experiences with my own slide presentations, from my years of sitting through seminars and student talks, and more recently from sitting through faculty candidate research talks. If I’m lucky, there might even be some useful info for some of those faculty speakers.

**Introduction**

2. Choosing the Right Theme

Consider the audience and the room size. Does the theme support the tone of the presentation? Does it match the content of the message? A theme with classic colors might be perfect for an audience of over 40, but if the audience is young adults, the same slide theme with classic colors may not be so well received. A presentation with detailed content might do better with a technical theme than with a nature theme. Make sure the theme is a good fit with the message. We present the chart from slide 1 using some of the different themes available in PowerPoint. You’ll see the right side of the chart is cut off when the ‘Grayscale’ theme is used. The colors in ‘Aspect’ and ‘Organic’ themes conflict with the colors in the chart. The data in this chart is best displayed using the ‘Apex’ theme. Now sometimes certain colors and effects in a theme will be too distracting for a slide. A good way to check the readability of your slide is to actually print it out in black and white and see if it’s still clear and readable. Finally, with all of the choices of themes available, if we click on the ‘Apply to All’ button in the ‘Slide Design’ task pane, this lets you see an overview or preview of how the entire presentation looks with a certain theme. It’s very quick and easy to try different themes this way. Always make sure to save changes, as sometimes the ‘Apply to All’ feature will not take effect when the presentation is closed and reopened. Remember one of the main functions of presentation slides is to support the speaker and the message, and if a theme is not doing that, it needs to be changed. By taking the time to really understand the material and choose the right theme, the end result will be a high-quality presentation.

3. Top Themes for Professional Presentations

‘Aspect’ is a 2 in 1 theme, coming with both Aspect and Aspect Dark. The ‘dark’ version was made with contemporary presentation styles in mind such as those seen in TED talks and Ignite events, where the speaker is encouraged to create a visual, image-based presentation that eschews bullet points and in-depth text. The regular version is for use with more traditional text and bullet points. The theme is picture heavy and makes use of transparent shapes over images to create low contrast areas for text placement. Overall it’s a very stylish and minimalist theme.

Our next theme was built with presenting marketing and strategy plans in mind. The name says it all – ‘Marketing’ utilizes a lot of whitespace and strong colors to evoke a sense of power and control. It uses a mix of serif and sans serif fonts for headers and body, and the title text on each slide is given extra emphasis by putting it inside a shape. This is a very simple and easy to use theme which can be applied to a wide variety of presentation topics.

Our first theme, ‘Business’, exploits contrast in the color scheme and subtle textured backgrounds to create a professional look. It could be used for a variety of business style presentations, especially ones that are to be printed out on company letterhead. This is a very ‘executive’ style theme, although the slide designs are fairly flexible. The name is quite generic – in hindsight I probably should have thought of a better one, but nevertheless it serves its purpose.

4. Creative Themes for Engaging Presentations

The Circus: Are you sick of the ordinary? With a circus-themed presentation, anything goes. You can use it to poke fun at the ridiculousness of a certain project or to portray how different elements of the project are unfolding. Whether using drawing, photography, or clip art, the circus theme is guaranteed to amuse.

Inception: Use visual paradoxes and mind-bending graphics to capture the essence of the film Inception. This theme would be very interesting if you have an abstract or philosophical topic. Just be careful not to make the theme too confusing or overwhelming.

Food: Using food as a metaphor for your presentation is an entertaining way to express the importance of that topic. For example, if you were presenting a sales strategy, you could use the metaphor “The strategy is the ingredients, and the result is the dish.” You would have a slide of a dish followed by a slide with visual representations of the strategy, i.e. images of products and prices.

It is crucial to consider a theme for your presentation. This will help guide the content and feel of the entire presentation. The text, images, and even animations should tie back to the theme. This will help maintain interest of your audience and keep them engaged. So, to help you think outside the box, I have compiled some unique theme ideas for your next presentation. Before we get into it, just a reminder when using certain themes that involve visuals, be aware that your audience may get distracted and miss the key points of the presentation. Always tie back the visuals used to reinforce the main message of that part of your presentation. This will help ensure your audience does not lose track of the point you are making. Try using pen and paper to draw a mind map for that topic of your presentation. This will help you to have a clear plan for how you want to present each section and where you will tie in some of the visuals that relate to the theme. Also, using pen and paper will reduce the risk of frustration that comes with computer software, giving you a head start to being stress-free! Now for the themes:

5. Conclusion

In conclusion, theme and background selections are very important to your slide presentation. It should provide a good visual, not too crowded, simple but not too empty. As a matter of fact, the background can put emphasis on the content of the slides. If before we used plain bullets for listing some points, better try using SmartArt or numbered/bulleted list with pictures. We can choose many different layouts for the same slides. This can be very helpful if you think a slide can be presented for two content alternatives. And last, color selection. If you are presenting a company product, it’s good to use the company’s official color to get a straight identification. Every single employee or user of PowerPoint is recommended to use the selection and creation of the themes through brainstorming with other employees, seniors, or with yourself. With good practice and experience, it can increase our creativity in creating presentation slides and finally produce a final product that is much better.