December 4th Meeting Notes
11 people attended face to face and one person attended via Yugma.
We started the meeting doing a brief demo of some Photo Editing Basics using GIMP software. GIMP is open source software for photo editing and is modeled very closely on the features and look of Adobe's Photoshop. Since its a free download [ gimp.org ] you can't go wrong.
During our session: [click links here to see individual how tos ] or go here for the complete Photo Editing Web Set
We basically took a very large image (7.5 MB) then cropped and resized it. Then I showed how to use the Levels tool to change the contrast of an image. This is a feature that I use practically all the time. It can make your whites, whiter and your blacks more deep. Sounds like laundry detergent but its not!
For those further information on this stuff call me and I can either offer a training on site or can guide you to other online resources.
Below are the handouts from The art of Presentation presentation that I did later.
Some Practical Tips - Distilled from about 5 sources...
1. Remember your slides are not your script. Your slides support your script
2. Be concise but don't edit down to the point of meaninglessness
3. Don't try to make them documents, that's what your handouts are for!
4. Write your script for your talking voice not your writer's voice
5. More than 25 words of text? Maybe that’s a document
6. San Serif fonts are easier to read on screen, avoid italics
7. Get a hold of a good projector, new projectors are brighter and sharper
8. Work in Slide Sorter View to get the big picture
9. Create in Analog… Post Its or pen and paper. Qty over quality to start
10. Think of the viewers visual image channel
Using PowerPoint Presenter View - How To (Windows)
Model Presentations
Larry Lessig - Laws that Choke Creativity
A good example of how tight synchronization of slide to speech can over come the issue of using a lot of text on a slide.
Presentation Zen listing of exemplary TED presentations
Great Selection Exceptional TED Presentations hereOther great examples are:
Steve Jobs: 2007 MacWorld Conference Keynote
Watch part on iPhone, well done.Al Gore: an inconvenient truth DVD
see trailer
http://www.climatecrisis.net/trailer/ Please see the whole film if you haven't yet. Of course, its content is so important, but also watch him take what is essentially a PowerPoint presentation and make it riveting.
Sources
Beyond Bullet Points
Cliff Atkins
http://www.beyondbulletpoints.com/
Print Out: 5 ways to reduce PowerPoint overloadMade To Stick
Chip and Dan Heath
http://www.madetostick.com/
Print Out: Teaching That SticksPresentation Zen
Garr Reynolds
http://www.presentationzen.com/
Print Out: How to Design & Deliver Presentations Like a ProSlide:ology | The Art and Science of Creating Great Presentations
Nancy Duarte
http://blog.duarte.com/
Lessons from TED: 5 Simple Tweaks : Print OutBeautiful Evidence
Edward Tufte
http://www.edwardtufte.com
Print Out: PowerPoint Does Rocket Science--and Better Techniques for Technical Reports