Do you want to see a great presentation?

It's not often that you get to see a presentation and think, "Wow." I'm not talking about the "whoa dude! That was so awesome!" kind of reaction. What I'm talking about is when you know that the message you just heard was exactly what the presenter meant for you to hear, and that the whole experience was simple and clear. I recently had this experience watching the keynote at Apple's World Wide Developer's Conference. Go ahead, chuckle, snort, you can even post a snarky comment about me being an Apple fanboy. It's alright. Because it's true. I love Apple and everything they stand for. I'm not saying that they are a perfect organization or that this presentation didn't have any flaws (in fact, there were two obvious errors in this keynote). It's just that their simple, direct approach to business, product design, marketing – and presenting – make it so that little, if anything, is misunderstood.

Go ahead and watch just a little bit of it.

Notice how there is rarely any text on the screen. Beautiful, high quality images are used in place of bullet points. Simple, easy to read graphs. Transitions are used appropriately to create emphasis. Not to mention a clutter free stage, large projector screen, the use of light humor, repetition, seamless transitions between speakers, and more.

Seriously, just watch a bit if you have some time.

Watch the Presentation

Watch the Presentation in HD

PowerPoint Handouts Not Effective

A while back, Mike Pulsifer pointed me to an article on Ars Technica: Study: class podcasts can lead to better grades. The article, and the research done by State University of New York, focus on whether using podcasts as an extra study resource for students can improve grades. I am a huge fan of podcasts. Over the past couple of years I have learned an immense amount by listening to podcasts – from language, to photography, to brain science, and design. On iTunes U anyone can access lectures from some of the best universities in the country by downloading and listening to podcasts of each lecture. This is a great way to acquire knowledge or to get further study for a class you're currently taking.

What I found even more interesting about this study was the method of teaching and study that wasn't as effective: handing out printed copies of the lecture slides to students. As the author of the article notes, passing out PowerPoint handouts has become "all the rage" in many lecture halls, within or outside the academic world. In fact, two of my previous science courses are designed around PowerPoint handouts – every slide of every lecture for the entire semester is included in a "Lecture Guide" that the students purchase at the beginning of the semester (sometimes in lieu of a textbook).

What's the problem with this?

PowerPoint slides are NOT notes. They should not function as notes. Not for the teacher and especially not for the student. Retention increases when exposure to information occurs across multiple modalities - listening to a lecture, reading a textbook, discussing a subject in a study group, etc. (You may be familiar with the idea of being a visual vs. kinisthetic vs. auditory learner.)

A printout of common lecture slides is not much different than the lecture - except that you probably aren't having them read to you by a Ph.D.

But repitition increases recall, right?

Yes, that is true, but do not forget that certain modalities of learning are less effective than others. As Dr. John Medina points out, "the brain sees words as tiny pictures. Reading creates a bottleneck." (Brain Rules, pg. 234)

This is just one more reason to do away with text on those lecture slides, replace them with images, and maybe even replace the handouts with a link to the podcast version of your next lecture.

Finding High Quality Images with Google

Here is the first video tutorial. This is a follow up to my previous post on using Full Screen Images in your presentations. I mentioned how important it is to use images that are at least 800 x 600 pixels. Most people tend to grab images that look grainy and pixelated.

In this video, I will show you how to use Google Image Search to limit your image search to high quality images. As mentioned in the video, I do not recommend using Google to find your images since you will likely run into copyright issues. However, it is very probable that you will continue to use images from the web when time, budget, or other constraints prevent you from using license-free stock images, so why not learn how to make small improvements.

Find High Quality Images Using Google Search from Brain Slides on Vimeo.

Just Say No to PowerPoint Week

I just discovered via Scott Schwertly of Ethos3.com that the second week in February is officially "Just Say No to PowerPoint Week." Scott linked to an opinion piece at the Daily Princetonian that explains it well. It's also covered by Nashua Telegraph and there are plenty of other sites mentioning it if you Google it.

So join in! Hopefully some posts on this site have helped prime you to "Just Say NO!"

Scott McCloud on comics | Video on TED.com

I recently watched this video on TED.com and was terribly excited by it. I don't know anything about comics, and I don't care to learn anything about them, but what excited me so much was the way in which Scott McCloud presented on comics. His presentation style actually resembles a comic strip in many ways. Heavily - nay, almost exclusively - based on visuals, Scott uses full bleed images to illustrate key points or even single words as he is speaking. At times he speaks a sentence naturally as he rapidly steps through a series of images for each of the words (pay attention at 2 min 15 sec to see what I mean).

Scott's presentation is also in the form of a story. He talks about the influence of his father in his life and also explains the history of comics in an entertaining and flowing narrative. And yet his presentation is also very informative and includes a lot of important concepts and even facts.

I look at this presentation and dream of the day that I come across a professor using this format in a lecture. Mind you, by no means would I encourage any professor to adopt this lecture style exclusively (unless the course were on story telling), but, it is an excellent tool to employ once in a semester or to provide a change-up in the lecture.

Scott McCloud on comics | Video on TED.com:

Some of my favorite presentations

I've compiled a set of my favorite presentations on Slideshare.net. I chose most of these presentations for their design - they follow good principles that avoid distractions and excessive text - rather than the content. The majority of these presentations don't have to do with education or presentation design, but they are great examples of how to design a great presentation.
I chose a couple of other presentations more for the content related to Brain Slides. This doesn't mean that their design is horrible by any means, but the content deals with how to make good presentations.

You can view the presentations below or search for them on Slideshare.

| Get your Presentation Pack

Fill Screen with Images for More Impact

When you use images in your presentation you can make them have more impact by doing one simple thing: fill the screen with the image. In the printing business this is called full bleed. You've more than likely come across a book, magazine, or pamphlet that has a full bleed image. The great thing about full bleed images is that, rather than feeling like you are looking at a picture, you almost feel like you are in the image itself. That is because all distractions are removed by printing the image all the way to the edge of the page.

To make a slide have more impact and to avoid distracting elements, scale it up to fit the entire slide (or even larger if you want to focus on a certain element). Do not leave any portion of the background showing. Take a look at the following examples:

In the original, I simply placed the image in the slide as the template suggested. It's fine, really, until you see the second option. Here I filled the entire slide with the image. This changes the viewer's perspective from looking at a picture to actually being in the picture. Also, it actually made more room to place the text - right on top of the image.

Troubleshooting

Now, I will let you know right up front that you will run into two problems with this approach.

First, you may want to use an image that is in portrait orientation rather than landscape (meaning it is taller than it is wide). If you were to fill the slide with an image like this you would have to crop it and most likely lose nearly half of the image. The solution is simple. Use a plain black background and fill the slide vertically while leaving margins on the side. When the image is projected on the screen, those dark margins will simply disappear because they blend in with the rest of the unused projector screen. Softening the edges of the picture will remove any sharp lines and help the photo to blend in even more.

Second, after you scale the images to fill the slide, they may become distorted or "pixelated". If this happens, the image you are using does not have high enough resolution. Most projectors have a screen resolution of 800x600 pixels. (Newer models have 1024x768 or even higher if it is a widescreen projector.) In fact, 800x600 is the default resolution of new presentations in most software. If your image has a lower resolution and you stretch it to fill the screen, some detail will be lost. So be sure the images you use have a resolution of at least 800x600 pixels in order to fill the screen and maintain full quality.

In a future post I will explain how to determine the resolution of an image and even how to quickly find a suitable image on Google or Flickr.

The Science Of Presentations - SlideShare

I was browsing Slideshare, as I am wont to do, and came across this excellent new presentation by Kevin Gee. It's actually a slidecast, which means it includes his audio narration.
The Science of Presentation summarizes cognitive and educational psychology research as it applies to presentations. Kevin begins by explaining how our intuition does not always lead us to correct principles. This is so true! I frequently repeat that bad presentation design is not really the presenter's fault. They just do what the software and social norms dictate.

Kevin proceeds with 3 main topics:

1. Summary of Cognitive Theory

2. Factors for Effectiveness

3. Application

In the third section, Kevin does a great job of taking a poorly designed slide and transforming it into a few slides that are designed with the brain in mind.

My favorite part about the presentation: Kevin practices what he preaches. The whole presentation is well designed and does not distract from his narration.

The Science Of Presentations

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: kevin mayer)

(Via Slideshare.)