Event Technology – PowerPoint Hints

As my experience has taught me, many planners and event producers tend to learn the basics of the various disciplines in the industry and leave the details to the experts.

Like rumors in a high school, the basics can often become distorted, then be taken for rule-of-thumb, so the experts often have to contend with providing services within preconceived limits that are often inaccurate.

What I'm going to do is to explain as simply as possible the various aspects of using sound, lighting and video for meetings and events.

I think the best place to begin is the one thing most often used: the personal computer. And, the one thing most often used as a presentation tool: PowerPoint.

● If you've purchased the latest version of PowerPoint (Windows or Mac) then you have a very powerful presentation tool. It has great new visual features, a nice user interface (once you get used to it) and has a very solid embedded media playback capability. The best feature is the Presenter View which allows the presenter to see the current slide and next few slides on the laptop while the main output is full-screen.

● Embedding media, particularly video, is very easy to do and will be smoother to present if a few key rules are adhered to. The video to embed should be a Windows Media file (*.wmv) to get the smoothest playback. Other formats will work such as AVI and MPEG files. Once you embed the media, choose it to play automatically, then have the slide dissolve to black as the transition. When the presenter advances to the slide with the video file, the image will fade to black and the video will start automatically after about a second, just like the traditional video playback with a video system. No clicking the video box. I once had several videos in sequence start this way without the need for a switcher system and playback technician. And always store the media file in the same folder as the PowerPoint file. That way the file and media won't get separated when transferred to a USB drive, CD, .ftp site or e-mailed.

● Rules for embedding photos (including bitmapped logos and graphics) are simple. Rule #1 is always compress them before you save the presentation file and Rule #2 is remember Rule #1. Some think that the larger resolution the photo/graphic, the sharper it will be. The flaw in that thinking is that the screen resolution and/or projector resolution will only display the file at a maximum of 96dpi or, depending on the PC and projector, a maximum of 1,024 pixels wide by 768 pixels high at XGA resolution. Your client may be proud of that 12 megapixel photo but the projector couldn't care less and won't increase resolution beyond its inherent resolution capacity. And those high resolution photos take up a lot of storage space. So, why take up all that space and download bandwidth for high resolution photos that will never be displayed at high resolution? The answer is obvious and the remedy is to compress the photos. When you compress the images in the file you can see significant file reduction with absolutely no display resolution loss.

Here's how: Click on any photo or graphic, click the "Picture Tools" button above the "Format" tab. To the far left find the "Compress Pictures" button and click it. When the "Compress Pictures" window appears, make sure the "Apply to selected pictures only" box is unchecked and click the "Options..." button.

Note the various options but particularly the resolution. 150ppi (similar to dpi) is best for display-only so click that and click "OK" twice to compress the entire file. I once compressed a 56MB file down to 400KB.

The next article will deal with placing the projection in and amongst the décor, tables and room constraints. I hope this helps you and, most importantly, your clients.

Scott Justis is Marketing Manager for LD Systems based in Houston and has more than 20 years in the events and meetings industry. He can be reached via e-mail at sjustis@ldsystems.com.

The information and views of this contributing columnist are not necessarily the views or opinion of Meetings + Events or its parent company, Tiger Oak Publications.