Production Presentation Scenarios
Lesson 9 from: How to Create and Deliver an Impactful PresentationMatt Stevenson
Production Presentation Scenarios
Lesson 9 from: How to Create and Deliver an Impactful PresentationMatt Stevenson
Lessons
Class Introduction
04:44 2Course Walkthrough and Philosophy
03:59 3Preparing Logistics
14:49 4Preparing Content
15:11 5Ready, Set, Go! (Green, Yellow, & Red Scenarios)
07:00 6The Outline
16:45 7The Deck
22:01 8Presenter Notes
05:15Lesson Info
Production Presentation Scenarios
So, let's go ahead and review some of these things, and we'll talk about them in terms of the green, yellow and red level when we're creating our deck. So, as we're producing, sometimes we wanna think about humor, but I encourage you to let the humor be natural, so instead of designing things inside of the deck to be humorous, just go ahead and try to get your points across and humor often comes in the live presentation instead of relying on a visual, although you can still add it in there if you need to. For a green level presentation, we're gonna want to set up that template file, and by template file I don't just mean the actual look of the slide deck, but we're also gonna wanna do our asset file. That's the thing where we're putting all of our graphics into. One common trick that I use, for those designers out there, who have Photoshop, or work with a graphics program, is to create one template file, like say a PSD that is the exact height and width of a slide, and it's great for b...
ackgrounds too. And then you can just be putting images into that template file, and then saving each file out as that less-than-one-megabyte JPEG, to put in to the backgrounds of your images. Having a big background image is a great way way to be visually impactful at a low, low, low cost to your time of presenting your deck. And then the last thing you're gonna wanna do in a green level presentation is start a visual rhythm. This is something that once you get in the habit of it, you can do it in yellow and red level presentations, but it green it's especially great because you have the time to be able to do it. By visual rhythm I mean, designating the kinds of slides that we talked about, where we're picking, this is an arrow slide, this is a divider slide, this is a full image slide, this is a one-word slide, this is a quote slide, this is a hero slide, this is a finale slide. Making sure that you create some terminology around the different kinds of slides that you're creating. This is different than a template where you just have a header and a footer and kind of that stuff. These are picking kinds of slides, because what happens is, as an audience is viewing you presentation, they get farther and farther into it, they'll see a kind of slide and they'll know how you're going to talk about it. Which is really great. So for instance, an arrow slide, every time that they saw that, they would know, okay, he's probably gonna read that, then we're gonna talk about it for a minute, and then since it's one, it'll probably be one of something else, and then he'll move on. So that visual rhythm that comes from your template is really, really important. The next set of things that I wanna talk about for the yellow level presentation, when it comes to producing your content, is using markers for slides to address certain things. So this is what I was talking about where we had that note up in the corner for things, extremely, extremely important to designate which slides are done, which slides you need to address, sometimes I will take a big magenta box and I'll just put it over the entire slide and I'll say, come back to this later. Doing that kind of triage to figure out where you need to spend your effort is extremely important when using yellow level decks. Because you're not gonna have a lot of time, or you're not gonna have a lot of resources, or a lot of people working on this deck, and you wanna make sure you're designating where they're working in an efficient manner. And then the next thing in the yellow level presentations, is using magenta for placeholders. You'll notice that in a couple of the slides previously, I was making marks and notes in magenta, and that's so I wouldn't get them mixed up with the actual content of the slides. Sometimes I'll put an image in, or a box that's just magenta, and that's just gonna help me visually identify, as I'm going through the slide deck extremely quickly, and figuring out what I need to work on. What things I can work on, what things I should come back to later. And it's also a good tool for other people who are looking at your deck. Sometimes I'll be in situations where, I have to send a draft version of a deck to a client and I'll make my notes in magenta so that they know, okay, all of this stuff is to come, I don't have to worry about this deck, or about this page, he's working on it, he's coming back to it. In fact, they may have some ideas, visually, for you to use, if you indicate, hey I need help with this, please look at any of the magenta slots. And then the last part about the red level, producing a deck, that I wanna talk about, is the idea of designing your outline. So this is something that I didn't practice for quite a while, because I always thought that the outline would be something completely separate than the deck itself. So this concept is, taking your content, taking the words that you're working with, and even the images that you're working with, and putting them into what you end up are going to be using for your actual presentation. And then that way you're running design passes over top of your outline, you can change content on the fly, you can rearrange stuff, and still be able to work with your visual rhythm and all of your other design, and make sure that everything is in the place that it needs to be. The other point that I wanna make about a red level presentation, when you're producing your deck, is your deck can be your script. If you have the ideas properly placed in your deck then that's all you're going to need. A good example of how this could go wrong, that I want you guys to avoid, is if you're putting words onto your deck that are more obscure, that really don't have a lot to do with the actual idea, it's a little more obtuse, then that's gonna throw you off if you're using this for your script. And I'll give you a good example. Let's say you had a word on the slide that just said, technology. Well, what you really wanted to say is that technology is the driving factor behind your business's increase in revenue in the past two years. Well, having the word technology doesn't help you. Especially if you're doing a red level presentation. What you probably should've done, is technology equals two year's growth, or something a little bit more specific, it may be a couple more words, but it is actually the idea. So again, you don't wanna be vague when you're putting words on your slide because if you end up using those slides as your script, or as your prompt, then it's gonna fall a little bit flat, and you're gonna forget what that word, technology, is supposed to actually mean when you're speaking to your audience. Also, it doesn't help your audience any. They don't get anything from the word technology. You could've showed them any word, it doesn't really matter. They may be looking to you to explain what that word is, and that's kind of a reveal, which we'll talk about in a minute. But, there's really no meat to it, it doesn't do anything for them. You wanna be a little bit more specific with what you're putting on your slide and then making sure that what you're talking about matches what you're showing. And then the last thing that I wanna recommend is this concept of a single image, or a single word on a slide. Now, as you can see here, I'm teaching you guys, so I have a lot of words on this slide, but, if you're doing a presentation, take your time, where, every so often, in your visual flow and your rhythm of your deck, go ahead and put just a single image there. Or a single image and a single word. Or a quote, a single sentence. The power of just having one visual, means you're telling your audience, okay guys, you saw what the visual is, now go ahead and look at me. And it allows them to sort of take a breath from looking at something or from reading a page and it goes directly to you. And we'll talk about a little bit of that when we look at the presentation section. So, in review, we looked at how to produce your content in a couple different ways. We talked about how to make your outline the most efficient outline it could be, how to get content from the stuff that you prepared, from your logistics into that outline, and then we also talked about how that outline can progress from becoming just words and texts and maybe a couple images that are ideas in there, into your actual, final deck, and then we talked about how that deck can be used as your notes. If done correctly, then what the words that you see on the screen should be enough prompts for you when talking about it. And then finally, we talked about your notes themselves, whether you're gonna be using cards or something else or actually the deck, what you should be doing and what levels, be they red, yellow or green are right for the right kind of notes.
Class Materials
Bonus Materials with Purchase
Ratings and Reviews
Tomas Verver
As a presentator designer I think Matt has an interesting approach on how to create and deliver impactful presentations. Presentations are important part of you career. Presentations can change the company's future, your own future and the world. Making them impactful is very important. At the moment we have still many presentations but many can improve big time. And we have more presentations online (at) the moment.
Jude Temianka
Great course with lots of handy tips. I often find myself having to prepare and give presentations at short notice, and a lot of the preparatory advice that Matt gives falls by the wayside as I frantically jump straight into production mode. I often have the feeling to overwhelm my audience with too much information because I don't take the time to step back and determine what content matters most. Super tangible advice that I will be implementing!
Rebecca
Found this course concise and informative. Would recommend to all who have to do presentations.