Dos & Don’ts While Using Images In Your PowerPoint Slides.

Whether you are in the corporate, education industry, or any other area of work, presentations are common in each. Most of you might have been given the task to build a presentation, and many of you wouldn’t have the clue how to make one. Powerful PowerPoint Presentations are a mix of important text and lots of visuals. Templates or no templates, mostly a presentation rely on relevant pictures and other visuals. Also, as not everyone is a graphic designer or has the access to one, photos are there to rescue, that can be downloaded from a free or paid website. Despite the ease of getting the pictures, putting those pictures on PowerPoint slides is not that very easy. There are multiple Dos and Don’ts you need to take care of while inserting the images to the slides of your presentation, and these Dos and the Don’ts include the following:

1. Relevance:

Don’ts: Every presentation has got an aim behind it, so it is quite obvious that we will only include the pictures that have some relevant meaning to it and fulfill the basic idea of the presentation. Putting anything without context is not what you do to make an impressive presentation.

Dos: As mentioned above, there has to be a meaning behind putting the pictures on the slide, so make sure that the pictures you choose to include have got relevance with the text on the slide.

2. Quality:

Don’ts: When it comes to putting up pictures on the slides, the quality matters the most. You can’t include images that are blurry or distorted. The images need to be high quality and clear. Also, never stretch an image to fit it into the slide. The stretchy image is the last thing you would want in your presentation.

Dos: Make sure to get your hands on the high-quality pictures, whether you are clicking those pictures or buying from other sources. The images are there to tell half of the story of the presentation, so you cannot take the risk of putting pictures that are not high quality and do not attract the audience.

3. The Placement:

Don’ts: Since the presentation is made with a purpose, it should have a different start, different inner content, and a different end. The text and the images are planned in a way that the information flow is in a perfect sequence. So having the relevant pictures is not the end, but their placement on every slide is also a task that one needs to do carefully. Do not place the images wherever you want, but according to the storyline of the presentation.

Dos: The slides must not be only text or only visuals. So make sure to mix the text and the images equally on the slide. Place the images in a way that doesn’t overlap the text or is too far from it. You must make a balance between the written content and the images, so every slide looks attractive, not messy.

4. Do Not Clutter the Slides:

Don’ts: Following the saying, more visuals lesser text, people tend to put different types of ‘more’ visuals per slide, which makes the slide look very unattractive and cluttered. There are different types when it comes to visuals. As we are talking about the images, we would suggest if you are using an image on a slide, do not accompany it with the PowerPoint clipart, but make sure, if another object is needed, it should be another image only.

Dos: Though one image is mostly enough if you require to put one more visual to validate a text on the slide, just put another similar image, with similar colours. Also, you can create a single image, that fits the slide and includes the text or two different images that are there to help make the text strong. You can also make use of icons in place of an image if fits the need.

5. Copyright Issue

Don’ts: Never use images that are copyright restricted. Sometimes, people download the images from Google without knowing that those are under some copyright restriction. Most of such images have watermarks on it that may help you identify the images with copyright. But in many cases, you will not be able to find out if the images are copyright restricted or not.

Dos: To deal with such a situation, we always suggest clicking your own images. Clicking or creating your own images can help you develop pictures based on the theme of the presentation, and there is always an additional personal touch to it. And if it is not possible to create your own images, there are several websites where you can purchase relevant images at reasonable prices.

6. Simple and Clean Design:

Don’ts: When it comes to presentations, the text and the visuals go hand in hand. So make sure you have enough space for the text as well as the images, such that nothing is overlapping each other and the slide design is clean. Never go for extra things on a slide, like extra borders, extra images or extra clipart. Be consistent and try to keep the slides as simple as you can.

Dos: A powerful image with informative text is what you need to make a simple slide look attractive. You do not need to put extra formatting or extra stuff on a slide to make it engaging, rather you may push away the audience with your dramatic content on the slides. A simple and clean design is always attractive enough to make the audience stay.

Online or offline, each presentation needs great content to bind the interest of its audience. Only putting the pictures on the presentation is not enough to get the audience’s attention, but it is how you put those images and align the text on the slides.

For more inspiration on how you should use and place images in your presentation, visit the huge share presentations library, where you will find presentations on almost every topic in the world. Great designs and information-loaded presentations on SharePresentation will surely help you get some idea of the usage of images in presentations.