Chapter 10. Streaming with Producer for PowerPoint

OK, who out there has created a presentation in PowerPoint and then travelled somewhere far away to present it? Hmmm, many hands showing. I thought so.

OK, now how many people have travelled to multiple places to give the same PowerPoint presentation? Hmmm, even more hands. Well, unless travel is a bonus for you, this is your chapter.

Here we'll run through how to use Microsoft's free Producer for PowerPoint 2003 to create a presentation, complete with video and PowerPoint slides, then package it up for placing on a CD-ROM, Web site, or intranet server. You can also add Web pages and digital pictures, trim and split your videos, and even add special effects, though obviously these may degrade the compressed quality of your video (Go back to Chapter 6 for more on that). Producer is a great tool for training, communications, marketing. and sales basically, any activity for which you've already created and given a PowerPoint presentation.

I used Producer for PowerPoint to create an explanation of the materials covered in the Delivering Digital Video class I teach for the University of Wisconsin-Madison, culminating in the presentation shown in Figure 10.1. On the upper right is the PowerPoint slide, and beneath the player on the left are slide titles the viewer can click and jump to. The viewer can also use the two double-arrow buttons beneath the video window to jump 10 seconds backwards and forwards.

Figure 10.1. A finished presentation from Producer for PowerPoint.

At a high level, to create a Producer presentation, you videotape the presenter giving the presentation, either live or in the studio. You then capture or import the video (or just the audio, if desired) into Producer, import the PowerPoint slides, and synchronize them to the video. There are a few design options, such as template and font size, but overall the process is straightforward and efficient.