Section 10.1. Adding Sound | PowerPoint 2007

10.1. Adding Sound

Sound can be a powerful way to communicate with your audience. If you're delivering your slideshow yourself, you'll likely be narrating each slide. But you can also add sound clips to your slideshowanything from a phone ringing to the opening bars of Beethoven's Fifth.

PowerPoint gives you six different ways to add sound to your slideshow:

Using voiceover narration. This approach lets you record your voice (or any other sound) using your computer's built-in microphone. This is the way to go if you want to synchronize sound with individual slides. PowerPoint treats voiceover narration differently than other kinds of sound effects. To record voiceover narration for your slideshow, see page 230.

DESIGN TIME
When to Use Multimedia

Just because you can add multimedia doesn't mean you should . In today's blinking, spinning, flashing world, adding stock sound and video clips for the sake of livening up a dull slideshow is likely to get you a big fat yawn. Adding multimedia is generally an expensive proposition, too, in terms of file sizeand, therefore, negatively affects slideshow playback. Thirty seconds spent standing on a podium waiting for a video clip to start playing is going to feel like a lot longer to your audience.

If your goal is to create a good presentation, focus on crafting a compelling message. Then, if you decide a particular sound or video clip might get your message across more effectively, by all means add it. In most cases, you'll want to create a sound or video clip from scratchone that's specifically tailored to your presentation. For example, a stock audio clip of a ringing phone or singing teakettle isn't likely to impress your audience. But an audio clip of your R&D director explaining the latest scientific breakthrough and its implications for your company is .

Adding sound to an animated transition. You can tell PowerPoint to add sound to a slide transition, such as a fade or a wipe. Best of all, you create these effects using PowerPointno added sound files needed. Chapter 11 focuses on animated transitions.
Adding a sound clip stored on your computer. If you already have a sound file stored on your computer in one of the file formats described on page 327, you can attach it to one of the slides in your slideshow (as you'll learn in this chapter) and tell PowerPoint to play it just while that particular slide is onscreen; play it all the way through until it ends (even if that means playing the sound across several slides); or loop it until the slideshow ends.
Adding a sound clip you've found in the Clip Organizer. All Microsoft Office programs include the Clip Organizer. The Clip Organizer is a collection of stock in other words, genericpictures, sound clips, and video clips you can add to your slideshows, spreadsheets, memos, or whatever else you're creating. You can customize the way media clips from the Clip Organizer play during your slideshow just as you can customize the playback of your own media clips.
Adding a sound clip from an audio CD. PowerPoint lets you add one or more tracks from an audio CD (as well as portions of individual tracks) to your slideshow. If you like, you can stretch the clips all the way to the end of your slideshow to create a full-length soundtrack.

Note: If you didn't record the audio CD yourself, check out the box on page 328.
Recording a sound clip and adding it to your slideshow. The Sound Recordera program that comes with Windows (and which you can access from PowerPoint)lets you record a sound file and add it to your slideshow. Using the Sound Recorder, you can even make basic changes to other sound files, such as hiking the volume or adding an echo effect.

10.1.1. Sound File Formats You Can Use in PowerPoint

The popularity of sound effects and music on computers and the Internet has led to a proliferation of audio file types. You can use most of the well-known ones in PowerPoint. Here's the complete rundown:

Audio Interchange File Format (.aif, .aifc, .aiff). Audio files typically created on Macintosh computers.
Audio File Format (.au, .snd). Audio files typically created on Unix, Macintosh, or other non-Windows computers.
Musical Instrument Digital Interface (.mid, .midi, .rmi ). Technically, this isn't a "sound" file at allit lets computers exchange musical information with synthesizers, sound cards, and other hardware. In other words, depending on your sound card, MIDI files can sound like kiddie pianos.
Motion Picture Experts Group 3 (.mp3, .m3u). These highly compressed files tend to be small, which is perfect for long music clips. The tradeoff is a noticeable loss of sound quality. For this reason, audiophiles call these files lossy .
Windows audio and media files (.wav, .wma, .wax). Files saved in the .wav format preserve quality (which is why they're called lossless ), so they tend to be pretty hefty. They're best for short bursts of sound. Window's Sound Recorder (page 335) saves sound files in .wav format.

10.1.2. Inserting a Sound Clip from Your Computer

You may already have a sound clip that you (or your media department) has created or purchased stored on your computer. If that's the case, follow these steps to add the sound clip to a slide:

Go to Insert Media Clips Sound and click the down arrow next to the Sound button.

The Sound menu (Figure 10-2) appears.

Figure 10-2. Instead of selecting Sound Sound from File, you can simply click the Sound icon itself (as opposed to the arrow below it). In either case, PowerPoint displays the dialog box shown in Figure 10-3.

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTION
Multimedia, Copyright Law, and You

I want to add this cool cut from one of James McMurtry's albums to my presentation. It's an educational presentation, and I've heard that you can use copyrighted material if you're using it for educational purpose, but one of my co-workers said I have to contact the record company for permission. Who's right?

Very few folks would think to ask if it's okay to walk into a furniture store, drag a couch back to their house without paying for it, invite all their friends over for a party, and then throw away the couch. But that's exactly what you're doing when you use media (songs, quotes, speeches, photographs, movie clips, and so on) that someone else has created.

Excuses like, "It's for educational purposes," "I'm not using it to make money," and "They wouldn't have put it online if they didn't want people to download it" simply don't hold water. The U.S. Copyright Office (www.copyright.gov) outlines the very few cases where excerpting for educational or critical reasons apply.

Bottom line, if you didn't create something, you don't have the right to use it unless you get permission from the person who didperiod. Maybe you'll be caught and fined, maybe not; either way you're stealing someone else's hard work.

To keep your conscience clear, you can find a ton of free stock mediawhich you can use to your heart's contentonline at sites such as www.a1freesoundeffects.com, www.findsounds.com, www.freestockfootage.com, and www.wildform.com/videolibrary. On these sites, media creators willingly offer their wares in the hope that you'll like them so much you'll purchase additional clips in the future. Remember, too, that the most effective media clips are usually the ones you create yourself. Page 335 shows you how.

From the Sound menu, select Sound from File.

The Insert Sound dialog box you see in Figure 10-3 appears. Like every other Open File box in Windows, the Insert Sound dialog box lets you browse for a specific file.

Figure 10-3. In the Insert Sound dialog box, mousing over a clip displays information such as the artist, composer, album title, file type and size , and any other pertinent info the file's creator included.

In the Insert Sound dialog box, select the sound clip you want to add to your slideshow, and then click OK. (Alternatively, you can simply double-click the file you want to addthere's no need to click OK.)

The Insert Sound dialog box disappears, and the prompt shown in Figure 10-4 opens. On the ribbon, the Sound Tools Options tab appears.

Figure 10-4. If you're not sure whether you want your sound to begin playing automatically or in response to a mouse click, don't worry: you can always change your mind later. PowerPoint makes customizing clip playback easy, as you see on page 330.

In the prompt box, choose whether you want the sound to play automatically when the slide appears, or only when someone clicks it.

Your options are:

Automatically. Tells PowerPoint to begin playing the sound clip as soon as the slide appears, but after any other media clips you've already added to your slide. Media clips work on a first-added, first- played basis.
When Clicked. Tells PowerPoint to add a bullhorn icon to your slide. If you choose this option, your sound clip doesn't play until youor whoever runs your slideshowclicks the bullhorn.

The dialog box disappears, and PowerPoint returns you to your slide. You see the newly displayed Sound Tools Options tab as well as a bullhorn icon on your slide (Figure 10-5).

Figure 10-5. Only the first half of the Sound Tools Options tabthe Play and Sound Options sectionsrelates to sound playback. The other half lets you tweak the size and alignment of the bullhorn icon. For serious revamps, use the Picture Tools Format tab described in Chapter 9. (If you don't see the Sound Tools Options tab, head back to your slide and click the sound [bullhorn] icon to display the tab.)

Note: PowerPoint adds the bullhorn icon to your slide regardless of whether you chose "Automatically" or "When Clicked" (see page 329) so that you can click the icon to customize sound playback. To make the bullhorn icon disappear when you run your slideshow, see step 6, below.

Double-click the bullhorn icon to preview your sound. (Alternatively, right-click the icon and select Play Preview. You can also head to the Sound Tools Options tab and click Preview.)

PowerPoint plays your sound clip. If you don't hear anything, check your computer's speakers to make sure they're turned on and that the volume is turned up high enough for you to hear. To stop the sound, click the bullhorn icon again.

To delete the sound clip from your slide, right-click the bullhorn and choose Cut from the shortcut menu.

Customize how you want PowerPoint to play your sound by choosing one or more options from Sound Tools Options Sound Options.

You can choose how your clip sounds and how PowerPoint shows it on your slide:

Slide Show Volume. Clicking this icon lets you adjust the playback volume of your sound clip to Low, Medium, High, or Mute.
Hide During Show. Turning on the checkbox next to this option tells PowerPoint to hide the bullhorn icon when you run the slideshow. But beware: If you tell PowerPoint to play a sound when clicked and your turn on this option, youor whoever's playing your slide showwon't have an icon to click.
Loop Until Stopped . Useful for short sound clips, turning on the checkbox next to this option tells PowerPoint to play the sound clip over and over again until you advance to the next slide or the slideshow ends (depending on the Play Sound option you choose).
Play Sound. Choosing one of the three Play Sound drop-down options tells PowerPoint whether you want it to begin playing the sound clip: as soon as the slide appears and stop playing as soon as the slide disappears (Automatically); only after the presenter clicks the bullhorn icon (When Clicked); or as soon as the slide appears and until the clip finishes, regardless of whether the presenter advances to subsequent slides or backs up to previous slides (Play across slides).

Max Sound File Size (KB). Click the slider and then select a number of kilobytes (or click in the box and type in your own number) to tell PowerPoint not to embed the sound file into your presentationbut link to it insteadif the sound file weighs in over the selected number. You only have the choice to link or embed .wav files; PowerPoint automatically links to all other types of sound files.

Note: Linking to a sound file instead of embedding it helps keep your presentation file size small, which can improve playback. The downside is that you have to make sure you keep both your sound and presentation files together. To set a maximum embedded file size for all your future sound files, click File

PowerPoint Options

Advanced, head to the Save section, and then click the spinner next to "Link sounds with file size greater than xx KB."

Test your sound clip by clicking the Slide Show icon.

Alternatively, select Slide Show Start Slide Show From Beginning. Its always a good idea to test a sound clip after adding it.

NOSTALGIA CORNER
Old and New Ways to Set Sound Options

In PowerPoint 2003, you set sound options by adding a sound clip to your slide, right-clicking the clip's icon, and then choosing Edit Sound Object from the shortcut menu. Doing so displayed the Sound Options dialog box, which offered you an array of sound- related settings including volume and looping options.

PowerPoint 2007 gives you a much easier way to set your sound options (see page 330, Figure 10-5). But if you miss the good old days, you can access the Sound Options dialog box in PowerPoint 2007 by heading to the Sound Tools Options tab and clicking the Options dialog launcher. When you do, the familiar Sound Options dialog box appears.

10.1.3. Adding a Sound Clip from the Clip Organizer

When you install PowerPointor any other Microsoft Office programyou automatically install a bunch of stock media clips including the sound of a ringing telephone, an animated birthday cake, and more. Unfortunately, Microsoft assigns these media clip files unrecognizable names like j0214098.wav . Fortunately, PowerPoint gives you a quick way to find them, preview them, and add them to your slides: the ClipArt task pane.

POWER USERS' CLINIC
Multiplying Sounds

PowerPoint doesn't limit you to one sound file per slide. You can add as many as you want, and even choose different settings for them in the Play Sound dialog box. For example, you can tell PowerPoint to play soft background music beginning on the first slide of your slideshow in addition to a recorded message that, when clicked, plays over the background music.

But if you add more than a couple sounds, things can get complicated. Say you've added two sound clips to the third slide of your slideshow and you've set them both up to play automatically. Because PowerPoint plays sounds you've set up to play automatically on a first-added, first-played basis, the first sound clip plays, and then the second sound clip plays.

But if you also added sound clips to the first and second slides of your slideshow, telling PowerPoint to play each one across slides (page 331), by the time you get to the third slide, the cacophony of sound is enough to make your audience members stuff their fingers in their ears.

The best approach is to use sound sparingly and test it thoroughly, as described in the section on page 330.

Note: Because not all of the sound files in the Clip Organizer are embeddable .wav files, if you add a sound clip from the Clip Organizer and then send someone else a copy of your presentation, they may not be able to hear your sound clip. When portability is what you need, you have to track down the actual file name of the Organizer sound clip, copy it to the same folder you saved your PowerPoint presentation in, and follow the steps on page 327.

Here's how to add a sound clip from the Clip Organizer:

Choose Insert Media Clips Sound Sound from Clip Organizer.

The ClipArt task pane shown in Figure 10-6 appears, showing sound clip icons in the Results section.
Click the sound clip you want to add to your slide.

A dialog box like the one back in Figure 10-4 appears.

The rest of the process is the same as adding one from your computer, so continue with step 4 on page 329.

Figure 10-6. Mousing over one of the clips in the Results section shows you the clip's file type and size. It also displays an arrow on the right side of the clip icon that you can click to bring up a pop-up menu of clip-related options (deleting the clip from the Organizer, for example). To see all the things you can do with the ClipArt pane, check out Chapter 9.

10.1.4. Adding a Sound Clip from an Audio CD

PowerPoint 2007 makes it easier than ever to add music or sounds from an audio CD to your slideshow. Unlike the old dayswhen you had to rip the clips you wanted (copy them from the audio CD onto your computer)you can add them directly to your slides from the CD. Adding CD clips is an easy way to create a classy soundtrack for your presentation. Imagine, for example, giving your presentation accompanied by the soothing strains of Vivaldi. But don't forget the magic of short clips from a CD, too. Try revving up your audience by adding the first 15 seconds of, say, the Pointer Sisters' I'm So Excited to the slide following each section break of a long, multi-section slideshow.

To add a sound clip from an audio CD to your slideshow:

Insert an audio CD into your computer's CD/DVD drive. Then go to Insert Media Clips Sound Play CD Audio Track.

PowerPoint displays the Insert CD Audio dialog box shown in Figure 10-7.

Figure 10-7. Using the Insert CD Audio dialog box to specify clip length, volume, and other characteristics doesn't affect the audio CD in any wayit simply tells PowerPoint which portions of the CD to play. Always double-check the "Total playing time" at the bottom of the dialog box; if it's 00:00, it means you've forgotten to pop a CD into your drive.

Choose the portion of the CD you want to play and how to play it by setting one or more of the following options:
- Start at track/time. In the "Start at track" box, enter a number to tell PowerPoint which audio track you want your clip to start with. If you want to start at a point other than the beginning of the selected track, use the Time box to tell PowerPoint precisely how many seconds into the track you want to start the clip.
- End at track/time. Use the "End at track" box to choose which audio track you want your clip to end with. If you want to end your clip at a point other than the end of the selected track, use the Time box to tell PowerPoint precisely how many seconds into the track you want to end the clip.
  
  Note: After you click either "Start at track" or "End at track," clicking anywhere else on the Insert Audio CD dialog box automatically updates the appropriate Time box to the selected track start (or end) time.
- Loop until stopped. Tells PowerPoint to keep playing the clip over and over until the slide is no longer visible or until the slideshow ends, depending on the option you set for Play Track (see page 335).
- Sound volume. Clicking this icon displays a volume slider you can drag from low to high and a checkbox you can turn on to mute the sound clip.
- Hide sound icon during slide show. Turning on the checkbox next to this option tells PowerPoint to hide the bullhorn icon when you run the slideshow.
When you finish setting options, click OK.

A prompt appears that asks when you want the sound to start. In the prompt box, choose Automatically to have the clip begin playing as soon as the slide appears, or When Clicked to have PowerPoint display an icon you can click to play the clip.

Note: For more details about the difference between automatic and triggered sound clips, head to page 329.

The prompt disappears, and PowerPoint returns you to your slide. You see the newly displayed CD Audio Tools Options tab (Figure 10-8), a little CD icon on your slide, and the Picture Tools Format tab, which you can use to edit the CD icon.

Figure 10-8. After you've set up your CD audio clip, PowerPoint gives you two ways to change the settings. You can click the icons you see on the Set Up section of the CD Audio Tools Options tab (shown here). Or you can click the Set Up dialog launcher to display the CD Audio Options dialog box, which is identical to the Insert CD Audio dialog box (except in name).

If you want your CD audio clip to continue playing even after you've advanced past the slide you've added it to, click the down arrow next to Play Track and then, from the drop-down menu that appears, choose Play across slides.

To preview your audio clip without actually running the slideshow, double-click the CD icon or, on the CD Audio Tools Options tab, click Play Preview.

10.1.5. Recording and Adding Your Own Sound Clip

Chapter 7 shows you how to add slide-by-slide narration, which is handy when you plan to play your presentation over the Web, at a kiosk, or in any other situation where no one will be there to narrate. But sometimes all you want to do is record a quickie sound bytefor example, the new marketing slogan you're presenting.

To record a sound clip and add it directly to your slideshow:

Go to the Insert Media Clips Sound Record Sound.

A Record Sound dialog box appears (Figure 10-9).

Figure 10-9. Click record (the circle) to start recording, stop (the square) to finish recording, and then play (the triangle) to listen to your recorded clip. If you're happy with the way it sounds, click OK. If you're not happy with it, type in a new name to create a brand-new clip.

In the Name box, type a name for the clip you're about to record.

Choose a name that's both descriptive and short.
Click Record.
Speak (or play music, or do whatever it is you want to record) into your computer's microphone.
When you're done, click Stop.

PowerPoint changes the "Total sound length" to the length of the clip you just recorded.
Click Play to preview your newly recorded sound clip. If you're satisfied, click OK to add the clip to your slide.

The Record Sound dialog box disappears and you return to your slide, where you see the clip as a bullhorn icon.

10.1.6. Creating a Soundtrack

PowerPoint 2007 makes it easier than ever to turn a single sound clip into a continuous soundtrack that plays in the background, from the first slide of your presentation to the last. However, if all you're looking for is mood music, you may find it easier to bring a boom box to your presentationit'll give you better audio quality. Consider, too, that due to copyright laws you typically need to pay for any music you add to your slideshow, as described in the box on page 328.

When you want to create a soundtrack for your entire slideshow, add a sound clip to the first slide of your slideshow, as described on page 327 starting with step 1. On the Sound Tools Options ribbon, turn on the checkboxes next to Hide During Show (page 330) and Loop Until Stopped (page 331). Then, from the Play Sound drop-down box, select "Play across slides."

Note: Adding a soundtrack to a PowerPoint 2007 slideshow is easier than it sounds, even if you're doing it for the very first time. To see the process in action, check out the screencast at www.missingmanuals.com.

10.1.7. Making Sound Clips Presenter-Triggered

Sometimes, you want to associate a sound clip with a specific slide, which you do by setting the clip's Play Sound option to Automatically (page 329). But other times you want the person presenting the slideshow to be in charge of when (or if) the sound clip plays. In that case, all you need to do is head to the Sound Tools Options tab and choose Sound Options Play Sound When Clicked, as described on page 329.