Formatting Techniques | Faster Smarter Microsoft Office System -- 2003 Edition

Making formatting changes is a fairly simple task in PowerPoint. Usually, you can simply right-click the object you want to change to get a shortcut menu of choices related to that item. Here are some of the more common formatting changes you re likely to make:

Italicize or boldface a few words for emphasis Select the text you want to change and click Bold or Italic on the Formatting toolbar. You also can press Ctrl+B to boldface the selected work, or Ctrl+I to italicize it.
Change the color of a title Highlight the text and click the down arrow to the right of the Font Color tool on the Formatting toolbar. Click the color you want from the displayed palette.
Change the bullet characters on a bullet list Right-click in the list you want to change, and select Bullets And Numbering from the shortcut menu. In the Bullets And Numbering dialog box, click one of the alternate bullet styles, or click Customize to display the Symbol dialog box. Click the character you want to use as a bullet, then click OK.

Aha! ”Changing Fonts

If you don t see a character you like, you might want to see what other fonts have to offer. Click the Font down arrow and choose a different font. The standard symbol fonts included in the Office System are Webdings, Wingdings, Wingdings 2, Wingdings 3, and Symbol, but your system may have others as well.

Change the alignment of text The easiest way to change the way text is aligned is to select it and then click Align Left, Center, or Align Right on the Formatting toolbar.
Modify indent levels If you want to increase or decrease the indent of text on the current slide, you can use the Increase Indent or Decrease Indent tools. You also can change indents by clicking the text you want to change and pressing Alt+Shift+Right arrow to increase the indent, or Alt+Shift+Left arrow to decrease it.

Change the Slide Background

Choose Background from the Format menu, and then click the down arrow in the color bar beneath the Background fill window in the Background dialog box to display the pull-down menu. Choose another color from the selected scheme, choose More Colors to select a different hue, or Fill Effects to choose a pattern, texture, gradient, or picture for the background. Click Apply to apply the change to the current slide; click Apply To All to change all slides in the presentation.

Aha! ”Making Global Text Changes

When you want to make a font change that is applied throughout your presentation, you need to work on the master that applies to that slide type. Choose Slide Master from the View menu, and then make the changes ”font, size , style, color, and alignment ”that you want to make. When you re finished making changes, click Close Master View on the Slide Master View toolbar.

Changing Color Scheme

Perhaps you like the look of the presentation design, but you re not crazy about the colors. You can easily change that. Here are the steps:

Open the presentation you want to change.
Choose Slide Design from the Format menu.
In the Slide Design task pane, click Color Schemes. A selection of color schemes appears in the task pane.
Point to the one you like, and a down arrow appears. Click it and choose whether you want to apply the change to all slides, or just the selected slide. After you make your choice, the color change is made.

From Color to Grayscale

With a click of the mouse, you can see how your presentation would appear in black and white. This is helpful for projects in which you ll be printing handouts on a monochrome printer, and you want to see how your slides will look on the printed page. Click the Color/ Grayscale tool on the Standard toolbar, and a drop-down menu appears, giving you the choice of Color, Grayscale, or Pure Black And White. Click your choice and the change is applied to the current slide. The Grayscale View toolbar appears so that you can choose additional settings, or click Close Grayscale View when you re finished.