Thank you for your interest in presenting The Greening of American Cemeteriesslide show. The Green Burial Council is grateful to you and others who are helping educate the public about their options. The following suggestions are intended to ensure that our message is consistent, knowledgeable, and easy to understand.
Basic Presentation The slide show is designed to relate basic principles of green burial to a general audience. A running script has been provided in the Notes section to give the speaker a general idea of the flow and intention of the slides. Feel free to improvise using your own voice, which is always most persuasive and natural.
Customizing the Presentation The presentation lends itself to customizing simply by re-ordering the existing slides or adding ones that speak to your specific audience. To replicate the fonts and sizing, most styles are set in the Master slide, though others have been customized. For more information on how to design or edit the existing slides, go to the Help menu or follow the instructions and recommendations below:
Change Text You can edit text just as you would in any word processing program by highlighting, cutting, copying and pasting, or by highlighting and simply typing.
Replace Photos Don’t like the photo on a given slide? Switch it out with one from the Photo Gallery or upload your own. Simply highlight the offending photo, delete it, highlight the one you want and paste it in place. Grab a corner to resize it, highlight it and move it to the desired location. Don’t forget to change the credits. Make sure you give accurate credit for every image you use.
Add Video Clip To add a video clip to your presentation, select the slide you want to use (create a new one by clicking on New Slide). Click Insert at the top of your menu bar, then go to Movie or Media on the same bar. Click Movie from File (presumably you have it downloaded onto your computer and filed somewhere easy to find), then navigate to the file you want; click on it, then hit OK. You will get an alert box asking if you want the film to begin automatically or on your click. Voilá.
Change the Slide Order Slides are easy to move around, so if you have a better flow in mind, go for it. Click on the slide you want to move on the left hand column under Slides. It will get an orange frame so you’ll know what you are working on. Click and drag it up or down to its desired location.
Edit the Commentary Easy. Just like any other text. If there is text in the main slide you want to remove but remember to cover, simply highlight, cut and paste it into commentary. This is space reserved for you and only you, so load it with good facts and figures so you will have access to it if you need it.
Create Custom Presentations If you don’t want to create completely different documents just to eliminate or add a slide, another option is to create a custom slide show for a specific event. Open the master slide show and click on Slide Show on the main top menu bar. Then click on Custom Shows, Edit Custom Shows. Here you will be able to name a new presentation by clicking NEW, then typing the name of your new presentation. Select the slides you want to use, reorder them if necessary with the up and down arrows, and you will have a show specific to the audience you are addressing. To play, just go to Custom Shows and click to begin.
Animate To bring in lines and images when you want them during your show, go to Animations on the top menu bar. Click on the textbox you want to animate. You can either highlight the box itself or highlight each line in the order you choose. Once highlighted, click on Entrance Effects. Use ONE STYLE for your presentation, not a circus of different zips in and out. To change the order of appearance, click on Reorder on the top right and use the arrows. If you want to have things disappear, use Exit Effects. Be careful with these commands, as they often distract more than they wow.
Dress Up Images, Text Boxes To add text boxes, go to the Insert section of the Home page. There you will find a text box with a big A on it. Click, then touch down on the slide and begin typing. Adjust the font, style, color and size as necessary. To add frames around text boxes and images, click on image or box. This will highlight Format on the Menu Bar. Click on Format, then find Line. Choose colors, then More colors to customize, Weight to determine width of lines, Effects to change shape, and any number of other ways to customize. Try not to create a circus of colors—choose one and use it uniformly.
General Image Placement The same design theory applies to placement. Each slide needs to have common elements in order for the eye to read it comfortably. Keep images in the same general vicinity from slide to slide so the reader knows what to expect. Text size should also be uniform so as to appeal to the reader for content, not shock value.
Representing the Green Burial Council While making the presentation your own, please do keep in mind that you are representing the GBC. The information provided is accurate and will ensure a consistent message to the public by all who give it. We would love to hear your suggestions for improvement or additional information or questions.
For more information, contact: Green Burial Council, 888.966.3330, [email protected]