Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard)
I get sent presentations made by people who dont know how to use masters. When I have to format them it's a nightmare as there is no master template to edit. Is there a way of converting their text boxes to my master template in one presentation without copying and pasting individual text boxes across into a new presentation based on the correct template? Know what i mean? How do i apply a master to an arbitrary text box? Ie Like i would apply a style sheet in Indesign or Word.
Hi,
The answer to all of your questions is, "yes."
There's some vocabulary that needs to be addressed (I'm going to take
some big short cuts for brevity here):
Master Slide
Whatever is on this slide is what you get when you insert a new slide
into a presentation and can be applied to all existing slides within a
presentation.
Template
A document that when opened, is a copy of the template but with a new
file name, such as Document 1, and the template lives on unaffected.
Theme
A color scheme for a presentation and it's objects (especially drawing
objects). In 2008 Themes have .thmx file extensions
Style
A file that contains the formatting information for text. (really it's
more than that, but let's keep this simple).
OK now I'll try to answer your question as simply as I can.
In PowerPoint 2008 you can save styles and themes. What I propose that
you do is to use that feature. Then, if you want to apply a style or
theme to a Master slide, you can do it esily.
Let's say you have a presentation with just an arbitrary text box. You
get that text box formatted just so and you're happy with it.
Click on slide background. On the Formatting palette look in the
Document Theme section. Click the Save Theme button. Give the theme a
name and save it in the My Themes folder. If you want the theme to be
available to the Project Gallery, then put it into either the Theme
Colors or Theme Fonts folders, or make a new folder and put it there, too.
Themes that are saved in the first level of the My Themes folder appear
in the Elements Gallery under "Custom Themes." You can apply your themes
from there, or use the formatting palette to apply themes that are
inside the folders (I know, it's kinda odd the way it's set up but it
makes sense in certain scenarios).
Then, when you switch to the Slide Master view, you can apply any theme
you like to the slide master.
So it really is just like Word and Indesign. Themes are now office-wide.
-Jim
--
Jim Gordon
Mac MVP
MVPs are independent experts who are not affiliated with Microsoft.
Visit my blog
http://blog.360.yahoo.com/blog-i7JMeio7cqvhotIUwCzaJWq9