Blog-Presentation-PowerpointBlog-Presentation-Powerpoint-Video

So now you have made this amazing presentation and you get asked at the end if you could share it. You could download all of the slides into a PDF and email it out, but if you had any videos or audio files embedded in your presentation, you will lose those. And, PDF files can’t do any of the transitions or animations you have spent time carefully creating. But the good news is – you can turn your PowerPoint into a video that you can post to Vimeo or YouTube, or that you can embed in your website.

Getting started

To do this, you start by either using Save and Send on older versions, or Export. Both are found in the File tab on the ribbon. Then you can select Create a Video. You can choose what video quality you want to save it as. Remember that the higher the video quality you pick, the larger your end file will be which is fine if you are streaming, but if you plan to email out the file, you will want a much smaller size, like 720p or even 480p. Unless you have a lot of HD videos embedded in your PowerPoint, you can safely save as a 1080p file which is in the high definition range.

Recording audio

If you didn’t record audio for your presentation and you want to, you will need to go to Record Timing and Narration, select the slide you want to start the narration on, and then in the Slideshow tab on the ribbon, click on Record Slide Show. If you don’t have your presentation down pat, you can click on Rehearse Timing first to make sure you have everything you want.
If you don’t want to have any audio, you will need to decide how long you want each slide to appear during playback. You can’t click forward on the remote in everyone’s offices, so you will need to choose a time – 5 or 6 seconds should be long enough, unless you have a lot of information on that slide. And then you have to ask yourself why you have so much information on that slide.

Saving

When you are all done, click Save As and give your new video a name. You will then be prompted to choose a file format. Many machines means many different video players. A good safe bet is a WMV file which can be played on almost any video playing software.
But what if I have a Mac?
On a Mac, you have a few different steps. You will still go to File and Export, and then you will choose your file format right away. MP4 is a good choice here, as it is a common file type. You will then have an option to select your file quality. If you figure that most monitors and TVs today are wide screen, you should choose 1920 X 1080 as your size. Then you will want to pick Timing to bring in your narration, and then choose how long each slide should be, then click

Export

And there you have it! Your PowerPoint is now a sharable video.