About two years ago, I reviewed Geetesh Bajaj's book Cutting Edge Power Point For Dummies. Since then, PowerPoint has gotten a facelift, so Bajaj has re-issued his book, with additional content specific for PowerPoint 2007.
The biggest change in PowerPoint is the user interface, and that's where Bajaj starts off. The ribbon is a new look for PowerPoint, but it seems more intuitive to me, and Bajaj does an excellent job in showing exactly how the ribbon works. Interface changes can confuse users who are used to older versions, so this is an important topic to cover right up front.
Another addition to PowerPoint 2007 is themes. The bane of the novice PowerPoint user is a slide show with inconsistent graphics. We've all seen them: different fonts in every slide, text that cannot be read because of the background color, etc. PowerPoint has always had a way to eliminate this - slide masters and templates. With PP2007, Microsoft introduces themes, which are essentially templates that extend throughout Office. Bajaj shows us that using themes within PowerPoint isn't really much different from using templates, and themes can actually give a presentation a more coordinated look.
Two years ago, Bajaj covered working with lines and fills in only ten pages. In the new edition, he's expanded that out to a full chapter (thirty pages) of valuable information, reflecting the expanded capabilities of PowerPoint 2007. This is another area where even experienced PowerPoint users will learn a few new tricks.
Another new chapter covers "Distributing, Repurposing, and Extending" your presentations. This is one area where PowerPoint has greatly improved over the version I still have on my home computer. It's easier to share presentations, and Bajaj goes into creating an autorun CD, emailing a presentation (which was "not recommended" two years ago), and reusing your slides (after you've done all that work, it seems a shame to just start from scratch next time!). This chapter concludes with a list of "add-ins" that are available for PowerPoint 2007 to add functionality to the program. There are a lot of solid extensions here, and I plan on giving many of them a workout.
Of course, just as it was two years ago, the value in this book is the accompanying CD. Bajaj has picked out several programs, both freeware/shareware and demo versions, to help you get the most out of your PowerPoint design efforts. The CD includes full versions of:
* TechSmith Camtasia 3
* TechSmith SnagIt 7
* Xara 3D 3
* Business Objects CX Now!
* Ppted Background Texture Collection
and demo versions of:
* TechSmith Camtasia Studio 3
* Xara 3D 6
* Sony Sound Forge
PLUS you get:
* Studio F PowerPoint Templates
* Liquid Cabaret Music Soundtracks
* Opuzz Music Sampler
* Style Workshop Drag and Drop Graphics
* Ron Leishman's Cartoon Sampler
* Movieclip.biz Video Clips
AND:
* 180 PowerPoint Backgrounds
* 3 Sample Flash SWFs
* 50 Readymade Frames
* 100 MIDI Music Scores
* 60 Images
* 275 PowerPoint Templates
from the author himself!
Cutting Edge PowerPoint 2007 For Dummies is a good update to a great book. I've used the older version quite a bit since I got it, and can see myself using this one just as much once I finally upgrade my version of Office.
Article comments
1 - Steve Hards
Geetesh Bajaj indeed provides clear and comprehensive instructions in this book - I reckon I'm pretty PowerPoint-savvy and it's the one that I keep by me for reference.
I was interested to note that you are going to try out some of the add-ins. Please do also take advantage of the free trial of my Opazity add-in (www.opazity.com), which came out too late to include in the book, but Geetesh wrote a nice review of it on his Indezine blog (here) and so did Tom Bunzel (here). I created Opazity to extend PowerPoint with an opaque-glass effect that I always wanted, but Microsoft never got around to including.
Regards, Steve