tutorial

Tineye – Find Images Online (3)

TinEye has a web browser plug-in, so you can right click any image on a page and search the database directly. The free plug-in is available for Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, Safari and Opera. To use, pick any online image.

1. For this image, we want to find a higher resolution version. Right-click the image and select “Search Image on TinEye.”

2. TinEye found 121 results, and using the Biggest Image sorter, there is a 800x635px version available*.

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-08-16T08:53:28-07:00December 21st, 2012|Resource/Misc, Tutorial|

Tineye – Find Images Online (2)

TinEye, the reverse image search site can also be used for some detective work.

Let’s use TinEye to check if an image is being used by another website without permission. Here is a beautiful photo by my friend and incredibly talented photographer, Rikk Flohr, from his webpage.

1. To do a quick web search for non-permitted use of this photo, I loaded it into TinEye using the drag and drop feature.

2. TinEye’s search only found 1 result, which is actually Rikk’s Flickr account.

3. Of course, no search engine covers the entire internet. TinEye is constantly crawling webpages and updating the image database. And this image search proves it is possible other instances of an image exists online. The test image was found on Rikk’s Flickr account, but missed it on his actual webpage. I assume TinEye hasn’t yet crawled Rikk’s site or it is possible the site is already protected in which case TinEye can’t get the image information.

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-08-16T08:53:47-07:00December 19th, 2012|Resource/Misc, Tutorial|

Tineye – Find Images Online (1)

TinEye is a reverse image search engine. It can be a great resource for presentation design.

TinEye lets you upload, or link to an online image, and see where it came from, find higher resolution versions, how/where it’s being used and if there are modified versions. It is the first image search engine to use image identification technology rather than keywords, metadata or watermarks. When you upload an image to be searched, TinEye creates a unique digital signature for it, and then compares this signature to every other image in their index to find matches. In our tests, TinEye did not generally find similar images, but exact matches – including those that have been cropped, edited, or resized.

The free service allows 50 searches per day, up to 150 searches a week. There is a paid version of TinEye which allows for more searches.

TinEye is easy to use. Here is our sample image and the goal is to find a high res version.

1. On the TinEye webpage, click “Browse” to upload the image. The sample image is fairly small at 350×520 pixels.

2. TinEye search of its database for this image found 80 matches.

3. The default search result is set to Best Match.

4. Changing the sort by Biggest Image, I find a link to the same image that is 1600×1200 pixels!

Note: Most images found online are protected by copyright. If you would like to use any image found through TinEye for commercial purposes, you should confirm it is available under Creative Commons, or contact the image owner for permission.

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-08-16T08:54:05-07:00December 17th, 2012|Resource/Misc, Tutorial|

Veterans Day Salute By TLC

As a salute to everyone in the U.S. military for everything you do, and sacrifice – here is a tribute created in PowerPoint:

1. Great video loop from videoblocks.com

2. Image from istockphoto

3. Same image after some development work in Photoshop and saved as a .png with transparency

4. Image from istockphoto

5. Same image after resizing and development work in Photoshop, saved as a .png with transparency

Assemble all in PowerPoint 2010, animate and export as a video
[youtube src=”https://youtube.com/embed/heUG1f5yBKg?rel=0″]

Troy @ TLC

By |2016-08-16T08:57:59-07:00November 14th, 2012|Personal, Portfolio|

QR Codes For Your Presentation

A “QR” Code is a “Quick Response” Code. Think of them as UPC, or SKU, codes on steroids.

The QR code is a great way to allow an audience to quickly capture your contact information, website, or your department’s page on the company intranet. And, using a QR code is free! Plus, virtually every online capable smartphone has free QR code reading applications. To use, just launch the app, take a picture of the QR code and it will automatically open a webpage.

At TLC Creative Services’ PowerPoint training programs, I open the session with a list of resources, one being a QR code to this blog. At the end of the training, my “Thank you” slide includes a QR code that goes to the TLCCreative.com contact page. Both are much quicker and easier than everyone scrambling for a pen to write down the info (and everyone has their phone out reading email, texting and probably checking the score of the game already).

There are many websites that let you create your own QR code for free. For this tutorial, I am using BeQRious.

What sets this site apart from many other free QR code generators is the numerous types of QR codes you can generate, but also the tracking and managing of your QR codes and data. Plus, generating a code is simple.

1. Select the type of code you want to generate: choose from web URL, email, phone, text, vCard, SMS, YouTube video, Facebook profile, Twitter profile, map, or graphical. Enter the information into the text box.

2. Customize the color of the code (QR codes do not need to be black and white, just high contrast).

3. Download the QR code as a JPG, PNG, GIF, or PDF. And this site lets you choose how large you want your file size to be. The PDF option is great because you get your code as a fully scale-able vector image that can be made as large or small as you’d like, without losing any quality. At TLC Creative Services, we open the PDF in Adobe Illustrator and export as a .emf to have a vector (ie. scalable) graphic for PowerPoint. Or export as a .png is another good option for use on PowerPoint slides.

4. You can then insert your new QR code into your presentations to make it easy for your audience to connect with you.

5. Within PowerPoint (using 2007 and above), use the Picture Color feature to change the QR Code to any of the template colors. As long as there is contrast between the QR code and the background, it will work.

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-08-16T09:01:22-07:00October 26th, 2012|Tutorial|

Videos Not Pure White or Pure Black?

You watch a video in Windows Media Player or Quicktime Player or any other player and it looks great. On the same computer, the video is inserted whites and blacks look grey. Don’t blame PPT, but the Graphics Card (GPU).

If running an nVidia card, look at the DYNAMIC RANGE setting, because it is most likely set to limit the color range of videos (no idea why, but I see this on everyone of the TLC show computers I setup).

Dynamic range describes the ratio between the maximum and minimum white and black.
With the nVidia graphics card, you can adjust the settings for the display. By default, many nVidia cards are set to use the settings which are limited to 16-235 (whites won’t be white, blacks won’t be black).

Open the nVidia Control Panel >> on the left in the “Select a Task” column go to ADJUST VIDEO COLOR SETTINGS >> look at the settings in “2. How do you make color adjustments.” Click on the “ADVANCED” tab. If the DYNAMIC RANGE setting is (16-235), go to the next step.

Select the WITH THE NVIDIA SETTINGS radio button. On the ADVANCED tab, change the DYNAMIC RANGE to FULL (0-255). This lets videos use the full color range from pure white to pure black.

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-08-16T09:05:25-07:00October 2nd, 2012|Resource/Misc, Tutorial|

PPT 2013 – Improved Presenter Notes

Okay, the title is a bit misleading for this one. It is not so much the presenter notes that are improved, but rather the way you open/close the presenter notes.

Here is my sample slide, which is not showing the Presenter Notes:

New in PPT 2013 is the addition of a NOTES button on the bottom of the UI.

Click the NOTES button and the Presenter Notes open – no need to fiddle with positioning the cursor and getting the double arrow cursor so you can click and drag to raise up and open the Presenter Notes.

Here is a video of the NOTES button in action
[youtube src=”https://youtube.com/embed/pr5op_ibccE?rel=0″]

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-08-16T09:10:22-07:00August 31st, 2012|PowerPoint|

Shape Locker Add-in (Something We Have All Been Asking For!)

Last week, Excel and PowerPoint add-in developer Chirag at OfficeOne Solutions released Shape Locker. It took me only reading the description and who the developer was to know it was the answer to a lot of project requests – and this add-in does not disappoint!

Shape Locker is simply listed as a PowerPoint add-in to “Lock shape position, size, rotation, text and more with Shape Locker.” And it simply does exactly that! After downloading and installing, PowerPoint adds a new “Design Tools” tab.

There is only one button for the add-in. Select a shape in a presentation, go to the DESIGN TOOLS tab and click the LOCK SHAPES button.

The add-in is controlled through a single dialog box. Check the options desired, click OK and you are done.

Here are my test slides:

Slide 1 = is completely editable.
Slide 2 = I have applied different Shape Locker options to each text bar
You can download these slides to text the results here (57 KB .pptx)

———————–

The first bar has all editing options disabled, so you can select the shape, but do nothing to it (move, resize, change colors, edit text, etc.). Here are the Shape Locker settings applied:

For the second text bar, I left the text editing and disabled all other options, so you can change the words but not move/resize/re-color/etc. the shape.

On the 3rd bar, it is the opposite of the previous. The shape can be adjusted (move, recolor, resize, etc.), but the text cannot be modified.

And for the final text bar, I simply used the option to disable the ability to select the shape to completely lock it from any edits.

This is the functionality that users (especially myself) have been asking for since PPT 2000. But it does have a few downsides:
– Only 1 shape at a time can be locked. So if you want to lock a full presentation (or most of a presentation), it is going to take some time to click on each shape and apply the Shape Locker settings.
– To unlock a shape, it is also a time consuming process. Select a shape, open the Shape Locker dialog, uncheck the lock settings – for each shape, 1 at a time. Note: If the disable selection option (used in the final bar of the test slide) is used, that shape cannot be selected and cannot be unlocked (ie. It is permanently a part of that slide).
– Any computer with Shape Locker installed can unlock shapes.
– This add-in specifically says it works with PPT 2010 (32-bit and 64-bit) and PPT 2007. The add-in is not available in PPT 2003 and if a presentation with locked shapes is opened in PPT 2003, there are some unpredictable results. Here is the same test slide opened in PPT 2003 and among other things, if the text has been locked, it does not show up.

I was able to ask Chirag about a few issues and feature requests. The good news is a few features are already in the works that will resolve a few of the tedious use aspects and also add even more power to this fantastic add-in!

You can get the Shape Locker add-in from the OfficeOne site here. And if you first go to my friend Geetesh’s Indezine site, that review has a 50% off promo code (until August 31, 2012).

Last, fellow PowerPoint MVP Steve Rindsberg of PPTools offered this fun trivia about the Shape Locker add-in:
Q – “Why do they call it Shape Locker when it lets you lock placeholders, text boxes, video clips, and pictures as well?”
A – Because when coding everything on a slide is a Shape; placeholders, text boxes, videos, pictures, sounds, etc.

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-08-16T09:18:42-07:00July 30th, 2012|Software/Add-Ins|

Turning Point on Computer with Multiple PPT Installs

Last week was a corporate meeting that integrated Turning Point ARS (audience response system) for a series of audience interaction questions throughout the meeting. I have used lots of ARS options, but find Turning Point the most full featured and best PowerPoint integrated package.

All of TLC Creative’s show computers have two versions of PowerPoint installed, currently all have PPT 2003 and PPT 2010. When installing the Turning Point app, I always run into the issue of it being recognized in the PPT version needed for that meeting. So here is a quick tutorial on setting up Turning Point to open and function in a specific version.

OPTION A:
1. Open TurningPoint in 2003 – Select Tools on the Turning Point toolbar

2. Go to Settings

3. Under Misc >> Add in always loaded – Change to “TRUE”

OPTION B:
Launch the TurningPoint before starting (any version) of PPT, which will open 2010 as default
1. Control Panel > Programs

2. Click Programs & Features

3. Scroll down to Microsoft Office 2010 > Select Change

4. Repair

5. Wait for the repair to finish, it will ask you to restart. Once restarted when launching TurningPoint 2008 PowerPoint 2010 will be the default. TurningPoint will default to launching the last modified version of Office – so when you repair Office 2010, it prompts TurningPoint to choose 2010 as default.

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-08-16T09:19:03-07:00July 27th, 2012|Tutorial|

Creating the “Open Again” Image in PPT

Yesterday’s post used a fun image that was downloaded from Fotolia.com and completely customized in PowerPoint. Here is what I did:

1. Research and download image from Fotolia.com (where TLC Creative Services has a subscription plan), then insert on slide.

2. Frame the right and bottom of the image with gradient lines.

3. Add a white box (white to match the slide background color).

4. Size and position the white box to cover the existing text.

5. Add PPT text with the new message using a custom font, same fill color as the marker in the image and positioned right over the marker.

6. Done – no Photoshop needed.

– Troy @ TLC

By |2016-08-16T09:23:07-07:00July 2nd, 2012|Tutorial|
Go to Top