1. Presentation Guidelines for Authors
Applicable Notes

2. About this Presentation
Use a good virus checker to make sure this file has not been corrupted
View this presentation first as a slide show
Then go to “View”  “Notes Page” for important additional information!
Remember: Confidentiality of information is not guaranteed
View it as a slide show first. It will highlight important aspects of your presentation, and give you an example of a presentation that lives up to HST 2017 guidelines.
Virus checker: When we created this presentation guide it contained no known viruses. This file was scanned by a Norton Antivirus Corporate Edition tool before being distributed to authors. You should use a good, up to date virus checker on this file, and any other file you import from an outside source. Make sure your virus checker’s data files are up to date, too. Keep in mind: the version of this file you are reading may be different from the version we checked!
Confidentiality: We respect your copyright, and do not distribute your presentation before the symposium. However, we cannot promise strict confidentiality of your presentation before the conference, because various people have read access. Do not include any confidential information in your presentation.
Applicable Notes

3. Purpose
Recommend guidelines for electronic slide presentation at workshops and tutorials
Provide an electronic template
The file you are reading has settings, colors and fonts that conform to HST 2017 guidelines
You may edit this file and replace its slides with your presentation
The purpose of this presentation is three-fold:
1. It documents guidelines for good practice.
2. This presentation follows the standards and guidelines that it contains. With the obvious exception of the “Bad Examples” portion, this slide guide is an example of a presentation that conforms to both standards and guidelines.
3. This presentation may be used as a starting point for your own SubVt slides. Simply replace the text and diagrams that you see here with your own information.
Applicable Notes

4. Place Presentation Title Here Author Name(s) should go next
Title Slide
Place Presentation Title Here Author Name(s) should go next
Company or Institution Name Here Address City, State, Country, Postal Code
Your first slide must be the Title Slide. The suggested format is shown above. (You may adapt this slide to suit your tastes.) It is recommended that your company or university logo appear on the title slide only. This is followed by your Outline Slide and the other slides mentioned in this template.
Company name and/or logo at the bottom
Applicable Notes

5. Outline Slide
After your Title Slide, your next slide should be your Outline Slide
Briefly tell the audience what you are going to cover
Verbally, cover only the main points on the Outline Slide
Outline the high points of the presentation you are giving. Don’t include the title or conclusions in your Outline Slide. You may want to state the purpose of the work described in your paper. If so, describe the big picture of why you did the work, not the detailed technical objectives your work accomplished.
Applicable Notes

6. Company Name and Logo
Company or institutional name and/or logo and any other organizational identifying information belong at the bottom of the page, NOT at the top
As shown below
The tops of the slides are reserved for their individual titles. Leave the corporate or institutional identification for the bottoms of the slides.
Company Name / Logo
Company Slogan
Applicable Notes

7. Contrast High Contrast is very important
Use dark lines/text on a light background
Background: White, yellow, light cyan
Foreground: Blue, red, dark green, black
Caution: White, light green or yellow lettering or lines become unreadable when projected
High visual contrast is very important. If your slides are difficult to read, then the audience will concentrate on reading them and not concentrate on what you are saying. Or they may just walk out on you...
We suggest a few tried and proven color schemes that will produce highly visible visual aids.
Every year a few authors ignore warnings about yellow, white, and light green. Each year there are negative yellow card comments about the authors who use these inappropriate color schemes.
Colors that look good on computer monitors do not necessarily project well. The best advice is: Do not use white, yellow, or light green slide lettering under any circumstances ! Other colors, including light blue or other muted tones, are also a common problem.
Applicable Notes

8. Style and Font Guidelines
Use short phrases, not long sentences
Use Arial, or similar Sans Serif font
This document uses Arial throughout
36 Point Titles or larger!
28 point text or larger!
Do not use fonts smaller than 28 point, or people in the back of the room will not be able to read your slides!
Let your slides highlight your talk, and not be a substitute for what you have to say. You, the speaker, deliver the message and let your slides augment your talk.
Use fonts that do not have a blurred appearance or look like 70s “computer characters.” Arial and Helvetica are two fonts that project well. If you use other fonts, we suggest you project them electronically to get a feel for what your audience will see.
36 point titles with 28 point supportive text are visible from the rear of the session room. Smaller fonts may be visible at the front of the session room or on your monitor, but NOT from the rear half of the session room. USE NOTHING SMALLER THAN 28 POINT FONTS! Larger font is even better.
Make your text large enough so that your audience instantly reads your message. If they have to concentrate to read your slides they will be concentrating on the screen, and not on what you are saying, or they may just walk out on you...
Applicable Notes

9. Style Guidelines (cont.)
Roughly one slide per 1 to 2 minutes of talk
Each slide should have a title
9 lines maximum on a text slide
7 - 8 words maximum per line
In “File”  “Page Setup…” specify:
Slides sized for: “On Screen Show”
Slide orientation: Landscape
Use high contrast: Dark lettering/lines on a light background
One of the most common complaints from attendees is unreadable visual aids. If you follow these guidelines you can avoid two of the most common pitfalls:
1. Trying to cram too much information on a single slide. A common mistake is to use reduced font sizes to make room for more words and lines. If you can’t read your lettering from ten feet away from a laptop display (15 feet from larger monitors), then most of your audience will have problems.
2. The second common complaint is bad color contrast. Colors that look good on your monitor do not necessarily view well when projected in the session room. If in doubt, choose in favor of higher contrast.
Black lettering on a pure white background, while perhaps somewhat dull, is perfectly readable. However, we discourage the use of a pure white background. We prefer that you use a very light yellow background, per the template.
Rule of thumb: Try to eliminate, or at least minimize, the use of red text and lines. You would be surprised at the number of color-blind people who simply can’t see dark red colors!
Applicable Notes

10. Special Fonts or Symbols
Watch out for:
Wingdings
MS Line Draw
Monotype Sorts
Scientific Symbol fonts
Greek characters
Asian language fonts
Always embed TrueType fonts in file
The fonts on the computer where you prepare your presentation will not necessarily all be present on the projection computers. Some authors were surprised to discover that bullet fonts and scientific character fonts displayed differently when loaded on the conference presentation computers.
Problems were especially common with “Wingdings”, “MS Line Draw” and “Monotype Sorts” fonts. Also, some Asian language fonts and Greek characters were problem sources.
If your presentation has special fonts, you can include the fonts in your upload by checking the “Embed TrueType Fonts” box that appears when the “File”  “Save As…” menu is selected.
Caution: Use of this option increases the size of your presentation file by as much as 5X. Large presentation files take a long time to upload. Use embedded fonts only if necessary.
Applicable Notes

11. Presentation Flow Title slide Outline slide
Detail slides (i.e., slides #3 and up)
Conclusion slide
Backup slides??
In summary, your first slide must be the Title Slide. Your company or university logo may appear on the Title Slide and, hopefully, only on this slide. This is followed by your Outline Slide and your detail slides.
Most speakers will use between 40 and 120 seconds per slide, so plan accordingly and rehearse your timing!
Finally, have one slide, the Conclusion Slide, that ends your presentation and leaves the audience with the key points that you would like to communicate.
Consider having Backup Slides in reserve to answer specific questions. If time allows, address questions with your backup slides, located beyond your conclusion slide. (Do not expect to have time to cover backup slides.)
Applicable Notes

12. Use a blank slide to focus attention on the speaker
If you are finished with a particular slide and wish to talk for a while before the next slide, include a blank (all light yellow) slide. When the audience sees the screen go blank, attention automatically moves back to the speaker.
Applicable Notes

13. Display Speed Slides should display instantly
Do not distract the audience with slow transition effects
Avoid overuse of slow graphics or special effects
Presentations at HST 2017 sessions never seem to be long enough to convey all the information the speakers wish they had time to present. Do not waste any of this precious time waiting for your next slide to display. Allow 2 to 3 minutes for a few questions at the end of your presentation. The length of time available for your individual presentation is twenty minutes. Do not abuse your audience by exceeding your time allotment! Practice your presentation several times in advance of giving your talk. Cut your presentation down until you fit within your allotted time, including a few minutes for questions.
Be fair to your fellow speakers and do not encroach into the time available for their presentations.
Overuse of transition effects not only wastes your presentation time, it distracts the audience. Transition effects are VERY irritating.
Remember: The audience is present to hear what you have to say.
Applicable Notes

14. Transitions Between Slides
Special animation when changing from one slide to the next
Highly distracting to the audience
Don’t do it!
Default settings should be:
Effect: No transition
Speed: Fast
Advance: On mouse click
We strongly suggest you minimize transition effects in your presentation when moving from a complete slide to the next slide. Make transitions between slides be instantaneous. No exceptions!
You will be able to control your presentation with a remote control that lets you move forward to the next visual or backward to a previous one. A laser pointer will also be available to let you point to specific areas on the projection screen.
You should assume that NO mouse or keyboard will be present on the podium, so your presentation must be designed to run in consecutive order from the first through the last slide.
Hidden slides, graphic objects with action settings, PowerPoint menus, drawing on the screen, and other effects that require the use of a mouse or keyboard cannot be used.
Final note: The Advance Setting “On Mouse Click” does not imply that there will be a mouse available during your presentation. The phrase “On Mouse Click” is the title of a PowerPoint setting, and means only that pressing “Enter” or clicking a mouse will begin animation. A mouse will probably not be available when you present.
Applicable Notes

15. Transitions Between Lines
Optional
Focuses attention on a specific line of a slide
Can be highly effective
Make transitions happen instantaneously
Dim previous lines
Use sparingly
If you use a transition effect between phrases or lines, the transition should be instantaneous. Focus your audience on the current line or phrase. But do not overuse this effect. Use it wisely and sparingly!
In this slide guide we use an effect that is rapid and not distracting: The current line is highlighted, and previous lines are shown in a faded color. This is one effective technique, but certainly not the only way to present your ideas. Use what you are comfortable with, and be consistent in your use of effects.
It is especially distracting and obnoxious when the next phrase moves onto the slide from seemingly random directions. The result is that the audience concentrates on the slides rather than on what the speaker is saying.
Applicable Notes

16. Sound Effects DO NOT USE SOUND EFFECTS
Sound effects slow down slide transitions
Enough said.
Applicable Notes

17. Borders Borders are discouraged!
They reduce the amount of space available for text and data
They slow down the slide display
Notice in the above slide that PowerPoint automatically places a small margin around the outside of the slide. If you use an additional border, the effect will be a border inside a border. You lose valuable space that would otherwise be useful for information.
Applicable Notes

18. Diagram Slides Keep diagrams simple Make them easy to view
Make text readable with large font
See “View”  “Notes Page”
An example follows on the next slide:
Don’t force the audience to study your diagram in order to understand it. Instead, make it simple so that you can walk them through details.
Keep the diagram uncluttered. Use large fonts to make the text readable.
Do not use borders because borders take away space that is better used to make your diagram readable.
In RARE circumstances, animation can make diagrams easier to understand. An effective effect is the use of animation to build a diagram piece by piece. But don’t overdo it! With each click of the slide controller another piece of the diagram appears and is explained by the speaker. Be aware that many viewers in the audience find this annoying, so do not use this technique unless you absolutely must.
The following example uses this technique:
Applicable Notes

19. Diagram (see “View”  “Notes Page”)
Board 1
ASP
Board 2
ASP
Board 3
ASP
tdo
PSBM
tck
Several characteristics of this example are not obvious:
1. The connection lines use a weight of 2.5, rather than PowerPoint’s default value of This makes little difference when the diagram is viewed on a monitor, but makes things much easier to see when projected.
2. The yellow boxes use an even heavier weight.
3. The signal names to the right of the PSBM box will be difficult to see because they use small 20 point font. Presumably the speaker would walk the audience through the signal names when each name appears on the screen
4. We purposely use a “fly from left” animation to draw the attention of the audience as each piece of the diagram appears. As diagrams become increasingly busy, making an object appear instantly would not be obvious to the audience.
5. DON’T USE THIS ANIMATION TECHNIQUE UNLESS YOU ABSOLUTELY POSITIVELY MUST! Compared to having the entire diagram appear instantaneously, this takes a lot longer to display, and may irritate some viewers in the audience. Use common sense.
tms
tdi
trst
Applicable Notes

20. Presenting Data - Graphs
Use graphs, not tables, when possible
Keep graphs as simple as possible
Eliminate or subdue any distracting grid lines
Use large font sizes
including the numbering and labeling of the axes!
An example follows on the next slide:
Simple is best. It would probably be a mistake to take a detailed graph that appears in the proceedings and use it directly in a slide.
Use graphs to summarize relationships.
Make sure that all numbering on your graphs is AT LEAST 28 POINT FONT OR LARGER!
Applicable Notes

21. Fault Coverage vs. No. of Vectors
100 80 60
Fault Coverage (%) 40
Oversimplify, if necessary for the understanding of relationships.
Note the use of thicker lines, rather than the default line thickness, to promote easier viewing.
In this example, the author discusses relationships in three areas of the curve and makes each of the three areas appear by clicking the slide controller.
However… consider having all of your data display at once, unless you really need to use this technique. Keep it simple. 20
1.0E+01
1.0E+03
1.0E+05
1.0E+06
No. of Vectors
Applicable Notes

22. Some Bad Examples
The next three slides show examples of bad practices that should be avoided:
Bad slide layout
Improper color use
Sound and transition effects gone mad
The bad examples that follow are closely patterned after slides that we have seen at previous conferences.
The examples in this document are not as bad as the worst we have seen in actual slide review. Most authors simply wouldn’t believe it if we included some truly bad examples of real slides.
Applicable Notes

23. (Press the “Enter” key to continue)
This slide has no title. Titles help guide the audience through the talk. All slides except photographs should have a title.
The type on this slide is too small. It’s readable here but, when projected, only the presenter and maybe those in the front rows will be able to read it. Those in the back will be completely lost.
USE OF ALL CAPITAL LETTERS OR ITALICS also makes slides difficult to read. Use light backgrounds; not dark!
This slide would be easier to follow if indentations were used.
Don’t design your slides to stand alone. They are a guide to your presentation. If they were understandable by themselves, we could just publish them and forget about presentations! Your slides support what you say. They don’t replace it.
This slide has too many words and too many points. Keep your slides under nine lines.
The text in the “slide” above speaks for itself. Probably no author would combine all the bad practices into one single slide, but a few of the bad practices creep into many presentations each year.
Applicable Notes

24. Bad Color Usage Poor Contrast ASP ASP ASP PSBM Board 1 Board 2 Board 3
tdo
This slide doesn’t look too horrible on a monitor, but it is really bad when projected. The light orange/green/yellow lines will nearly vanish when projected. The color combination in the PSBM box will also become unreadable.
Signal names to the right of PSBM are too small, even near the front of a session room. Note that they are readable on a monitor, though.
Was the green text on a dark blue background easy to see?
tck
PSBM
tms
tdi
trst
Applicable Notes

25. How to Annoy The Audience (Press Enter)
Misusing sound
Overusing transition effects
Focusing the audience on the slides, not on the speaker
Trying to use every feature PowerPoint has to offer
Applicable Notes

26. Your Final Steps
Use a good virus checker to ensure that no virus crept into your presentation
Before traveling to the conference, decide on how you wish to deliver an electronic copy of your saved presentation to your conference chair.  To conserve time and avoid potential technical difficulties, conference policy does not permit you to use your own computer to run your presentation.  You therefore have to choose one of the three options listed on the slide that follows this one.
View it as a slide show first. It will highlight important aspects of your presentation, and give you an example of a presentation that lives up to HST 2017 guidelines.
Virus checker: When we created this presentation guide it contained no known viruses. This file was scanned by a Norton Antivirus Corporate Edition tool before being distributed to authors. You should use a good, up to date virus checker on this file, and any other file you import from an outside source. Make sure your virus checker’s data files are up to date, too. Keep in mind: the version of this file you are reading may be different from the version we checked!
Applicable Notes

27. Electronic Presentation Submission
Submit your final presentation in powerpoint or pdf format to Kathleen Ballos at no later than 5:00 PM ET (ET) on April 21st AND
Bring an electronic copy of your saved presentation on a USB flash memory to the conference.
Do not wait until the time of your talk to load your presentation. The time it takes to load your presentation onto the conference computer will count as part of your allowed 20 minutes.
Applicable Notes

28. Conclusion KISS -- Keep Individual Slides Simple
Use large fonts for high visibility
36 point for titles
28 point for details
Use highly contrasting colors
Highlight, don’t detail
You have 20 minutes, including questions
Have fun and enjoy the experience
Contact your session chair if you have any questions.
Applicable Notes