How can you make your slides readable from a distance?

My mentor taught me long ago to never have more than five words on a slide. If it needs more than five words, it needs to be more than one slide. Most of my slides just have a full-page photo, nothing more.

Some things I consider: 1. As few colours as possible (max 3, Background, Font and perhaps an Accent colour to highlight anything important.) 2. As few words as possible. 3. Use Photos/Tables or any sort of graphic representation wherever possible. 4. No serifs on fonts. 5. Large font size 6. High contrast between background colour and font colour. Main mindset shift: Use as few slides as possible. Remember, not every word needs to be showcased visually. It might be best to avoid slides altogether when sharing anecdotes, greetings or gratitude at the end. Keep the focus on you, you are the hero, everything on the screen is a background dancer!

Some things that I keep in mind when creating a deck is text hierarchy and contrast. There should not be too many fonts and too many text sizes. Choosing a simple font without serifs and usually staying away from italics. The more legible and “easy on the eyes” a deck is of course the easier it will be to read from a further distance. If you’re thinking that a slide has too much content 1- eliminate the unnecessary or 2- separate ideas

You need to use clear and simple language as well as fonts to ensure easy readability for all audiences. Ensure your font is large enough, at least size 24. Be aware of the colours used for both the font and background. To make presentations more visually appealing you can use contrasting colours such as a black background with white font. When using colours for fonts, ensure that it can easily be read from afar, taking into consideration the layout of your room and size of your audience, if it is a face to face session. For virtual sessions there can be a bit more flexibility. Be creative but simple , less is often more when designing your slides. You want to find the balance between engaging your audience but avoiding overstimulation

Humans are attracted to light. Using a light background with dark words brings attention to the background. Using a dark background with light words brings attention to the words. You can also add shadows to add depth to the contrast of the words. If a background has to much contrast, you can add blur and darken or lighten.

Powerful pictures or a quote, relating to context would be great at catching attention..! One liners exude power !! Stating to the point is a catch in most areas !! example : Enhance Revenue in International Student recruitment business

I love to use pictures, infographics and diagrams in my slides! A combination of words with pictorial illustration allows for easier assimilation for persons with varying learning styles. It also allows the information to be more easily consolidated as the words, images and audio (your lecture) reinforce each other. Using simple bullet points, with the 'less is more' philosophy makes it easier for audiences to follow and understand the material.

For larger audiences, you'll want to keep all necessary information in the top half of the slides. For non-theater style seating, the backs of people's heads will block the bottom from being readable.

Yes!!! Definitely test your slides before you present, anything can go wrong during the presentation. If your doing transitions, keep them simple and uniformed as to not make it too animated, although, depending on your audience, you can tailor it how you like. Ask a co-worker to put another set of eyes on it just and a secondary opinion, usually you need it just to make sure you did not miss anything. (Punctuation, spelling, details, etc..).

Don’t even use words at all. Just photos. Occasionally a chart. People should be staring at you telling a story about your topic, not reading text on a slide. The photos should be there to just remind you about what story to tell next. At most – when unavoidable – allow yourself three or four words. People are there to hear you speak. They’re not there to read your slides. Don’t make them choose.

Use Pecha-Kucha style slides, and limit the text to no more than 6-7 words with a single full-screen picture. You will automatically end up with small enough text that can be expressed in large enough font that can be easily read from the back of the room! However, that is not even the most important point. My slides convey only 5-10% of the story, whereas my narration and storytelling and on-stage performance constitutes the remaining 90%+. Keeping text to a minimum helps ensure that you are delivering a great talk, and not simply creating slides for you or the audience to read!

Make your presentation slide as focus per slide as possible. Focus-per-slide does mean that we shall limit to 3 upto max 5 highlights per slide page. In the case we have more than 5 points to explain, it is much better to have additional slides to complete the highlights.

Follow the CRAP principle: CONTRAST ?? Try to keep to 3 main colors ?? Stick to no more than 4 font sizes ?? Make sure you are using color blind-safe colors REPETITION ?? Keep the objects in your presentation at the same size to avoid confusion. ?? Make sure you always use the same highlighting color for key elements in your presentation. ?? Keep the layout of your slides/screen consistent ALIGNMENT ?? Align your text to the left to make it easier to read. ?? Align elements together to create a virtual line so it is easier to scan. ?? Use a grid whenever possible ? PROXIMITY ?? Keep all the key information in one slide at a summary level ?? Group similar content together to create visual hierarchy. ?? Do not overload the slides