Slideshow on Widescreen (2002)

Topic

New Reply

I have to create a slide show to be run at a trade show where we will have a 42 inch plasma widescreen display. I am trying to work out whether and how I can set this up in Powerpoint and whether there is any way of checking out the effect before we get to the exhibition hall. I cannot find any reference in the Mircrosoft Knowledgebase about how to do this. Some practical advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for your interest and advice.

Richard

Reply | Quote

Replies

With our Sharp LCD display (only 30″, but who’s jealous), it will automatically sense the 1024×768 dimensions of the signal on the VGA cable and display the presentation centered with black areas on both sides. If you want to design your slides to the dimensions of your big screen, instead, you can set the horizontal and vertical pixel count in PowerPoint (perhaps under the Show menu; I don’t think I’ve ever gone looking for it). However, you really should test either approach with your specific target screen, since you might find that it does not support 768 lines, but only 480 lines, leading to unattractive compression or distortion; not all big screens are created equal.

Reply | Quote

(Edited by Leif to make link live – see the quick guide and/or Help 19)

Richard,

This page from the FAQ may help you…
Make screenshow fill a wide screen display
http://www.rdpslides.com/pptfaq/FAQ00566.htm%5B/url%5D

This posting from “adam crowley” goes into detail about 16:9 proportions….
http://groups.google.co.uk/groups?hl=en&am…60@TK2MSFTNGP11%5B/url%5D

If it was me, I’d want to do a few tests beforehand.

Reply | Quote

TAJ, thanks for the useful links!

I’ve been inserting photos into PPT on a computer with a 1024×768 display, so I couldn’t understand why they were scaled to 94% vertical and 94% horizontal. This helps, because I see now that the slide size under Page Setup is 10×7.5 inches, while the photos, at 1024×768 / 96ppi are 10.67×8 inches. I’m inclined to resize my presentation to fit the photos. But… here’s the question: does it matter? If PowerPoint re-scales the image twice, once to fit on the slide and again when projected, back to its original dimensions, is any quality being lost in the process? I’ll have to test this out when I get some time with a projector…

Reply | Quote

>If PowerPoint re-scales the image twice, once to fit on the slide and again when projected, back to its original dimensions, is any quality being lost in the process?
No quality is lost by powerpoint re-scaling an image.

If you put an image into powerpoint that only contains 500 pixels (wide), then scale the image to fill the screen, then powerpoint is going to scale the 500 pixel image to fill (approx) 1000 pixels wide. So it ‘smooths’ the picture. It’s not going to look too great.

What would be better is to put a 1000 pixel wide image into powerpoint if you to full the screen with the image.

You could put a 2000 pixel wide image into powerpoint and scale it to full the screen…..but when you project the image on a laptop/pc/projector combination that only supports 1024 pixels wide (lets call it 1000 !), then you’re wasting pixels. You’re making your files bigger than they need to be, and generally giving powerpoint ‘more to do’. The less you give powerpoint to do the better!.

If you’re interested in reading a little bit more on this subject… see
http://www.powerpointbackgrounds.com/powerpointgraphics.htm

Cheers
TAJ

Reply | Quote