{ How to Create a Powerful PowerPoint }

PowerPoint presentations can be either beautiful and thought-provoking assets or an audience's worst nightmare. Here's how to create a presentation that will keep your audience engaged, rather than counting the seconds till it's over.

Here are just some facts to keep in mind when you create your PowerPoint

• 500 million PowerPoint users worldwide 
• 30 million PowerPoint presentations made around the world each day
• A great PowerPoint presentation should shine in three areas, Content, Design, and Delivery 

Content

• Once you iron out your great idea it's time to start generating content
• Be clear and concise as possible 
• If your already a writer, great. Start putting the pen to the paper 
• Even the best scribes benefit from extra word smithing
• Get other peoples feedback or have a freelancer work on it with you

Design

• Look for visuals that are simple yet evocative and able to easily express a complicated concept
• Color palates and any other visuals should integrate with overall message 
• When in doubt K.I.S.S { keep it simple, silly }. That goes for slide transitions and animation
• Follow the 10/20/30 rule, 10 slides, 20 minutes, 30 point font or larger

Delivery 

• Differ the content you deliver verbally and onscreen so people don't get bored listening 
• Add variety and excitement to your delivery by talking directly to the audience
• Practice makes perfect. Whether you do a practice run in front of your dog or your coworkers, the more comfortable you are with your content, the better your presentation will turn out

{ Design Tips for Everyone }

Here are ten tips for designing effective visual communication

{1} Typography- all fonts should be legible and appropriate for what you are communicating

{2} Color- use no more than five colors in a single layout. You can use different shades of a single color to distinguish

{3} Iconography- icons should be simple, easy to understand and universal. They're meant to enhance comprehension, never distract

{4} Callouts - use callouts sparingly to highlight only key information

{5} Negative Space- keep significant negative space. When too much information is in a layout messaging becomes cluttered and incoherent

{6} Illustration- should match tone and subject matter. Only include if it enhances the content

{7} Layout - present content in a way that guides readers through in a logical hierarchy. Aligning the elements in a layout with each other will help maintain consistency

{8} Comparison- visualize data in a way that is easy for the viewer to compare values

{9} Simplicity- avoid unnecessary design, including 3D charts, ornamental illustration or extraneous elements

{10} Accuracy- visualization should represent their values proportionately.Inaccurate representations can deceive viewers

{ Wine Bottle Designs }

Since my 21st birthday, everyone I know has been asking my all kinds of questions. Such as what  your favorite drink, or what your favorite brand of wine or beer. Since I'm not a big drinker it can be hard to come up with an answer. So recently as I was doing my daily check on Buzzfeed I came across something that may help me when it comes to giving people an answer. Buzzfeed had posted the 33 most brilliantly designed wine bottles. So now when someone asks I can just answer with the wine bottles that in my option are designed the best. Here are some of my favorites, if you want to see all 33 wine bottle designs just click here.



{1} This wine bottle has a very unique design, the crystalline fox creates a very visual pleasing design. Sadly this is not a real brand of wine, it was part of a student project by an unnamed designer.

{2} The pull away strip idea on this wine bottle is a great idea. It also is making a abstract interpretation of the Spanish flag, which when you pull the strips becomes the regional Catalan flag. This bottle design was created by La Fonda Grafica and can be found around Barcelona.

{3} This is my favorite wine bottle design. The idea of using the wine bottle to look like a bouquet of flowers was genius. It does a great job of showing a loved one how much you care for them. This was designed by PACKLAB and can be found in Finland.

{4} This wine bottle has a lovely colorful and geometric pattern that is visual pleasing to the eye. The color scheme is a perfect representation of the wine itself. The designer and where this wine can be found is unknown.

{5} These wine bottle designs are great examples of how three different bottles can appear similar as long as you stick to the same color scheme. The use of simple colors, black and white makes the design both stylish and smartly designed. These bottles were designed by Tsilili and can be found in Greece.

{6} These wine bottle designs are wonderful examples of simplicity. The simple star design and layout of the constellations make for a great layout. These bottles were created by White Fences Vineyard that has unfortunately gone out of business.

{7} It may come as no surprise that many graphic designer including myself are fans of sans serif especially Helvectica. The simple layout and design of this wine bottle is the perfect example of san serif wine. Unfortunately there are only around a thousand bottles of this wine available in the world. It was designed by WildWildWest in Spain.

{8} These wine bottles have made the list because they are an unique example of what a wine bottle can be, they don't have to be the generic size that many wine bottles are. This bottle is perfect for drinkers who don't intend on drinking the whole bottle of wine. This was created by Stack Wines and can be found on Amazon and other sites that sell wine.

{9} This design is similar to number four on this list, because of the geometric pattern. Unlike number four this design is simple and has a much more open color scheme. It's can be assumed that the design was based on a kaleidoscopic illustration. This wine design was created by designer Simon C. Page and is not available for sale, but you can download the pattern as a wallpaper on his website, for the link click here.

{10} The last design on the list is a much simpler designer that sends a lovely message to the person whom your giving the wine too. The whimsically design makes for a wonderful gift to give to friends or a host of a dinner party. This was created by Small Talk Wine and can not be found in stores or online.

{ Halloween Costume Ideas for Designers }

It's that time of year again when children go door to door begging for teeth rotting goodies. For a kid this is the best day of the year but when your an adult it can become depressing. The pressure to have an amazing costumes can be overwhelming especially if your a designer. People aspect you to have a great and creative costumes. That's were I can come in handy, here are some different ideas for a graphic designer who wants to dress up and celebrate this time of the year.

{1} You could go as the World Wide Web. For this costume all you really need is fishing lure and some kind of Internet content that you can post on the "web" you make out of the lure.

{2} You could go as graphic designer zombie. For this costume all you need is face paint, fake blood, riped hipster clothes, and either a Macbook or a sketch pad. Just make your self look like a zombie and walk around criticizing every piece of design that you see.

{3} Go as a QR code. For this costume all you have to do is create a QR code , print it out and tape it on to a plain white or black t-shirt, bonus if the code actually works with a QR scanner.

{4} You could go as a sponsored post. All you need for this is a square frame and a marker. Just write sponsor post on the bottom of the frame and put on a shirt your already own that has a brand on in. Put the frame around the shirt and start collecting the complements. { Sorry no picture }


{5} You could go as the cover of your favorite magazine, for example Times. All you need for this costume is the red boarder and the Times font. And before you know your on the cover of Times.

                                     

{6} You could go as a Roy Lichtenstein painting. For this painting all you need is face paint and polka dot outfit and a lot of patiences to complete the process.

                           

{7} You could go as a Instagram photo. For this costume all you need to do is print a large outline of the Instragram cut a hole in the middle and walk around showcasing your yourself.

                            

{8} You can go a designers true nightmare which would be Error 404. For this costume all you need is a sharpie and a white t-shirt. All you have to do is write Error 404 and then Costume Not Found underneath it. This is a great last minute costume for all kinds of computer nerds everywhere.

                                        

{9} You can go as a Photoshop file. For this all you need is a light blue placard against a navy background, and if you like you can make the logo tool out of painted wire. This is a perfect costume for the creative and lazy designer.

                                      

{10} And the last costume is to go as an over worked,and tired graphic designer who is trying their best. With all the stress of Halloween its okay to just go as yourself, because being a designer sometimes can be the scares thing you can think of.

                          

                      Happy Halloween !!!

{ DYI String Art }

Beside graphic design I have a love for DIY crafting as well. Back in January I came across a crafting trend taking over Pinterest. This art form perfectly combines my love of the fine arts and of graphic design it's called DIY String Art. To create string art is simple. All you need are tacks or some kind of nail, a board, string or thread, and a way to trace your wording or image on the board. From their you trace the image or wording on the board, nail or stick the nails in the board following the tracing. The next step is were it gets hard, the easy way to describe it is to show the steps. From this point on I'll be explaining the DIY String Art process in photo form.

Step # 1 - Print out a tracing of your word, you can do this by either printing it out or projected the image or wording on to the board .

Step # 2 -  Once you have the tracing placed on your board, begin placing your pins or nails along the outline of your word or image. Be careful placing the pins and make sure to stay on the tracing line. It may help if you create a series of dots on the lines to make sure you stay on track.

 Step # 3 - Your next step is to begin adding the string onto the pins or the nails. The best way is to do so in a criss cross like pattern, starting at the corner and working down. This is the longest part of the process and can be very time consuming.

Step # 4 - Continue with adding the string in a criss cross pattern. Once you have finished one thing of string tie a knot on the last pin and continue. You'll keep doing this till the end.

Step # 5 - At this point you should be finished with the string process. All of the ends of the strings should be left, you'll tie them again around the pins and tie a knot making sure that it's tight. Once you've done that you will cut the ends, and be finished.

Step # 6 - Pat your self on the back because you have just finished your String Art project. Your project should look simliar to the one below. If you really want your project to pop you can add black string around the outline.

Hope this was helpful and I would love to see what you guys create. Feel free to post it on the blog.