Weekly PowerPoint Prep

[Adam Spriggs]

I've seen a lot of PowerPoint at churches. I seems to me that people spend more time than necessary putting presentations together -- especially for song slides.

Using a PowerPoint template and pasting into Outline mode makes it a snap. It takes care of all of the formatting for you. If you keep all of your songs in individual presentations, it's even easier.

I created a Wink (http://www.debugmode.com/wink) tutorial video of what I do to prep the song slides each week. Thought it might be helpful for those of you who do it every week.

You can download our template and the tutorial from here:

http://www.bluespringsnazarene.org/drop.html

I'm interested in your feedback on the tutorial and the methods.

[Ralph Wood]

You must have put a lot of work into this.

The tutorial was too small for me to read and follow along. When I opened the template, I assumed it was opening in PP but it came up in an IE window that was all black. I did not know what to do from there.

I guess I am not computer literate enough.

I store all my songs, each in its own PP presentation. I insert into the main presentation in outline view. I still haven't learned to make those stored presentations conform to a format in the weekly main slide set that will be used on Sunday. I probably need to take a class on PP.

[Bob Woolley]

Adam said, "I've seen a lot of PowerPoint at churches. I seems to me that people spend more time than necessary putting presentations together -- especially for song slides."

I realize that there are easier ways to do things but when you are retired, you have some time to spend on slides. The way that Adam has suggested is great if you use standard backgrounds that can be seen with his setup.

However, if you use a different background to fit the song as we do, then it is a different story. You must place the text so that it doesn't interfere with the background. I have just about all the "Sing to the Lord" songs with backgrounds that fit the hymn. Yes, A lot of work but I have about 75% done now. Each week I might get one hymn that I do not have made up...that is quite a feat when in the past I had to make up every hymn. Call me a perfectionist but I prefer to have the hymn match the background as close as possible. In the examples below, you will find that a standard layout would not work as well. Notice the positioning of the text. We store all our hymns by number....example. 0003, 0012 or 0453 Our choruses are stored by name...some have several so we save those with several names so we are able to find.

But I do realize that not every church has the time to spend on making backgrounds and fitting them to various hymns or choruses. In that case, Adam is correct in using a standard text layout! :fav18

[Barbara Moulton]

When I opened the template, I assumed it was opening in PP but it came up in an IE window that was all black. I did not know what to do from there.

Same here.

I have most of our hymns and worship songs done already and I just insert them into the service each week.

But I find that for the actual words of each song, it is easier to read if I use straight text on a plain background. I might have a small illustration on the last verse of each song.

[Adam Spriggs]

The template is supposed to be black background with white text. The template makes it so that you don't have to do an alignment of the words on every slide -- just let the template do that for you.

[Adam Spriggs]

I tend to use backgrounds that have a high contrast to the white words on the screen. It's usually ends up being a picture of something taken at a close range with very few colors. Pictures with a lot of light colors are out.

I spend most of my PPT prep time doing the announcement slides. I have a lot of fun with that.

[Ralph Wood]

I spend most of my PPT prep time doing the announcement slides. I have a lot of fun with that.

Adam,

I would like to see some of your announcements. I could use some fresh ideas.

[Barbara Moulton]

Ok..now I understand about the template.

I normally use black words on a slightly yellow background because I learned when I was working in a Low Vision Clinic, that Black lettering on yellow is the very best contrast for reading.

We are renovating our church right now and until we get new window coverings, the sanctuary is brighter than before. So I am using black lettering on a a very yellow background for even greater contrast.

[Adam Spriggs]

I added some announcement examples here:

http://www.bluespringsnazarene.org/drop.html

Some of them may not look right because of the fonts.

[Christine Kelly]

When I started doing powerpoint, it took a while every week. I like the slide to match up with the picture. Now that it has been a while, I have most songs on file. Every now and then I have to type a new one. Usually when I want to change a background, it's because I found one that I liked for that song.

Christine

[Adam Spriggs]

I try to never type in words.

I use the CCLI SongSelect to download the words and copy and paste them into a new presentation (via the template).

[Adam Spriggs]

In case anyone is interested, I found a presentation that uses a Visual Basic script to do a search and replace across multiple PPT files.

I posted a link to it here: http://www.bluespringsnazarene.org/drop.html

[Larry Brincefield]

Hi Adam,
I enjoyed your presentation and it seems like a great way to do the powerpoint each week. My question or thought is:
If we could somehow come up with a way to share all the songs that all of you have already done (via the web? or via CD?); then we don't have to "reinvent the wheel" as the saying goes. All we would have to do then is to edit the ccli number.


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[Adam Spriggs]

It's funny that you mention that... What really prompted me to start this thread in the first place was an interaction with a guest worship leader who was struggling to coordinate getting and preparing PPT to send ahead to churches he visited.

I ended up giving him a CD with all of our worship songs on it. Hence the VB macro to replace all of the CCLI numbers, too...

Anyway, I've zipped them up and posted a link here:

http://www.bluespringsnazarene.org/drop.html

I also posted a song list so you can see the list before downloading the whole zip.

Nice VBS video, BTW. Did you use iMovie on a Mac or something else?

[Larry Brincefield]

Nice VBS video, BTW. Did you use iMovie on a Mac or something else?

Thanks!! I recently purchased an iMac (my first mac) and I love it!! I still have my pc laptop; but I will probably stick with mac from now on. I did use iMovie. It probably takes me a little longer than some people to do it; because I'm having to learn the software as I go. Thankfully, mac makes everything pretty easy.

[Cindi Hammons]

Adam,

Thanks for the Zip file of your PP'd songs. I would gladly reciprocate if I had access to zip filing.

One question. Many of your songs are duplicated with the second one saying "(Lynette)." What's the difference? Many of them are identical, while some slightly vary. Just curious.

Thanks a lot.
Cindi H.

[Adam Spriggs]

Yeah, well, we do have several versions of some songs. If they are different enough from the way I had them originally, I just created a new version associated with our worship leader (Lynette).

Mostly tagging the end of the song is what's different.

[Adam Spriggs]

BTW, if you have Windows XP, you can create a .Zip file.

Just highlight a bunch of files, right-click and choose Send To -> Compressed (Zip) folder.

If you don't have Windows XP or would like some more Zip functionality, you can download Filzip (http://www.filzip.com), which is my favorite Zip utility. I think it's pretty good.

[Cindi Hammons]

Excellent! I'll have to try that.

Thanks,
Cindi H.

[Ron Davis]

When I load your PPT there is always a text box that says click to insert text. Is that there for a purpsoe is is my PPT have a setting I am not finding.

[Adam Spriggs]

It's just a placeholder -- it doesn't show when you view presentation.

I just ignore them or delete them if they're in my way.

[Cecil Wallace]

When I load your PPT there is always a text box that says click to insert text. Is that there for a purpsoe is is my PPT have a setting I am not finding.
The text boxes can be deleted when first setting up Power Point, but on these existing slides, you would need to delete them on individual slides (unless there is another option to delete them on all slides at once.)

[Adam Spriggs]

The text boxes can be deleted when first setting up Power Point, but on these existing slides, you would need to delete them on individual slides (unless there is another option to delete them on all slides at once.)

There's really no need to delete them. If you work in outline mode for all of your song text, they don't matter.

That's really the whole idea of my template -- making it so you don't mess around with the placeholders/text boxes.