PowerPoint makes it easy to recycle the design of an existing presentation. If you have the original presentation file, you can "borrow" its design without changing the content of your current presentation in any way.
Just choose Format, Slide Design. Scroll through the Apply a Design Template List and click the one you want to use. If you've downloaded a template or saved an existing presentation that isn't on the list, click the Browse link at the bottom of the Slide Design task pane, locate the presentation you want to use, and click Apply.
The design of the chosen presentation is applied automatically to your current presentation.
Importing from a Word Outline
Have you been asked to give a presentation based on an existing report or other document? If you can import the document into Word and convert its headings to Word's default "Heading 1" style, the rest is a snap.
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To convert a Word document into an outline that can be used in PowerPoint, you need to learn just a few simple Word shortcuts. In Word, click to select the paragraph you want to turn into a slide title and press Ctrl+Alt+1, which applies the Heading 1 style. For the text that will go into bullet points, press Ctrl+Alt+2 (Heading 2). Want bullet points beneath the bullet points? Press Ctrl+Alt+3 (Heading 3). Save the document and import it into PowerPoint for quick results. |
Outlines in Word can be imported directly into PowerPoint in either of two ways. From inside Word, choose File, Send To, Microsoft PowerPoint. From inside PowerPoint, choose File, Open; in the Files of Type box choose All Outlines, select the Word document, and then click Open.
When you import a Word document, Level 1 headings (formatted "Heading 1" in Word) turn into the titles of new slides. Level 2 headings turn into top-level bullet points. Level 3 headings become second-level bullet points, and so on. In essence, the outline that you see in Word's Outline view is translated into a PowerPoint outline. Any body text beneath existing headings is discarded.
Each time PowerPoint encounters a Level 1 heading in Word, it starts a new slide and uses the Level 1 heading text for the slide's title. In other words, your presentation will include exactly one slide for each Level 1 heading in the Word document.
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You can also import files saved in HTML formats and turn them into a PowerPoint outline. (From the drop-down Files of Type list in the Open dialog box, choose All Web Pages.) During the import, PowerPoint turns each top-level heading into a new slide; all text underneath each heading is placed in a text box on the corresponding slide.
You can also insert an outline into the middle of an existing presentation. Select the slide you want the outline to follow, and then choose Insert, Slides from Outline. PowerPoint converts the outline to new slides and inserts them after the selected slide.