Presentation is not just a bunch of slides or few lines of text, but it’s an idea that you are about to implant in the brain of somebody and in your case that somebody is your audience. The scientific researches that were conducted across the globe shows that a human brain can store endless data, but when it comes to retrieve a particular information out of that stored data, it requires a lot of visual combinations. The better the visual combination the fast is the retrieval of information. Hence this is the reason why most of the presenters who knows this fact, use their fair amount of presentation time with better visuals along with the supporting vocal stream.
So, what actually is a better visual mean?
Better visual is nothing but a supporting media information that is related to the topic that you are about to present. Lets take Global Warming for example, what does your brain retrieve when you’ve read the phrase Global Warming? Well! I am not sure about your end. But my brain retrieved this information that you can see below:
This is a snapshot from the movie Day After Tomorrow, and it has the concept of Global Warming that causes melting of polar ice caps, and this concept was stored visually in my mind that was easy to extract when needed. So as you can see your brain can retrieve any data faster if it has better visuals related to that particular information. I don’t say that a human brain depends completely on visuals but most of the information that is stored in it, does.
So, keeping these facts in your mind, you have to use colors or pictures or media that add visual support to your presentations’ concept.
And also you must have good knowledge on colors, if not try getting some knowledge by reading color theory etc. The reason why I suggest this is, when you learn about colors! You’ll know what color suits your theme, because every color does represent something.
And by getting good knowledge on colors, you’ll avoid the common but serious mistakes that most of the presenters do on their slides which includes usage of bright colors such as red which do cause irritation to the human eye and also some colors which cannot be identified by people who are color blind.
I hope this information gives you some knowledge regarding how to choose best color or pictures for a presentation. In my next article I’ll try to explore some eye friendly colors that you can use in a presentation.
