While strolling through an art museum one day I overheard a guide commenting on the work of old Dutch masters. She said they tended to place the scene in the lower third of the canvas and then fill the upper two-thirds with sky. Looking at the results, it struck me that their paintings would make great slide backgrounds.

However, rather than purchase a painting by a Dutch master (a bit beyond my budget), I decided to test the idea with my camera. Now, whenever I travel, I compose some of my photos to include mostly sky with the scenery or activity confined in a narrow band along the bottom of the frame. The result? A photo that makes a great slide background.

For example: One of my presentation-writing workshops is built around a road trip theme. (I tell students that when they give a presentation, in a sense they take the audience on a journey, so the road trip analogy works well.) I’m always on the lookout for road trip imagery. So I was pretty happy to get a few good shots while travelling through the American Southwest. The result? Background photos I can use to make even boring bullet or chart slides interesting to look at.



While the bullet list or chart appears in the sky, the scene along the bottom keeps the theme alive in the minds of my students.

Tags: Tips