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Ask HN: What alternative presentation formats to PowerPoint are there?

by JacobEdelman on 12/13/14, 7:44 PM with 17 comments

• by percept on 12/13/14, 10:35 PM

  If you're interested in HTML-based options, there's a roundup here:

  http://www.sitepoint.com/5-free-html5-presentation-systems/

  I used Deck.js for a recent presentation, mainly because it seemed the quickest to get up and running at the very last minute, and seemed to have the least jarring/motion sickness-inducing transitions (among the various options offered by each tool).

• by ht_th on 12/13/14, 9:43 PM

  I like to generate my presentations with the LaTeX package "beamer", offering well-typeset symbols, text, and figures (through Tikz) that all fit together nicely. It might not be flashy of hipster-y, but it certainly is different from you run off the mill powerpoint presentations.

• by ColinWright on 12/13/14, 8:10 PM

  I've seen Prezi used to amazing effect - way better than "PowerPoint" and equivalent. Effectively PowerPoint is computerized OHP transparencies, plus transitions. Prezi really uses much more of the potential of a computer-based presentation.

  https://prezi.com/

• by jcchin41 on 12/13/14, 10:30 PM

  My favorite alternative: Reveal.js http://lab.hakim.se/reveal-js/#/ Simple HTML slides with snazzy transitions

  Warning: A common pitfall of "flashy" presentations is that even if you can avoid making it look gimmicky, the audience is too busy watching the effects and not listening to you. Is your intention to dazzle people, or optimize the amount of information your audience absorbs? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=meBXuTIPJQk

• by DanBC on 12/13/14, 10:49 PM

  Adam Buxton[1] used photoshop layers in his BUG[2] talks. I think this will show him switching the layers. http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=gx-WBaSNrTQ

  I'm not sure what you mean by "hipster" - wouldn't that be whatever was available on Windows2000?

  [1] Adam, from Adam and Joe. Joe Cornish went on to direct "Attack the Block". They started in a public access tv experiment; had a tv show; had a BBC Radio Six show (which is probably available online somewhere).

  [2] BUG - http://adam-buxton.co.uk/ad/what-is-bug/

  He does a bit where he voices-up Youtube comments, which is funny. http://youtube.com/watch?v=gx-WBaSNrTQ

• by jac0204 on 12/13/14, 11:34 PM

  Still in preview, but Sway may be of interest to you. https://sway.com

  I have been fiddling with the preview. Only basic features are available right now, but it may grow to be what you need.

• by GFischer on 12/13/14, 8:46 PM

  As the other two replies said, there's Prezi:

  https://prezi.com/

  It can be used to do much cooler things than PowerPoint, but it takes time.

  There are some cool sample presentations that show what you can do:

  http://prezi.com/explore/staff-picks/

  http://prezi.com/explore/popular/

• by 1971genocide on 12/14/14, 12:27 PM

  I use the CGP grey / Minute Physics way to do my presentations these days, They have won the evolutionary youtube game in disseminating most knowledge in the shortest period of time.

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3WrAk52e68

  Note: It takes about 1 hour for each minute of video footage, but its worth it.

• by mtmail on 12/13/14, 7:55 PM

  Have a look at https://prezi.com/vvbk0zjisuqa/what-is-prezi/. The presentation will be Adobe Flash though.

• by fundamental on 12/13/14, 10:20 PM

  For the more professional presentations I tend to stick to beamer, but for a quick presentation the deckjs backend for asciidoctor allow for a very fast setup.

• by philippnagel on 12/13/14, 11:44 PM

  I use http://www.decksetapp.com which is based on using Markdown.

• by seekingcharlie on 12/13/14, 11:17 PM

  For HTML5 / JS animations: Hype App

  For just a better PowerPoint interface: Sketch. Keynote is also good.

• by krmmalik on 12/13/14, 11:53 PM

  Have you considered HaikuDeck? It's about as hipster as you can get.