Presentation Design Tips - Color - the Magic Ingredient

Structure
Design and Layout
Type
Graphics

DO

Use color to communicate

Color is one of the most evocative and powerful communication tools you can use in a presentation. Color can set a mood, evoke an era, and be in or out of fashion. Consider your audience, as well as any cultural biases, when choosing a color scheme.

For example, for many people red evokes energy and excitement - or even a warning. Yellow indicates warmth and comfort, and blue denotes truth and honesty. Learn even more in Color Connection's Psychology of Color.

Keep your palette simple

Four to six colors are usually plenty to communicate your message. Of these, only one or two should be fully saturated.

Try choosing the color for the largest area (background) first and then pick a color that contrasts with it for highlighted elements.

Show priority and emphasize with color

Color is a useful tool to prioritize information when it is used consistently as a key. Emphasize a single item (one bullet point, one pie-chart segment, etc.) per visual by putting it in a warm, bright, active color. Color coding can also effectively draw associations and differentiations or establish hierarchies.

DON'T

Forget how colors affect each other

When fully saturated complementary colors (red/green; blue/orange; yellow/violet) are placed next to each other, they will appear to vibrate, glow, or have a "halo effect." This is not only visually distracting, but may make it difficult to correctly see data.

If you must use complementary colors next to each other, reduce the saturation of one or both of the colors or use a thin white or black line between them to minimize the possible vibrating effect.

Try to stay with color choices that can tolerate some shift (to accommodate variations in the degree of darkness of your presentation setting, for example).

Combine too many colors

Don't emphasize too much at once by using several different warm, vibrant colors; they may cancel each other out.

In addition, be aware that colors you choose to emphasize a point can change hue, depending on their background.

Download one of our pre-designed PowerPoint templates or experiment with the PowerPoint Design Wizard (PC platform only). This tool includes a variety of professionally designed templates with carefully chosen color combinations and backgrounds to compliment your message.