Introduction
Arranging objects in PowerPoint allows you to organize and layout the visual elements in your presentation slides, like text boxes, images, shapes, SmartArt, and charts. Properly arranging objects can greatly improve the aesthetic quality and effectiveness of your slides.
In this comprehensive guide, we will cover the key features in PowerPoint 2010 for arranging objects:
Aligning Objects
You can precisely align multiple objects relative to each other or the slide itself using PowerPoint’s alignment tools:
- To align objects, first select all the objects you want to align by holding down
CTRLand clicking each object. - Go to the Home tab > Arrange group > Click the Align button.
- Choose an alignment option like Align Left, Align Middle, Align Right, etc.
- Check Align to Slide to align relative to the slide instead of other objects.
You can also evenly distribute objects horizontally or vertically so the space between them is equal.
Smart Guides
Smart Guides make alignment even easier by displaying dynamic guides when moving objects that snap to other object edges and slide edges.
To enable Smart Guides:
- Right click the slide background
- Select Grid and Guides…
- Check the Display smart guides option
Ordering Objects
When objects overlap on a slide, you may want to control which objects appear in front of others.
To reorder objects:
- Go to Home tab > Arrange > Selection Pane to see all objects on the slide.
- In the Selection Pane, use the up/down arrows to reorder objects forward/backward.
You can also choose Bring Forward, Send Backward, Bring to Front, and Send to Back arrangements.
Grouping Objects
Grouping combines objects so they can be formatted and moved together as one unit:
- Select the objects to group by holding down
CTRLand selecting each object. - Go to Home tab > Arrange > Group > Group.
- Now you can move and format the grouped object.
To ungroup objects, select the grouped object and choose Ungroup.
Slide Master View for Global Changes
Slide Master view allows you to make formatting changes that automatically apply to all slides, like:
- Adding/deleting object placeholders
- Changing background graphics
- Adding design elements
To open Slide Master view, go to View tab and click Slide Master.
Conclusion
By mastering object alignment, ordering, grouping, and using Slide Master view, you can achieve perfectly arranged objects in your PowerPoint slides. This creates professional, visually appealing, and effective presentations.
The key is spending time properly organizing your content before focusing too much on individual slide design. Following PowerPoint best practices for arranging objects will pay off in the quality of your final presentation.
