Inserting audio from a computer file

Most of time you already have an audio clip file save on your computer that you want to insert into your PowerPoint presentation. It's easy to add the sound clip to the slide. Up on the Ribbon, click on the Insert tab. On the far right you will see a button with speaker on it labeled Audio. If you click on the bottom half of the button on the dropdrop arrow, you can select Audio from file. If you just click on the top half of the button right on the speaker, PowerPoint automatically selects that same option. Navigate to the sound clip that you want to use and click once on it. We will use Intro.

I use this Insert button at the bottom to decide if you are going embed the audio clip or link to it. We explore all the ramifications and techniques for both of these options in linking and embedding video at the beginning of this course. In short, if you want to import the entire file into you PowerPoint presentation, you would choose Insert. If you want to leave it outside the presentation and have the PowerPoint look for it each time you to play it, change this to Link to File. I will choose Insert. My sound imports.

Now click and hold in the middle of the sound icon and drag it where you want it to go. I can make the sound clip icon larger or smaller by dragging the corners. While you click on the apeaker, you can also go to the Audio Tools Format tab and use the side boxes on the right. When you play your presentation, you won't see the sound controls until you hold your cursor over the speaker. At that point you can play or pause the sound and even adjust its volume.

(Music playing) Press Escape to end the playback and return to the slide. In future movies I will show you how to use all these adjustment tools on the Ribbon. Inserting the sound clip into your PowerPoint is a piece of cake and opens up all kinds of possibilities for including audio in your presentations.