What you should know before watching this course

- Just before we begin, there are a few things you should know if you plan to follow along with me in this course. Firstly, I'll be working with PowerPoint 2013 on a Windows 8.1 machine. Now PowerPoint, and all the other Office programs in the suite are often updated, and I'll be working with version 15.0.4649.1004. So if you notice small discrepancies on what you see on your screen versus mine, check your version. It could be different from mine. Next, we'll be flying through some time-saving shortcuts, and some features that might be considered intermediate level, so it's best if you have some experience already with PowerPoint to get the most out of this course and be able to follow along at a decent pace.

So if you are new to PowerPoint, you might consider checking out "PowerPoint 2013 Essential Training" with Jess Stratton here at Lynda.com. And if you are familiar with PowerPoint, but just new to PowerPoint 2013, you could out my "Office 2013 New Features" course. It'll get you up to speed on the changes throughout the entire suite, and you'll then find this course easier to understand. Lastly, to follow along with me every step of the way, there are exercise files that accompany this course. We'll talk about those next.