Most users will be familiar with applications such as PowerPoint which provide the tools necessary to create presentations for full screen display incorporating audio, video and interactive user content.
It is possible to utilise Adobe Acrobat and Adobe Reader as presentation tools to present using PDF documents.
This tutorial explains how to convert PowerPoint (or any document) to PDF and then set properties to control – slide transitions, timing and navigation. The advantage of using PDF for presentations is that the presentation can be created from any combination of content – web pages, spreadsheet, images, scanned documents to name but a few.
Converting a PowerPoint Document to PDF
Although any PDF document can be used in "full screen" presentation mode, this example uses a PowerPoint file as an example.
Clicking in the Acrobat menu in PowerPoint select Preferences
Setting the PDFMaker Properties
The Acrobat PDFMaker displays a Settings and Security tab which can be configured before the PowerPoint document is converted to PDF.
Options such as Links and Bookmarks can be created in the document during the conversion.
Creating the PDF
To create the document click the Create PDF option in the toolbar and a dialog will ask you to confirm the file name and the location to save the file.
Setting Full Screen Properties in Adobe Acrobat
Once the PDF is opened in Adobe Acrobat or Reader various Full Screen options can be set.
From the Acrobat Edit menu select Preferences and then click Full Screen to display the various options available
The screen allows a number of settings to be selected including:
1. Setup
2. Navigation
3. Appearance
4. Transitions
Full Screen Properties
The settings in this panel apply to ALL pages in the document.
For example a Default Transition set here would then be the transition for every page in the document.
Using the Pages Panel to set Individual Transition Settings
It is possible to apply Page Transitions to individual pages or ranges of pages.
This can be done by opening the 1. Pages panel and then selecting the 2. Options icon.
From the menu that appears selecting Page Transitions… will display the Set Transitions dialog.
This allows transitions to be set and applied to a Page Range.
The 3. Auto Flip option can be set to have the Page automatically flip to the next page in the document
Using Full Screen Mode
A PDF can be placed into Full Screen Mode by selecting this option from the Window menu or pressing CTRL + L
Navigating a Presentation
Depending on settings the PDF may auto advance or be controlled using the computer mouse buttons or arrow key.
Don’t forget the ESC key will close the full screen mode and return the document to normal viewing mode.
Software used: Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 UK: Scotland License.
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