Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 can help make your presentations sing. Since it works like other Microsoft Office applications, learning to navigate is a snap for most users, but its capabilities are so vast that even the most prolific and dedicated of users will be unlikely to find and use them all.

One useful aid to presentation creation is “Outline View.” Users can type in a list of topics then and review and rearrange the resulting presentation flow to ensure that it covers the planned topic and all key points in a logical way. PowerPoint will convert the finished outline into slides, using the outline text as the header for each slide.

PowerPoint comes with built in design themes that give a presentation real panache. Design themes include a slide background, pre-defined slide masters, complementary fonts, and a well-chosen color palette that consists of twelve base colors and several light and dark shades of each theme color.

One of PowerPoint 2010’s most powerful features is SmartArt, which consists of prebuilt diagrams that easily lend themselves to a variety of concepts, such as lists, hierarchies, Venn diagrams, trends, and relationships. When the user selects a SmartArt diagram, PowerPoint automatically inserts it on the slide and presents a box for entering the text to label each part of the diagram. Shapes and fonts automatically center and resize themselves (within limits) to suit the amount of text.

It’s very simple to apply a variety of effects to the diagram for even more visual appeal. Effects include everything from shadows, shading, and perspectives to 3-D effects. Users can apply a variety of pre-defined color schemes derived from the theme master color scheme. It’s easy to switch between diagrams until the selected diagram perfectly expresses the thought.

Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 also includes a myriad of custom animation effects and slide transitions. It offers tools for timing the presentation delivery and will even record the speaker. PowerPoint 2010 can turn the recorded presentation into a self-running package that can be either distributed or run in a loop.

Presentations come alive with Microsoft PowerPoint 2010.