Have you ever felt deja vu when looking at someone else’s slide deck? I have. It’s due to the overuse of stock images. We’ve all recycled stock images in our presentations. However when it’s overdone, it can actually put your audience to sleep and / or make your audience feel as if they’ve seen your presentation before! Here’s my top ten list of images not to use in a slide deck!
1. The handshake
2. 3D people
3. The company / team
![ManagementTeam[1]](https://alesandrab.files.wordpress.com/2014/03/managementteam1.jpg)
4. It’s on the up
5. The environment
6. Silhouettes and a map
7. People and a computer
8. The puzzle
9. Person creating a graph
10. The WWW image
What can you do instead?
Find an image that is powerful and that has meaning. If your message is clear and simple finding an image that stands out should be easy. An example from the slideshare blog:
Message: 19.5 million residents of New York State consume as much energy as the 800 million in sub-Saharan Africa
Image: Saharan desert
Very effective don’t you agree? And definitely better than a hand and a plant to show how the electricity is effecting the environment
Another example, this time from thewikiman.org. Instead of using the usual silhouettes and a map image, he finds a visually stimulating one instead
What do you think?
Thank you for the advice!