The Staufenberger Repository

My new brainstorming technique is unstoppable

A while back we invested in a few Dover Publications Clip-Art books in order to pep up the occasional presentation. Despite our preference for things non-Powerpoint, there are occasions when there's no avoiding it. But that's no reason not to make an effort, is it?

Our favourites are the more 80s feeling business titles, like this:

...and this:

...which includes this splendid pipe-smoking chap:

But we've a soft spot for these two, too:

Lot's of outdated home and office gadgets in the former, lots of ladies with big hair, hats and cats in the latter:

Plenty in there to bring a certain something to your next Powerpoint meisterwerk.

Of course, David Rees has used many of these to mirthful effect in his comic strips.

We've been trying to do a plannery equivalent for months, but couldn't think of anything nearly as amusing as Mr Rees' efforts. So this is as far as we've got. (Feel free to have a go yourselves. We might even find a prize for the best submission.)

Looking at it now, I think the blank bubbles do give it different kind of meaning.

From the days when cut and paste meant using something sharp and something sticky, all these images are printed one-sided so that nothing shows through from the reverse when you cut them out to construct your composition. And to help you do that, each book comes with handy instructions inside the back cover:

I think I want an X-Acto knife. It sounds like something from The Incredibles.

The graphic novel presentation

We took a bit of a risk with a presentation recently.

Thankfully, we didn't get laughed out of the meeting. And we haven't been fired yet.

So I guess they liked it.

Perhaps we'll try Ben's Post-It approach next time.

Alternatives to Powerpoint

We've been pretty busy of late. Hence the lack of anything remotely resembling a work-related post for quite some time. We've been too busy working to think about work, if you see what I mean. (Hope you've been enjoying the bike stuff in the meantime).

On Planet Staufenberger, work usually means a presentation of some sort. But clients get a bit tired of endless Powerpoint. And the document tends to get filed and forgotten. Now, we'd be the first to suggest that it's not Powerpoint that's the problem; it's the way you use it that gives it a bad rep. Nonetheless, we like being a bit different, and avoid it wherever possible.

So we always try to make landmark presentations a little bit special. And if we can't make them special then we at least try to make them stand out a bit.

The presentation-that-isn't we're currently working on is a graphic novel. The style is vaguely relevant to the gist of what we want to say in the meeting. And it will certainly look a bit different to a few bullet points and pie charts.

Let's hope the client likes it.

It's all in the presentation 1

One of the highlights of Chuck Porter's presentation at the On-screen advertising conference. Really good use of ppt. He didn't really need half these slides. But cheeky titles like this turned redundant charts into part of the performance.