Keynote v PowerPoint

October 14, 2009 in General, Mac by Angelina Roberts

Yesterday I was involved in an interesting debate over the virtues of PowerPoint over Apple Keynote. The argument was more or less based on the idea that a suite of applications (iWork) can no way compete with Office that costs £100s. The premise was ‘you get what you pay for’. The good humoured debate went on for some time and this member of the medical professional swore he could not present to the level he needed with Keynote.

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We decided to convert one of his current presentations to Keynote and compare the differences. Within twenty minutes he was convinced. People are hooked on PowerPoint and a cursory glance at the minimal interface of Keynote would have you thinking it is a pretty basic presentation application. it isn’t! The obvious advantage is the massive integration with iLife allowing you to pull from your iTunes and iPhoto libraries but this is a very powerful presentation tool.

1. Alpha Transparency

We covered this in a tutorial last year. If you pull an image into Keynote that has a different background colour to the one used in your presentation the this tool will allow you to make the image look as if it was specifically created for your presentation. We won’t go into too much detail as you can watch the full video tutorial here.

2. Image Control

Keynote allows you to control images without leaving Keynote. Insert an image and you can control, brightness, contrast, exposure in fact all the fine tuning controls featured in iPhoto. It is very easy to add a blue tint to images used as backgrounds etc.

3. Export Options

Yes you can save a Keynote as a Powerpoint file but over the last year I have been exporting in a number of different options. There is the PDF handout, but better still you can export as images for use on a website, as a flash video and best of all as a Quicktime for iPod. Check out our Keynote to YouTube Video Tutorial.

Imagine at the end of your presentation saying that your Keynote is available on your blog in iPod format for revision later on! Better still it is a one click option. The quality of the Quicktime is good enough to be used in iMovie and even FinalCut.

4. Animation Control

The level of animation for both transitions and assets in Keynote is amazing. Best of all you can combine zoom and movement to create BBC style video presentations. You can zoom in on an area of a map, add lines, move around the map, and zoom back out at the end. The transitions are easy to add and offer full previews. There is a massive selection and best of all you can control the fine points such as speed etc.

5. Movie Control

Ever moved a presentation from one computer to another to find your movie no longer works. Well Keynote takes a copy of the movie and adds it to the Keynote Package. In easy terms it means your Keynote travels perfectly. Keynote offers control of the movie even while your presentation is playing so you can go back, repeat and pause without having to back to the interface.
Don’t get me wrong this is not a PowerPoint bashing post it is merely flagging the true power of Apple Keynote.

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9 Comments

May 2, 2010 at 6:18 am | Uchin Mahazaki

it`s been 4 years since i moved to mac and left all about windows behind included powerpoint.

first of all, keynote good point is it`s so easily to use .. better look than powerpoint.

but, it`s not perfect at all .. wish apple can brings some easy features that should be there in first keynote like option music background to play in selected slides (there`s only once and loop option for all this time)

and building 3D shape is hell so difficult in keynote.. powerpoint beats keynote in this
November 11, 2009 at 8:53 pm | Osgood Concklin

A very important issue in which PowerPoint absolutely dominates Keynote is in support for Apple Events (AppleScript). No comparison. If you want to automate any aspect of slide creation, PowerPoint is the best tool — period, end of story. The scripting support in Keynote is laughable, if it weren’t so important.
October 16, 2009 at 5:19 pm | Charlie Milton

I didn’t realize you could use manual clicks with quicktime… i just never tried… thanks guys
October 16, 2009 at 4:48 am | Bob Barker

I export out of Keynote in Quicktime format using the “manual clicks” for my company’s presentations all the time. It’s great because our branding looks top-notch with Keynote. Thank goodness Quicktime Player handles the manual clicks, pausing at them as each on occurs.
October 15, 2009 at 2:30 pm | Mike Pulsifer

Those are some good points.

I myself use Keynote over PowerPoint and wrote an extensive comparison of slideware on the Mac (http://mike-pulsifer.org/2009/08/slideware-shoot-out-keynote-09-powerpoint-2008-openoffice-3-impress/). Even though I gave equal scores to the two on charting, it was only because I didn’t use a weighted scale. If I had it wouldn’t be close. I won’t even consider using PowerPoint for displaying charts because it’s flat-out impossible to create low-junk charts.
October 14, 2009 at 10:21 pm | Mark

@Charlie Milton – There’s an option to use clicks (i.e. not timed) when you export to Quicktime. I’ve used it, and it works well!
October 14, 2009 at 9:22 pm | Charlie Milton

I guess i could but everything would have to be “timed” instead of “clicked” and for many of my presentations we use a remote and the click just works better… but that could be a good work around… i am currently looking into bringing my own macbook and possible trying to hook up to the display…
October 14, 2009 at 7:41 pm | Angelina Roberts

@Charlie Milton have you considered exporting your presentations as Quicktime files ?
October 14, 2009 at 7:38 pm | Charlie Milton

I love Keynote my only problem is the fact that my college uses powerpoint and when i save my keynote as a power point ant attempt to present powerpoint strips down my presentation b/c the effects, reflections, and transitions are not supported.