Printing Options

What Can Be Printed?

Before looking at the "Print" dialog box, you need to know that there are various items that can be printed through Presentations:

Full document For printing the entire slide set
Current view Prints active slide (only available as a print option when in the Slide Editor View)
Slides Prints all or range of slides, each slide on a separate sheet of paper (or transparency)
Handouts Prints "thumbnail" or smaller versions of the slides with multiple slides per page. You may select the number of slides per page; common choices are 2, 4, 6, and 8 slides per page.
Speaker notes Prints slide with your speaker notes underneath; you may select one slide per page or multiple slides per page; if you wanted your audience to have an exact copy of everything you said, you can use this for handouts as well.
Audience notes Similar to the Handouts option but puts ruled lines underneath each slide, so audience can make notes about what you are saying.

The option you select when printing depends on your situation and preference.

Printing Basics

You can bring up the "Print" dialog box either by clicking on the [Print] button on the Toolbar, or by selecting FILE on the menu bar, then Print.

There are various "Tabs" in the dialog box. The main "Tab" is Print. From the Print Tab you select the type of item to be printed and number of copies. There is a button here for [Print Preview], which shows you what the output will look like before printing. This button is especially useful when you are printing handouts, speaker notes, or audience notes and do not know how many slides per page you want. Press the <Esc> key to exit out of Print Preview and return to the "Print" dialog box to print.

The Current Printer list box lets you select from the various Windows printers installed for your computer.

When Printing Slides with Color Backgrounds

If you are using Presentations to print traditional overheads or material for a poster display, you will want to be able to print in color to get the best effect. If you have a noncolor printer, your printer will translate colors into shades of gray.

There are two options you should consider selecting from the Details Tab in the Print window:

  • "Print background" lets you choose whether or not a background will print; even if you have a color printer, you may want to print the slides full page in color and then the handouts without the background, since this prints much faster (and is cheaper to duplicate).
  • If you select "Print background", then another option is available -- "Adjust image to black and white." This adapts the color by converting text to solid black, and rendering objects in shades of gray. If you do not adjust to black and white, then the slide is printed in color (or shades of gray on a noncolor printer). Even the color background will print in shades of gray.

Exercise 1

Open the "newsletter tips" file from earlier lessons, or a slide set you have created. Experiment with options under the "Print" dialog box. Change the print item to "Handouts" and select 6 per page. Use the [Print Preview] button to see the results. Press <Esc> to go back to the "Print" dialog box. Change the number of slides to 4 per page and again use [Print Preview]. Again, press <Esc> to get out of the preview mode.

Print a single full page slide using your regular printer with the "Print Background" option selected on the Details Tab. Then print it with the "Print Background" not selected. If you entered speaker notes for your slides in Lesson 2, print a few slides using this format.

Learning Corel Presentations 8.0