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Presenting with Air Cover
| 1.16.2005
Whether you’re pitching a potential client or presenting your first round of creative, it typically involves a lot of show-‘n-tell. In the print world, creatives are usually well armed with piles of brochures, catalogs, folders, stationary, etc. These pieces are either free-floating or cleanly mounted on black presentation boards. In the past, this seemed to work out well. The creative lived on paper and paper is what you showed. It could be touched, smelled and passed around the table below a quiet din of critique. Since the inception of web and interactive design, there has been much confusion about presentation styles and protocols. It seems pretty clear—the creative lives in pixels and pixels are what you show. This involves having a projector, laptop and yes; you guessed it, an Internet connection. I know what you’re going to say…”have a local copy on your hard drive” or “show screen shots in PowerPoint.” These are all good points and I’ve tried them all. They’re not bad ways to show work. On your best day, it always seems to feel a little sterile and lackluster. While technology has created and pushed design into new and exciting mediums and formats, the way in which people interact with the work during presentations has not been so quick to change. I think a natural human response to something unknown is to touch first. It’s almost like it makes it more real and substantial. Ever notice how you’re drawn to those beautifully colored glasses at Crate&Barrel but quickly need to touch and pick them up before you can determine how much you like them?
At a past web agency, we started off presenting pixels only. We won our fair share of jobs but always seemed to get large number of requests for copies of the presentation and almost always asked for something to leave behind to show other members of the decision committee or to their bosses. Thinking back, it was for them, not other “members” of their organization. In other words, presenting in a dim room via projector never seemed like enough to them…or to me. It felt analogous to getting together with an old friend you haven’t seen in a while and then going to a movie–little dialog, interaction and narrative.
As a test, I laid out 15 web/interactive case studies on 24” X 30” laminated Gator Board. They looked beautiful! We started to present with both boards and projector. The boards were the primary eye candy with the projector providing “air cover” during the presentation. This unique dichotomy provided an almost perfect balance during every presentation. People would walk up to the boards, pick them up, bring them back to the table, pass them around to other colleagues and even present back to us, what they liked/disliked about a particular concept or idea. They would say things like “I like the navigation in this one.” or “can we change the color of the banner ads on this site?” What was fascinating was the fact that people were interacting with a tactile object (boards) while clearly engaged in speaking about pixels.
I’m not saying I have the answer. I’m only highlighting an issue that’s faced by many and sharing some of my thoughts and strategies.
posted at 9:58 AM
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3 Comments:
This is a great summary of presenting style
Nice inroad to the psychology or presenting.
this is cool! thanks, scout!
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