Technical Presentations - Can the slides work without bulleted lists?

Question

If this isn't the type of fodder that belongs on StackOverflow, feel free to bury this question. I figured technical presentations are something that most of us do, and God knows we've all attended plenty, so I thought I'd get your feedback.

I'm preparing for a technical presentation, and am wondering if I could get away with simple, elegant slides. No bullets, small amounts of text that represent the high level point I'm trying to get across. No bullets, no titles, just simple.

After watching DHH's presentation at startup school, though not technical, I found it a pretty elegant presentation deck, and it kept my focus on what he was saying.

Can you get away with that in a technical presentation, or does the audience need to see more?

Answer 1

Yes! Please! All pictures, no bullets -- or at the very least, a sentence or two per slide!

I wrote a little about this in a blog post here:
http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000512.html

If you haven't seen the Lessig fair use presentation linked in that post, prepare to have your mind blown. It forever changed the way I give presentations.

Fantastic stuff.

Answer 2

I think that bullets are for like attributes of the topic you are talking about - used for reference for the audience.

But there must be more to the presentation than dry facts.

One of the best presentation I saw was this

Maps models and metrics by Maps,

Models and Metrics (Mike Lloyd, Managing Director, Carbonflame at Architect Insight 2008)

Gaining Commitment

And this one

Best technical presentation that I have seen...

Answer 3

I've given many presentations: to peers, to business users, to management, and the ones that have been best received are the ones where the slides have little to no text. The key is finding (or making) simple, memorable visualizations to express the idea you are trying to get across. Keep the bulleted lists in your notes, to remind you to hit all the relevant talking points. I've also found that using animation (sparingly) to emphasize data flow and/or state change can really aid the audience's understanding.

Answer 4

Garr Reynolds has some excellent advice on this subject... Check out his site Presentation Zen or his book by the same name. From the site's main page, be sure to checkout the "Popular Posts" section, especially the comparisons between Gates and Jobs, Yoda vs. Darth Vader and the various posts on different "Methods".

Answer 5

The only contra it has is that weight too much for an easy distribution. I made this presentation about ProjectZero and ended with a file of 13 Mb which is prohibitive for mail distribution.

But it look neat anyway!

Answer 6

My best answer for a quick lesson on effective Powerpoint is Seth Godin on Really Bad Powerpoint Go read it now!