Apply template without changing colors of objects on slides

[Guest]

Is it possible to apply a new template to a presentation so that the
presentation gets the new background/slide master but does not update the
colors of all the shapes and text to match the templates color scheme?

Similarly, is it possible to copy a slide from one presentation to another,
so that it gets the same background as the presentation it was copied into,
but keeps its own color scheme so that all the shapes and text retain their
original colors?

PowerPoint's "helpfulness" of applying the new color scheme during these
operations has been frustrating me for years. Even if I am working with two
presentations with identical backgrounds, if I copy one slide to the other
presentation, the colors of the shapes and text will almost always change to
something I don't want. I am desperate to find a way to make this stop.

 

[Guest]

If the fills etc followed the colour of the old template then they will
follow the colours of the new one. If you selected "custom " colours then
they will stay the same as before.

You can easily change the colours in a master colour scheme by going to
format > slide design > colour schemes>edit colour schemes> where you can
change the colour for fills, text etc
--

 

[Guest]

John,

Thanks for your response.

The problem is that the colors almost never match from template to template.
Our organization has many different people creating presentation material,
and rarely are they ever using the same template (each division and group
within a division has their own).

To make matters worse, our graphics often need to use many more colors than
PowerPoint will store in a template, so that color information is always lost
when copying a slide from one presentation to another. So simply editing the
color scheme is not a viable option.

I am having a very difficult time understanding why such a simple process of
copying and pasting from one document to another is intentionally so much
more difficult in PowerPoint than it is in any other program. Except for the
background of the slide, I want everything I copy to be EXACTLY the same as
the original when I paste it (fill colors, line colors and text colors). But
for the life of me I can't make this happen due to PowerPoint's color
pallette limitations and its insistance that colors be converted. This
feature of PowerPoint has cost our organization countless hours due to the
need to fix every single graphic we copy and paste with the rare exception of
the times when two presentations used the same template.

The only solution I have found so far is to do all my graphics in Visio.
The problem with this is that anyone who doesn't have Visio can't edit the
graphics if needed.

PowerPoint is a great program in so many ways, but this one so called
feature makes me hate PowerPoint and everyone at Microsoft who has ever had a
say in how it is supposed to function. (Yes, I am beyond frustrated!)

 

[Steve Rindsberg]

To make matters worse, our graphics often need to use many more colors than
PowerPoint will store in a template, so that color information is always lost
when copying a slide from one presentation to another. So simply editing the
color scheme is not a viable option.

No, but John's point, and it's one I agree wholeheartedly with, is that in your
situation you specifically want to AVOID using colors chosen from the scheme, at
least for graphics whose color must stay constant no matter where used.

The whole point of the scheme colors is that shapes colored with them *do* change
when the color scheme changes.

For example, if your background changes from white to pure blue, you really do want
those headings to be something other than <vibrating_eyeballs> pure red
</vibrating_eyeballs>

If the titles are given a scheme color, all you need to do is change the color
scheme and your whole presentation is fixed.

But if you choose "off-scheme" colors, the colors stay put no matter what happens
to the template or scheme.

Each has its place ... it's up to the user to choose the best tool for the job.
And yes, most certainly it's up to Microsoft to document all this stuff, and in
that they've failed horribly. Ah well. It gives us something to do here, though.

 

[Guest]

Steve,

I can certainly understand having the titles and body text changing to the
new color scheme. It's everything else that is frustrating me.

Unfortunately, even if the colors used originally are not from the source
presentation's color scheme, they will be changed in the new presentation to
something different. This is such a huge problem for us that if there were a
viable alternative to PowerPoint, we would probably switch immediately.

I just wish that there were an option to switch off that "Updating colors to
new scheme" feature so that I could control it to suit my needs. Oh well,
maybe PowerPoint 2012 will have this as an option...

 

[Steve Rindsberg]

Steve,

I can certainly understand having the titles and body text changing to the
new color scheme. It's everything else that is frustrating me.

Unfortunately, even if the colors used originally are not from the source
presentation's color scheme, they will be changed in the new presentation to
something different. This is such a huge problem for us that if there were a
viable alternative to PowerPoint, we would probably switch immediately.

I think you may not understand how schemes in PPT work; they're confusing.

But think of it this way:

The scheme colors aren't really colors. They're more like numbered inkwells.

When you assign a scheme color to a shape, you're not really assigning a color, you're
assigning a number that corresponds to one of the inkwells.

When the shape gets displayed, PPT checks its number, goes to the current scheme, dips
its brush in the inkwell and that's the color you get. If the color of the ink in one
of the inkwells change, so will everything that's been assigned its number.

It doesn't matter which presentation's color scheme you select colors from, it's that
you select the scheme colors at all ... that's what virtually *ensures* that the colors
will change. That's what they're *supposed* to do.

I just wish that there were an option to switch off that "Updating colors to
new scheme" feature so that I could control it to suit my needs.

Don't use scheme colors. It's that simple.