Inserting SmartArt in PowerPoint 2011 for Mac
Author: Geetesh Bajaj
Product/Version: Microsoft PowerPoint 2011
OS: Mac OS X
Date Created: September 7th 2011
Last Updated: September 7th 2011
Excerpt/Capsule: Learn how to insert SmartArt graphics in PowerPoint 2011 for Mac.
SmartArt is the successor to the Diagrams option in PowerPoint that let you insert organization charts and some simple diagrams. Certainly, SmartArt is much more involved than its predecessors -- yet it is quite easy to get started with this feature since almost everything you do is wizard driven. In this tutorial you'll learn how to insert a SmartArt graphic within PowerPoint 2011 for Mac. You can also look at our What is SmartArt? and SmartArt Samples pages to learn more about SmartArt.
Follow these steps to insert a new SmartArt graphic in PowerPoint 2011 for Mac:
- Insert a new slide where you want to place your SmartArt graphic. Alternatively, launch PowerPoint. You will see the Presentation Gallery -- click Cancel in this gallery to open a blank presentation with a new slide.
- Click the Layout button in the Home tab of the
Ribbon to bring up the Layout gallery as shown in Figure
1.
Select any of the layouts that include a content placeholder -- these layouts are highlighted in red in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Slide layout with a content placeholder selected
A content placeholder is the small palette like collection of multicolored buttons that allows you to add bulleted text or any of the six other content types, indicated by the 6 buttons you see highlighted in red in Figure 2.
Figure 2: A content placeholder
- Click the Insert SmartArt Graphic button among the six buttons
in the content placeholder that you saw
in
the
slide in Figure 2 (highlighted in blue).
- This activates the SmartArt tab of the Ribbon. Alternatively, if you want to insert a SmartArt in a slide that has no content placeholder, just click the SmartArt tab (highlighted in red in Figure 3).
Figure 3: SmartArt tab of the Ribbon
- Within SmartArt tab of the Ribbon, locate the Insert SmartArt Graphic group which includes several buttons that represent various types of SmartArt graphics as you can see in Figure 4. Clicking any of these buttons will open a gallery displaying a collection of SmartArt graphic variants of that particular type. In Figure 4 you can see such a gallery for Picture SmartArt graphics.
Figure 4: Picture SmartArt type gallery
- Click on any of the SmartArt graphic variants you want to insert on
the active slide. In Figure
4 you saw that we have selected Picture Caption List SmartArt
graphic.
- This will place the selected SmartArt graphic on the active slide, as
shown
in Figure 5.
Figure 5: Selected SmartArt graphic placed on the slide
- Once you place the SmartArt graphic on the slide, you may want to type some text in it. You can now directly type in text in the shapes and text placeholders. You can also click the Text
Pane icon (highlighted in red in Figure
5 above) to summon
the Text Pane that you can see in Figure
6.
Figure 6: SmartArt graphic Text Pane
- Any text content added or edited within the Text Pane shows up within
the SmartArt graphic as well.
- Save your presentation.
See Also: Inserting SmartArt in PowerPoint 2007 for Windows | Inserting SmartArt in PowerPoint 2010 for Windows
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