Process Graphics I – Using SmartArt, Icons and “Templates”

It’s pretty likely that you have described a process in some of your presentations. You may be explaining how your customer support procedure will help a company prosper or training new hires to maintain your equipment. Maybe you’re explaining the digestive system of a rabbit or the tragic cycle of domestic abuse.

A “visual aid” is a natural way to support this kind of description. This post is about going beyond boxes and arrows to add impact and memorability to your process graphics.

You can build engaging process graphics with these resources:

• SmartArt – a few of the SmartArt graphics are intended to represent Processes or Cycles. A SmartArt graphic can be used (and animated) as is or it can be decomposed into shapes as a basis for your design.
• Icons – adding simple, easily recognized pictures to the steps in a process improves comprehension and they can be used as graphical “signals” for later detailed slides. You can use Microsoft Icons or you can find a wide variety available on the web (some are free).
• Templates – if you search on “process infographics,” you can find pre-designed  graphics to which you can add your own text. It may or may not be practical to edit (e.g., add or delete elements and recolor) the “templates.” In any case, this search will yield a lot of inspiration for your own designs.
• Do-it-yourself – use standard shapes to create your own process or cycle designs. Linear processes are relatively simple to do, especially if you know how to use the Alignment tools. Cycles are a bit harder.
• Animation – revealing the steps in a process in order will help your audience digest the information; simple animation can accomplish this.

Part I of this post will explore making process graphics using SmartArt, icons and templates; Part II uses PowerPoint shapes and features for a DIY approach,

Here’s an example using SmartArt and Microsoft Icons:

Here are some notes:

• This is the Circle Process SmartArt graphic. The default has three steps; I used SmartArt Tools/Add Shape to add the fourth step.
• You can add text in the attached Text Pane or directly in the graphic. I positioned the text at the Bottom of the graphic (Format Shape/Text Options/Text Box).
• The text is automatically sized.
• I selected one of the Change Colors options – the color options are, of course, based on the Theme. You can color each element manually (Fill, Line).
• The icons are chosen from the Microsoft collection (Insert/Icons); they are not part of the SmartArt graphic but are positioned in front of it.
• I colored each Icon (Graphics Fill) to match the associated element.

Animating the process graphic takes a few steps:

• Select the SmartArt graphic and apply the Enter animation (Wipe/From Left); the default result of this is to animate the graphic as a whole; I want to do it one step at a time.
• Under Effect Options, select One by One. The result of this varies depending on the specific graphic; in this case, each step (shape and text) is animated On Click.
• In the Animation Pane, click the down arrow under the SmartArt animation; this expands the entry so the each effect is shown.
• Now, select the Icons and apply the animation (I used the same Wipe animation effect).
• Set the Icon animations to With Previous and move them so that each occurs with the corresponding SmartArt element. Here’s the Animation Pane:

Here’s another SmartArt graphic, combined with Icons:

This is the Picture Accent Process graphic; it is one of several graphics that includes picture place holders, which, ostensibly, allow you to easily insert images into SmartArt graphics. Here are some notes:

• As before, I added a fourth element and the text including some gibberish at level 2.

NOTE: this graphic will allow you to add a little more text detail to each step. If you need to add even more information, please do it on separate slides. after you have provided an overview using this graphic.

• Clicking on the picture placeholder offers three options for the picture source; I selected Icons and the appropriate variation. Then I picked a SmartArt color option – this is the result so far:

• The default size/alignment and color for the Icons is not what I want; so:
  • I manually moved and resized the icon images and the arrows to get a better layout.
  • Since the Icon images are Pictures, I changed the color using Format Picture/Picture color – this is different from Fill and it is more difficult to match colors with other objects.

Here’s another example – the Ascending Picture Accent Process with the Intense Effect Style, and the default One-by-one animation:

 

Here the Icons are acceptable but the animation order is bizarre. Since I cannot reorder the animations in a SmartArt graphic, I converted it to Shapes and modified the animations. And, while I was at it, I modified the graphic:

Generally speaking, it may be easier to decompose a SmartArt graphic than to modify and animate the original graphic.

There are 17 SmartArt graphics labeled as Cycles; these have the same features and quirks as the linear forms.

NOTE: Use some care with “cycles;” this common example seems to indicate that a disaster recovery process is inevitably and immediately followed by another disaster:

Here is an example using a SmartArt Cycle graphic with icons from flaticon.com:

Here are some notes on this example:

• I started with the Text Cycle graphic and used the text pane to add a fifth step.
• I used Fill and SmartArt Format/Change shape to change the text boxes to colored Rounded Rectangles.
• I used Format Shape/Text Box to set the text Vertical Alignment to Bottom, making space for the icons.
• As before, the icons are not a part of the graphic but are added “on top.”
• Since I can’t use different animation types for the SmartArt elements, I Converted the graphic to shapes to complete the animation.

I have experimented with a few “templates” (free downloads); here are some comments:

• Many of the available templates are for specific uses (e.g., real estate) although others are intended to be generic.
• These templates do not have the mechanisms to automatically add or delete elements; however, some are available with useful variations (e.g., 3-steps, 4-steps, etc.).
• I searched for vector graphics; these are sharp at any size and can be decomposed for easier adaptation than images (e.g., .JPG). For PowerPoint, .SVG graphics can be used directly; others require conversion.
• Although my search was not exhaustive, I did not find any .SVG process graphics; all were .EPS format. (.EPS format is generally much more common than .SVG but Microsoft chooses not to support it.)
• I used cloudconvert.com to convert .EPS templates to .SVG.
• Converting .SVG graphics to PowerPoint shapes often yields surprising and unhelpful results; see the example below for more on this.

Here’s a process “template” (.EPS format) downloaded from freepik.com and converted to .SVG using cloudconvert.com:

Suppose I want to use this graphic but I need five stages rather than four. The plan is to convert the graphic to Shapes and duplicate one of the stages to create a fifth. Here’s the result of the conversion with the resulting shapes selected:

There are 1,036 objects on this slide! This includes 64 Pictures; the rest are Freeforms. Your PowerPoint may slow down appreciably.

Each text character is represented by a Freeform – useless for editing. The Pictures are associated with the shadows in the original and include a black artifact as shown below – again, useless:Undaunted, I select the handful of objects that are useful to me, duplicate and recolor a couple of elements to make my fifth phase, add an Icon and, finally add Shadows to the arrow elements. Voila:

Is all this worth the trouble? If you paid for the “template,” I would question the value of using these templates (which are really not templates at all, in my opinion).

Part II of this post shows you how to use Shapes and PowerPoint effects to create your own process graphic designs.

If you want to see more details, use the link below and click on the PowerPoint icon to download a free “source” PowerPoint file containing these examples:

Powerpointy blog – Process Graphics I – Using SmartArt, Icons and Templates

See this page for more on downloading files.

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