Need to create design templates

[JonJacobs]

When I do presentations, I use a somewhat dark background with white text. However, the handouts I print need to be on blank (white) background with black text, but otherwise the same. Since I cant find such a design, I need to know how to create one.

Thank you,

[acknak]

Greetings and welcome to the community forum!

When you do File > Print, click on the "OO Impress" tab, then Color: Black & White.

That should give you black text on a white background without having to change the slides at all.

[JonJacobs]

Fantastic. I will try that at the next opportunity! I still want to learn to create design templates for Impress, but it's not so urgent now.

[acknak]

... I still want to learn to create design templates for Impress, but it's not so urgent now.

I'm not sure I understand what you're looking for from the template.

As far as I know, a template in OO Impress cannot modify the slide format for the handouts; the slide previews on the handouts will always be a reduced view of each slide as it appears on the screen.

[JonJacobs]

>cannot modify the slide format for the handouts
No but I have other reasons for wanting to create templates. I want to have shadow and bullets on by default, for example. I want a background that does not go too light right where it makes headings hard to read. I want some variety. etc. I went to the templates library on this Open Office forum, but as far as I could see, none of them were for Impress.

[JonJacobs]

Well I finally got the chance to try it... didn't work...

OO 4.0.1
OS Win 8.1
I selected File > Print. On the general tab I selected the desired printer. I selected Handouts, and 4 slide per page. On the Open Office Impress I selected Color: Black & White.
I clicked the Print button. It printed slides instead of handouts, and they were black text on the default background (clouds on blue sky - the only one I have) - very dark, using up a lot of toner and making the black text hard to read - instead of a white background.

I thought I had the newest stable version. Do I need something newer?

[acknak]

Maybe the "black & white" option doesn't work with every slide design?

This works for me:

File > New > Presentation

Type: From template; (title) Recommendation of a Strategy (comes with OO); click "Create"

File > Print > Document: Handouts; (tab) OO Impress > Color: Black & White

You should see the print preview (left side of the print dialog window) turn white with black text. Print a test page to check. You can use Options > Print to file to generate a pdf that you can view without having to waste ink/paper.

If that works for you, then I think it must be something about your slide design that interferes--a background image, perhaps?

Edit: PS:

For my part, I've had very little satisfaction trying to use Impress. It's just not mature software and the underlying design seems to be rather haphazard--at least I can't make much sense out of it, or get it to work in any kind of efficient manner. I've come to expect very little from it beyond the very basics.

[JonJacobs]

> just not mature software
That is certainly my impression. I did the steps you gave in creating a new presentation. It prints properly as a handout. So I saved it as a template (.pot file), naming it black and white, re-opened my current presentation. I loaded the black and white design. Unfortunately it only affected new slides, it did not change the design of the entire presentation, which I need.

The way I work is prepare a presentation with a pretty design for projection, save it for use the next day, change the design to BW and print handouts. Worked great on my old computer, but it is nearly dead.

What I have to do now is finish the presentation for viewing and send it to my old computer where I load it under power point, change the design, and print the handouts, hoping it doesn't blue-screen before I am finished. I can't find my old installation disks of MS Office, and I am not going to lay out megabucks to buy an new one since I already did that once.