# PowerPoint Class: Create a Modern PowerPoint Template - review & insight | Gareth B. Davies Source: https://garethbdavies.com/course-insights/powerpoint-class-create-a-modern-powerpoint-template/ [← All courses](https://garethbdavies.com/course-insights/) Business & Marketing · Solid intro · Rated 7 /10 # PowerPoint Class: Create a Modern PowerPoint Template Updated August 2026 One Skill · PowerPoint Enthusiast, YouTuber All levels · 105 min A fast, technique-dense walkthrough of building a full slide-template system from scratch, if you already know your way around PowerPoint's ribbon. [Get a Free Month on Skillshare](https://skillshare.eqcm.net/c/3155494/298081/4650?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.skillshare.com%2Fclasses%2Fpowerpoint-class-create-a-modern-powerpoint-template%2F981994332) New to Skillshare? Your first month is free, enough to take this course at no cost. ## What it actually builds This course is a single continuous build: a 19-lesson walkthrough that ends with a complete, animated PowerPoint template rather than a collection of disconnected tips. It opens with foundational setup, choosing a 16:9 aspect ratio, resizing slides to full HD, and constructing a custom grid with margins, columns, rows and optional gutters, either manually with guides or through the free BrightSlide add-in. From there it moves into Slide Master View to lock in a font pair (Montserrat for headings, Raleway for body text in the demo) and a six-color accent palette pulled from hex codes, since PowerPoint requires exactly six accent slots to fill. Everything that follows, welcome slides, about slides, services grids, team member layouts, portfolios, timelines, four infographic styles, a SWOT slide, a phone mockup, and a contact page with a world map, gets built as a reusable Slide Master layout rather than a one-off slide, which is the structurally correct way to teach templating and the course's clearest strength. ## Where the craft shows The most genuinely useful material sits in the shape-manipulation techniques that most PowerPoint tutorials skip. Carving a letter-shaped or phone-shaped image placeholder by drawing a rectangle, sending it behind the target shape, and using the intersect command is a real production technique, and it gets reused cleverly across the SWOT and device mockup lessons. The infographic section is similarly hands-on: rotating a hollow circle in 3D to fake a donut shape, exporting custom vector bars as SVG and reimporting them as editable shapes, and using motion-path animation to make a stack of donut layers bounce. The animation instruction throughout is practical rather than decorative, with a consistent pattern of fly-in-plus-bounce entrances, staggered delays in tenths of a second, and the animation painter used to propagate a single effect across dozens of objects quickly. ## Where it falls short The course assumes a working fluency with the ribbon, the selection pane, grouping, and shape formatting dialogs that a true beginner won't have, despite being labeled "all levels." Explanations move quickly from one setting to the next with little pause on why a particular value was chosen beyond "this is what I use," which makes the class better at showing a repeatable workflow than at teaching the underlying design reasoning. There is also no real coverage of typography hierarchy theory, brand strategy, or how to adapt the template for different industries beyond a brief nod to using a brand book for inspiration. Viewers hoping to learn how to write compelling slide content, structure a pitch, or handle print export will find none of that here; the scope is exclusively visual construction inside PowerPoint's Slide Master system. For its actual target, someone comfortable with PowerPoint who wants a systematic method for building a full branded template rather than dressing up single slides, the course delivers a coherent and reusable skill set in under two hours. It is not a beginner primer and not a design-theory class, but as a focused, technique-forward build-along it holds together well and leaves the viewer with a genuinely usable template file. The standout Building custom-shaped image placeholders by drawing a rectangle, sending it behind a letter or phone frame, and using PowerPoint's intersect command to carve a precise mask. ## What you will learn - · Setting up a custom grid system with margins, columns, rows and gutters using PowerPoint's native guides or the free BrightSlide add-in - · Building a Slide Master font pair and a six-color accent palette from hex codes, then applying both consistently across custom layouts - · Constructing reusable slide layouts (welcome, boxed, about, services, team, portfolio, timeline) inside Slide Master View rather than editing individual slides - · Designing four infographic styles: icon circles, layered donut shapes with 3D rotation, spinning triple circles, and colored bar charts built via shape union and SVG import - · Creating custom-shaped image placeholders, including a letter-shaped SWOT placeholder and a phone-frame device mockup, using the intersect shape tool - · Layering entrance animations, delay staggering, motion paths and push transitions to make static layouts feel dynamic Best for: Intermediate PowerPoint users, marketers, or freelancers who already know basic slide editing and want a repeatable system for building a branded template from a blank deck. Skip it if: Total beginners who need core PowerPoint navigation explained, or anyone hoping for narration design, storytelling, or content-writing guidance rather than visual layout. Helpful Examples Clarity of Instruction Organization of Lessons Engaging Teacher [Get a Free Month on Skillshare](https://skillshare.eqcm.net/c/3155494/298081/4650?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.skillshare.com%2Fclasses%2Fpowerpoint-class-create-a-modern-powerpoint-template%2F981994332)