Sunday, February 26, 2006
Passionate Purple PowerPoint
Purple is not a popular PowerPoint background color. I took an online survey a few years ago, and sure enough -- purple came in almost last.
Conversely, blue is extremely popular. My online poll showed that blue was far more popular than any other color for PowerPoint backgrounds. And if you look at TV news, you'll see that most of their video background colors when they do bullet points and such...they are on a blue background.
Now, purple is a hue that's only a few degrees away from blue. So why is blue popular...but not purple?
One thought - we don't see much purple in nature: we have to dig deep to see it in amethysts, or wait until spring to see it in butterflies or fields of lavender. It seems we save our use of purple for special, magical, mystical occasions.
Like spring. Or the Easter season. Or advent. Or the entire decade of the 1960's.
Our eyes are used to seeing a wide range of objects against a field of blue...but not so purple.
A little purple goes a long way. It's more of an accent color, a violet peeping up among a dark forest floor. Paint a picture of a purple sky, and the viewer's senses become akilter.
What images does purple conjure up for you? How would you feel if you listened to a speaker who presented with purple PowerPoint backgrounds?
If you need to beat the winter blahs, here's a purple PowerPoint template. ¶ 2/26/2006 06:49:00 PM
Purple is not a popular PowerPoint background color. I took an online survey a few years ago, and sure enough -- purple came in almost last.Conversely, blue is extremely popular. My online poll showed that blue was far more popular than any other color for PowerPoint backgrounds. And if you look at TV news, you'll see that most of their video background colors when they do bullet points and such...they are on a blue background.
Now, purple is a hue that's only a few degrees away from blue. So why is blue popular...but not purple?
One thought - we don't see much purple in nature: we have to dig deep to see it in amethysts, or wait until spring to see it in butterflies or fields of lavender. It seems we save our use of purple for special, magical, mystical occasions.
Like spring. Or the Easter season. Or advent. Or the entire decade of the 1960's.
Our eyes are used to seeing a wide range of objects against a field of blue...but not so purple.
A little purple goes a long way. It's more of an accent color, a violet peeping up among a dark forest floor. Paint a picture of a purple sky, and the viewer's senses become akilter.
What images does purple conjure up for you? How would you feel if you listened to a speaker who presented with purple PowerPoint backgrounds?
If you need to beat the winter blahs, here's a purple PowerPoint template. ¶ 2/26/2006 06:49:00 PM
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I don't think that purple is seen as a very professional color. How many people would wear purple to work? I have a few purple shirts and ties, and I wear them strictly because nobody else would, and I want to be different. This has to leak into the PPT realm in that nobody sees purple as terribly professional. Or so my theory goes.
Blue is for boys. Purple is for girls. You don't see much pink in business presentations either.
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# posted by 
: 8:39 PM, February 11, 2007
: 8:39 PM, February 11, 2007Links to this post:
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