Powerpoint: compress or downsample large images/graphics

You might be out of luck if you do not have the originals, as you know now the 2010 was compressing the pictures.

First save the picture to hard drive and open it with something like iPhoto.

If you like the quality there we can continue.

If you do not like the quality it is the end of the road, no advanced settings will help here.

You could report the picture file size here, like is it in 500k- 1Meg, or more or less than 100k.

In second case your only option is to keep the picture size as small as possible to retain the quality (resolution).

EDIT:

If the pictures look good in original presentation then lets try this.

Do not copy paste.

Use presentation mode (full screen) and make a screenshot (press cmd+shift+4). You will get a cursor allowing you to select the picture., and once you have done that it will save it.

Now take look at that result first, and if happy then import it in to power point.

Instead of Save As... PDF, Print->"Save as PDF". You can get around the print margins by setting up a printer/presentation that has no margins, "full bleed".

A few important steps:

1. First, go to File -> Page Setup and make sure that you've got the dimensions there identical for the default paper size in the printer. In my case, it's 8.5 x 11 inches for Letter size paper. Read the dialog box carefully, and select the option that lets you set a size larger than the printer will allow.

2. In the print dialog, make sure you do NOT have "scale to fit paper" checked.

You should now see that the print preview in the print dialog is edge to edge.