How to upload, manage and control your presentation in Studio

Once you have collected the final and approved versions of the presentations from your speakers, you can upload them directly into your live session in Studio. From there, you can easily manage, share, and control them, all in one place.

Preparing your slides

Once all the presentations that will be shared during the live session are finalized and approved, the host or moderator can collect them in order to upload them to the live session. Uploading the slides to Studio will ensure that your speakers use the precise version of the presentation that was approved.

The presentations must be in PDF format in order to be uploaded and used. This can for example be a PowerPoint presentation saved as a PDF, or Google Slides shared as PDF.

The maximum file size supported is 150 MB. There is no limit on the number of slide decks that you can upload.

Please keep in mind that for now slide animations are not supported in slides.

Uploading the slides into Studio

Only hosts and moderators can upload slide decks to Studio.

In SpotMe studio, open the option SLIDES:

Now click on Upload slides to add one or more presentation(s) to the live session

Select the presentation(s) to be uploaded, and wait a few seconds for the file to be processed and imported:
Multiple files can be uploaded simultaneously. The presentation must be PDF format, with a max size of 150 MB. Slide animations are currently not supported.

Once uploaded and processed, the presentation(s) are now visible to the left in the SLIDES section. Here after uploading a first presentation, we have uploaded a second presentation by clicking on the Upload slides button:

Previewing the uploaded slides

Hosts, moderators, and speakers can preview slides in Studio.

You can Preview the slides that you have uploaded to Studio by clicking on the eye icon in the slide thumbnail:

This will open the preview, where you can see the slides and navigate through them using the thumbnails at the top of the screen or the controls at the bottom:

The preview is accessible to all people who are present in the room, at any time, except while the slides are being presented live. No other actions can be performed in the preview by the host, moderators, or speakers.

To exit the preview, click on Cancel.

Deleting and changing the order of the slide decks in the list

Only hosts and moderators can delete or reorder slide decks in Studio.

If needed, you can delete any uploaded slides in the live session, and change the slide deck order in the list.

To do so click on Edit list:

To delete a slide deck from the list, hover the cursor over the thumbnail and click on Delete:

To change the order of the slide decks in the list, use the button to drag a slide deck up or down in the list:

Remember to click on Save once you are done to confirm your changes.

Managing who can control the slides

Only hosts and moderators can change the control settings for slide decks in Studio.

Once slides are shared to the screen, they can by default always be controlled by the host and moderator.

You can also give control of the slides to the speakers. For example:

• For more control, you can keep the control of the slides to just the host and moderators.
• For more flexibility, you can choose to give control of ALL the slides to ALL of your speakers.
• For more granular controls, you can choose exactly who among your speakers will be able to control each slide specific deck.

The controls that are given to speakers on the slides only include moving from slide to slide or selecting specific slides to be presented. Speakers cannot push a slide deck to the screen or remove a slide deck from the screen (only moderators and hosts can do that).

Below we'll explain how the slide control can be managed for the speakers.
Please keep in mind that the below controls in Studio can be used at any time to revoke a speaker's control of slides.

Managing the controls for ALL the slide decks in the live session (default settings)

At the top of the Slides panel, you can see a Control: No speakers text. This indicates that (by default) the speakers in the room cannot control any of the slides once they are pushed to the screen.

You can change this so that by default all ALL the speakers in the room will be able to control all the slides that are pushed to the screen. To do so, click on the icon next to the Control text:

Here you can choose between:
No speakers: None of the speakers in the room will be able to control any of the slides.
All speakers: All of the speakers in the room will be able to control all of the slides.

You can change this setting at any time. This setting is very useful for overriding or clearing any changes to controls that are made at the individual slide level.

Remember that the host and moderators will always be able to control of the slides.

Managing the controls for EACH of the slide decks in the live session

In addition to the default slide control setting explained above, for each slide deck you can decide specifically which of your speakers will be able to control the slides.

This is only available after you have opened the room, and should only be done once your speakers have joined the room.

To do so, hover the cursor over the thumbnail of the slide deck that you wish to configure the control for, and click on the click on the icon

This will open the following window, where you can select exactly which of the speakers present in the room will be able to control the slides once they are pushed to the screen:

Remember to click Save to confirm your choices.

If a speaker exits the room or loses connectivity, you will have to review the slide control settings to ensure they still have control access.

Changing the controls on an individual slide deck will change the default Control status for the slides to say Custom (1). It will also change the information on the thumbnail for the specific slide deck by showing the number of speakers who can control that slide deck (2):

Changing the default slide Control back No speakers or All speakers will override any selection that is made at the individual slide level.

Presenting the slides

Only hosts and moderators can push a slide deck to the stage in Studio. Once pushed to the screen hosts and moderators can always control the slides. Speakers (if they are given control of the slides) can only control the slides once they are pushed to the screen by the host or moderator. Only the host and moderators can remove slides from the screen.

Pushing a slide deck to the stage

Once you have uploaded the slides and defined who will be able to control them, you can add them to the stage. This can be done once the room is open, either before going live or while the session is live.

To add a slide deck to the stage, hover the cursor over the slide deck thumbnail, and click on Present now:

Before the slide deck is shared, you will see a confirmation screen that will include a summary of the speakers that will have control over this deck once it is added to the stage, as well as a button called Edit speaker control:

In the above example, we can see that "Speaker 1" will have control of the slide deck. Clicking on Edit speaker control will display the controls for the specific deck and allow you to verify and modify them if needed.

Click on Present now to proceed with adding the slides to the stage. The slides are now visible on the stage, and the controls for moving the slides forward are visible to the host and moderator, as well as any speakers that have control of the slide deck.

While a slide deck is pushed to the stage, the deck cannot be previewed, however the control settings of a slide deck can be accessed and changed in real time.

If a screen share is in progress when the host or moderator attempts to push a slide deck to the stage, a confirmation message will appear asking them whether they wish to replace the screen share with the slide deck.

Controlling the slide on the stage

The slide controls on the screen can be used by the host and moderators, and the speakers (if they are granted the controls):

(1) See which slide is currently visible on stage (LIVE).
(2) Jump forward to a specific slide in the deck (PUSH LIVE).
(3) Minimized the top bar controls if needed using the button.
(4) Move forward or backwards using the buttons

You cannot use your keyboard arrows t move the slides forward or backwards.

Removing the slide deck or changing the slide deck on stage

The host/moderator can remove the slides from the stage at any time, by clicking on the Remove from stage button (1), or replace them on stage with another slide deck by directly clicking on Present now for the new side deck (2):

Speakers cannot add/remove slide decks from the stage

Pushing a slide deck that was already presented to the stage

If you push to the stage a slide deck that has already been presented, an additional option appears in the confirmation screen asking if you wish to Display the latest slide that was being presented:

If you leave this option enabled, the slide deck will be added to the stage and immediately display the last slide that was shown to the audience at the moment when the deck was previously removed from the stage.

How do the slides look to attendees?

The attendees will see none of the slide deck controls that are used by the host, moderator or speaker in the studio.

If only the presentation is pushed to the stage, it will look as follows to the attendees once you go live:

Here the slides cover up the entire background image of the stream.

If the host and/or speaker are pushed to the stage at the same time as the slides, the stream player will show as follows:

Here the speakers are visible to the left, next to the slide, and the background image is visible.