Editor iPad

The central Editor panel is where the magic happens: writing your narrative, adding visuals, and turning your content into slides.

You can easily preview slide thumbnails by swiping right from the left edge of your screen. Swipe left to close the preview.

Start Writing

When you open iA Presenter on your iPad you’ll first see Instant Slides, our in-app tutorial. To remove it and start writing your narrative, select all text and press Delete.

Tip

If you no longer need the tutorial and prefer to start with a different or blank presentation, go to Settings → General → New Presentation Text and add your own template text, or delete it altogether.

Start by writing your narrative, the story you want to tell. As you write, format your text using Markdown. You can also import existing text—from iA Writer, for example.

New Slides and Layouts

To create a new slide, either type three dashes --- or press Return three times. You can also open the onscreen keyboard, select the Command Palette on the right and select Slide Break from the menu. Pressing Return three times only starts a new slide while Three returns to start a new slide is turned on in Settings → Editor (it’s on by default).

If you need a specific layout for your slide, click the + on the top-left of the Title Bar.

Presentation Options

In the Title Bar’s centre, click on the presentation’s name to rename it.

Under the Title Bar you’ll find a timer that estimates how long your presentation will take, based on your narrative. The time estimate updates in real-time as you write and edit.

Formatting Text

If you don’t know Markdown yet, open the onscreen keyboard, select the Command Palette on the right and select a formatting option. To choose which options you’ll see, go to Settings → Commands.

The first category in the Command Palette is called Spoken Text. Most of your narrative will probably be spoken text, but you can add lists or quotes here too.

Tip

Keep in mind that any text in the Spoken Text category won’t appear on your slides, but you’ll see it when you present.

The second category is called Text on Slide. Use it to add text that you want your audience to see. A faster way to do this is to add a tab ⇥ in front of your text.

Content visible on slide and Spoken notes.

Find Your Focus

With iA Presenter you can easily cut out all distractions while you’re writing.

Use iA Writer’s famous Focus Mode, which we integrated into iA Presenter too. Enable Focus Mode via the Text Size button AA.

Tip

Compared to iA Writer, Focus Mode in iA Presenter works slightly differently. Instead of highlighting a paragraph or a sentence as in iA Writer, Focus Mode in iA Presenter focuses on the slide you’re writing.

Multi-Color Code

You’ll notice that your cursor and slide titles gradually change color from blue to gold. Sure, it’s pretty—but it also shows you in which phase you are in a presentation:

Blue is a cold start.

Purple is warming up.

Red is when things get hot.

Orange prepares you for a sweet end.

Gold is the afterglow.

The cursor in orange, farther down the presentation.