Sometimes an interesting opening slide can get your audience’s attention.  There is a website that will generate a “newspaper clipping” that can be used to create an unusual introductory type of slide.  All you have to do to generate a clipping like the sample one I’ve added is go to the newspaper clipping generator and type in a fictional name for your newspaper, a date, a story title and some copy.  The site will generate a jpg graphic file that you download to your computer and insert as a picture on your slide.  I just grabbed something from one of my chemistry students senior seminar abstracts to make this sample graphic.  The entire process took about a minute.  This is not something that should be overused, but I thought it might be an interesting way to present introductory material….and yes, your audience is going to read it, but it could be part of what you are saying in your introduction.  Clicking the link above will take you to the graphic generator.