Corrections and Color Options for Picture Backgrounds in PowerPoint 2013 for Windows

Although it's not too common to have bright and vivid picture backgrounds for your slides, it is not unheard of. You will often see slides that are saturated with bright, sparkling colors that make anything placed on the slide almost impossible to stand apart. So, do you really want your slide background "to not be in the background?" If not, then the techniques explained on this page will help.

Follow these steps to learn how you can apply picture and color corrections for your picture slide background in PowerPoint 2013 for Windows:

1. Apply a picture as background fill, or open any of your existing presentations with picture background. Then summon the Format Background Task Pane, as shown in Figure 1. Within the Format Background Task Pane, select the Picture tab (highlighted in red within Figure 1).
2. 
   Figure 1: Format Background Task Pane
3. This will access the Picture Corrections and Picture Color options for the picture background (highlighted in blue within Figure 2, above). Let us explore them:
2. Click Picture Corrections to access all options within this section, as shown in Figure 2.
3. 
   Figure 2: Picture Corrections options within Format Background Task Pane
4. Let us explore all of the Picture Correction options that you see in Figure 2.

Sharpen/Soften

5. Click the Presets option to bring up a drop-down gallery, as shown in Figure 3. Here you'll find thumbnail previews applied with varied sharpen and soften values. Hover the cursor over any of these variants, and you will see a tool tip that shows its sharpen and soften values. The thumbnail in the middle (highlighted thumbnail) represents the current status of the picture.
6. 
   Figure 3: Sharpen/Soften Presets drop-down gallery
7. Click any preview thumbnail to apply it to the picture background. You can also manually change the Sharpness value as required by using the slider or by directly typing the values in digits (refer to Figure 2, shown earlier on this page).

Brightness/Contrast

8. Click the Presets option to bring up a drop-down gallery, as shown in Figure 4. Here you'll find thumbnail previews applied with various brightness and contrast values. Hover the cursor over any of these variants, and you will see a tool tip that shows its brightness and contrast values. The thumbnail in the middle (highlighted thumbnail) represents the current status of the picture.
9. 
   Figure 4: Brightness/Contrast Presets drop-down gallery
10. Click any preview thumbnail to apply it to the picture background. You can also manually change the Brightness and Contrast values as required by using the sliders or by directly typing the values in digits (refer to Figure 2, shown earlier on this page).
3. Click Picture Color to access all options within this section, as shown in Figure 5.
4. 
   Figure 5: Picture Color within Format Background Task Pane
5. Let us explore all of the Picture Color options that you see in Figure 5.

Color Saturation

6. Click the Presets option to bring up a drop-down gallery, as shown in Figure 6. Here you'll find thumbnail previews applied with various saturation values. Hover the cursor over any of these variants, and you will see a tool tip that shows its saturation values. The thumbnail in the middle (highlighted thumbnail) represents the current status of the picture.
7. 
   Figure 6: Color Saturation Presets drop-down gallery
8. Click any preview thumbnail to apply it to the picture background. You can also manually change the Color Saturation value as required by using the slider or by directly typing the values in digits (refer to Figure 5, shown earlier on this page).

Color Tone

9. Click the Presets option to bring up a drop-down gallery, as shown in Figure 7. Here, you'll find thumbnail previews applied with various temperature values. Hover the cursor over any of these variants, and you will see a tool tip that shows its temperature values. The thumbnail in the middle (highlighted thumbnail) represents the current status of the picture.
10. 
    Figure 7: Color Tone Presets drop-down gallery
11. Click any preview thumbnail to apply it to the picture background. You can also manually change the Temperature value as required by using the slider or by directly typing the values in digits (refer to Figure 5, shown earlier on this page).

Recolor

12. Click the Recolor option to bring up a drop-down gallery, as shown in Figure 8. Here you'll find thumbnail previews applied with various tints and shades of accent colors along with grayscale and black and white. While the first row is populated by grayscale and black and white variants, the previews in the second and third rows of this drop-down gallery are shades (darker variations) and tints (lighter variations) of Accent colors. Accent colors are influenced by the Theme of the active presentation. So, if the Theme is changed, the colors of these previews in the second and third rows will change. Just hover your cursor over any of these variants, and you will see a tool tip with the name.
13. 
    Figure 8: Recolor drop-down gallery
4. You can anytime get your original picture background by clicking the Reset button (refer to Figure 5, shown earlier on this page) within the Format Background Task Pane.
5. Choose any of the options explained in the preceding steps. Thereafter, you can proceed choosing any of the following options:
6. Click the Apply to All button to update all slides in the presentation with the picture background corrections made.
7. Click the Reset Background button to abandon all changes you made to the slide background.
8. More details about the Apply to All and Reset Background buttons can be found in our Format Slide Background in PowerPoint 2013 for Windows tutorial.
6. Remember to save your presentation often.