You can predefine design templates for your slides on Slide Masters and Layouts. You do not have to utilize PowerPoint's slide masters and layouts to generate an accessible PDF document from your presentation. However, it can make it easier for you to work on a consistently designed presentation.
Recommendations on how to format your texts for accessibility can be found in Text Formatting.
Opening Slide Masters and Layouts
To open the slide master, select the View tab in the ribbon and click on the Slide Master button. The Slide Master tab shows up in the ribbon.
Tip
You can also open and close the slide master in the axesSlide - Role mappings and reading order task pane using the buttons next to the master or layout levels. For instructions on how to do this, see the section Change role mappings and reading order for master and layout elements in the article Button "Role mapping".
Editing Slide Masters and Layouts
You can recognize the slide masters by the prefixed slide number in the navigation bar. Several layouts can be assigned to each slide master. Placeholders for titles, texts, and other objects such as graphics are placed on the slide master and the layouts.
For example, you can format the appearance of the slide titles and text levels on a Slide Master. All changes you make to the slide master also change the subordinate layouts.
You can use Layouts to create individual design templates for your slides. You can insert various placeholders for texts and objects such as graphics, diagrams, and tables.
Important: Make sure that there is a placeholder for the title on your layouts. Slide titles are important for accessible navigation. You can find out more about this in Slide Titles.
To exit the Slide Master View and return to your presentation, select the Slide Master tab in the ribbon and click on the Close Master View button.
Tip
Assign roles to specific objects directly on the layout to save time. For example, if you have layouts with multiple heading levels, you can use role mapping to directly specify the outline level on the layout. The roles are inherited directly by the slides that use the layout. see the section Change role mappings and reading order for master and layout elements in the article Button "Role mapping".
Using Layouts
To insert a new slide with a specific layout, select the Home tab in the ribbon and click on the New Slide button in the Slides function group. There you can select a layout template.
To change the layout of an existing slide, select the Home tab in the ribbon and click on the Layout button in the Slides function group. Select the desired template in the menu that opens. It is best not to use the "Blank" layout template, as this does not have a placeholder for the slide title.
Important for the PDF Export with axesSlide
The slide masters and layouts are for design purposes only and no information relevant to the content should be inserted there. Insert important content that all users should have access to directly on your slides, repeat it there, or assign it a different role.
If you have not assigned a different role to objects on the slide master or layouts, all objects such as graphics, background images, text, etc. will automatically be marked as artifacts (i.e., marked as decorative) when exporting to PDF with axesSlide. Assistive Technologies then do not read these objects. As the objects may be repeated on several slides, they would disrupt the reading flow.