/making-academic-presentations

id: making-academic-presentations
name: making-academic-presentations
version: 1.0.0
description: |-
  Create academic presentation slide decks and optionally demo videos from research papers.
stages: ["promotion"]
tools: ["read_file", "search_project", "write_file", "run_terminal"]
summary: |-
  Create academic presentation slide decks and optionally demo videos from research papers. Use when the user asks to "make slides", "create a deck", "make a presentation", "demo video", "paper slides", "conference talk slides", or wants to...
primaryIntent: writing
intents: ["writing"]
capabilities: ["visualization-reporting"]
domains: ["general"]
keywords: ["making-academic-presentations", "promotion", "visualization-reporting", "making", "academic", "presentations", "create", "presentation", "slide", "decks", "optionally", "demo"]
source: builtin
status: verified
upstream:
  repo: dr-claw
  path: skills/making-academic-presentations
  revision: 8322dc4ef575affaa374aa7922c0a0971c6db7d7
resourceFlags:
  hasReferences: true
  hasScripts: true
  hasTemplates: false
  hasAssets: false
  referenceCount: 3
  scriptCount: 2
  templateCount: 0
  assetCount: 0
  optionalScripts: true

making-academic-presentations

Canonical Summary

Create academic presentation slide decks and optionally demo videos from research papers. Use when the user asks to "make slides", "create a deck", "make a presentation", "demo video", "paper slides", "conference talk slides", or wants to...

Trigger Rules

Use this skill when the user request matches its research workflow scope. Prefer the bundled resources instead of recreating templates or reference material. Keep outputs traceable to project files, citations, scripts, or upstream evidence.

Resource Use Rules

• Read from `references/` only when the current task needs the extra detail.
• Treat `scripts/` as optional helpers. Run them only when their dependencies are available, keep outputs in the project workspace, and explain a manual fallback if execution is blocked.

Execution Contract

• Resolve every relative path from this skill directory first.
• Prefer inspection before mutation when invoking bundled scripts.
• If a required runtime, CLI, credential, or API is unavailable, explain the blocker and continue with the best manual fallback instead of silently skipping the step.
• Do not write generated artifacts back into the skill directory; save them inside the active project workspace.

Upstream Instructions

Making Academic Presentations

Produce slide decks (and optionally narrated demo videos) from research papers. The human drives all outline and visual decisions — the agent executes.

Pipeline

[1] Script Draft ──→ [2] Slide Generation ──→ [3] TTS Audio (optional) ──→ [4] Video Assembly (optional)
     Claude Code          nanobanana /edit     edge-tts / Kokoro / ElevenLabs       ffmpeg

Skip stages 3–4 for slide-only output. User can enter at any stage.

Stage 1: Script / Outline

**Input**: paper + user-provided outline or slide plan **Output**: `video-scripts.md` or `slide-outline.md` — per-slide content with talking points

The agent drafts scripts based on the user's outline. The user owns the structure — agent does not decide slide count, order, or what to emphasize.

Stage 2: Slide Generation

> Full reference: [references/slide-generation.md](references/slide-generation.md)

**Tool**: nanobanana (Gemini CLI extension)

**Priority order** (edit-first): 1. **Has paper figure** → nanobanana `/edit` to wrap into slide frame 2. **Has existing slide** → `/edit` to adapt 3. **User-provided reference** (e.g., from NotebookLM or PPTX the user made) → `/edit` to refine 4. **Title slide from scratch** → generate with academic style prompt 5. **Content slide from scratch** → generate with deck-style preamble

**Key principle**: prefer `/edit` on existing HQ paper figures over generating from scratch.

**Deck style**: create `deck-style.md` once per deck, prepend to all generate-from-scratch prompts. For `/edit`, style is inherited from the base image.

Example `deck-style.md`:

- Canvas: 1920x1080, white background
- Accent: #2563EB blue, text: #1e293b dark slate
- Clean sans-serif, flat design, no gradients/shadows
- Bottom bar: blue accent with white affiliation text

Stage 3: TTS Audio (optional)

> Full reference: [references/tts-engines.md](references/tts-engines.md) > Batch scripts: [scripts/batch_tts_edge.py](scripts/batch_tts_edge.py), [scripts/batch_tts_kokoro.py](scripts/batch_tts_kokoro.py)

**Output**: one audio file per narrated slide

Engine Selection

| Engine | Quality | Cost | Latency | Best For | |--------|---------|------|---------|----------| | **edge-tts** (default) | Very good | Free, unlimited | ~6s/slide (cloud) | Quick generation, good male voices | | **Kokoro** | Very good | Free, unlimited | ~1.5s/slide (local) | Offline use, fast batch, good female voices | | **ElevenLabs** | Premium | 10k chars free/mo | ~3s/slide (cloud) | Highest quality, voice cloning |

**Default**: Use edge-tts unless user requests offline or premium quality.

Quick Start (edge-tts)

import edge_tts, asyncio

async def tts_slide(text, output, voice="en-US-AndrewNeural"):
    await edge_tts.Communicate(text, voice).save(output)

asyncio.run(tts_slide("Your slide text here", "slide_01.mp3"))

**Voices**: AndrewNeural (male, presenter), AriaNeural (female), GuyNeural (male, warm), JennyNeural (female, pro)

Stage 4: Video Assembly (optional)

**Tool**: ffmpeg **Input**: slide PNGs + audio files + optional demo recording

# Use symlink to avoid iCloud path spaces: ln -sfn "long path" /tmp/workdir

# Slide with audio:
ffmpeg -y -loop 1 -i slide.png -i audio.mp3 \
  -c:v libx264 -tune stillimage -pix_fmt yuv420p \
  -c:a aac -ar 44100 -ac 2 -shortest seg.mp4

# Silent slide (N seconds):
ffmpeg -y -loop 1 -i slide.png -f lavfi -i anullsrc=r=44100:cl=stereo \
  -c:v libx264 -tun