conference presentation videos online

pwd

I'm giving a presentation at a academic conference in a couple of days. I have't given a presentation of that type before.
I'm looking for videos on youtube etc of decent academic presentations to help me prepare my own.Any advice from people who have done some would be helpful too.
Thanks.

Red Alert

I gave my first one a few months ago, so here's some things I've noted for next time:

Audience: Do you have an idea so far of who your audience is? I come from an electronic engineering background but my audience had many mechanical engineers and material scientists. That should guide how you will pitch the overall presentation, for example I put in enough to explain how and why I'd used finite element analysis and the governing equation I was using but I didn't go into detail on either otherwise.

Visuals: You're probably going to be using slides of some sort. You're better off having less slides and more talk per slide rather than racing through 20 slides in 10 minutes. You will probably be using powerpoint, if you're a LaTeX person then give Beamer a shot as it makes beautiful slideshows.
Either way choose a suitable theme which isn't overbearing - in Powerpoint 2007 I like Urban. If the conference are collecting all presentations and aggregating them then make sure to see what format they want - PDF or more usually PPT (or PPTX). Do make sure any graphics you're including are in vector formats if possible or if they're bitmaps that they're high enough resolution - graphics that look OK normally can look dreadful on a huge screen.

Questions will come from the floor after your talk (probably). Critically look at your presentation and try and make a list of five to ten questions that someone might ask.

Practice makes perfect. Say your presentation so often that you can say it to yourself on the bus or in the shower without thinking. Go through it multiple times with others in your group and outside of your group until you're confident in it.

Appropriate clothing for giving a talk depends on the conference. Many of the Ireland ones will happily take a jacket, open neck shirt n trousers if you're a guy.

The night before is not for getting hammered. By all means calm your nerves in the bar, but get to bed early if you're talking before lunch the next day. Have your laptop and clothes ready for the following day and get an alarm call if it's in a hotel.

On the day try and arrive about 10 minutes before the session you're in - that means getting up on time if it's an early session. Check your talk's there and good to go.

Microphones/sound systems can be a pain if they're not set up correctly or are too loud or soft. The room I was in had one that keep squealing, even when I wasn't near the mic, and I didn't have the cop on to turn the mic off. Have a look in the room before hand, and if the mic is problematic for you then just turn it off whilst you're talking - the switch is usually on the body for a normal mic and at the bottom of the neck for a slim 'pencil' one.

Projection: make sure your presentation (and any videos) will run if the computer is a shared one. If you're bringing your own laptop (which I'd do if at all possible) then make sure it'll talk to the projector - making sure you've the video drivers on it and tried it out by connecting to a monitor you have lying around will be enough. (Sometimes videos won't run if you've both screens on - you need to be on external only with some systems!)

Dealing with questions: If you don't know the answer to something (which is very common) or cannot answer it given the information you've got, then just thank the questioner and offer to get in touch with them personally about the question. (Make sure to get back to them however!) Try and talk for about 60 seconds on a question. You'll probably get about two.