About this design
Where the Thesis Defense style comes from, and what it signals.
A defense committee has read your dissertation chapter by chapter, so Thesis Defense organizes the talk the same way. A rail of six segments runs across the top of each slide, one per chapter. The current chapter turns ink blue, finished ones fade, and the committee can see where you are in the argument at a glance.
Your research questions get fixed labels, RQ1 to RQ3, and each results slide carries the tag of the question it answers. Figures keep their thesis numbers and Newsreader italic captions, so a committee member can ask about Figure 4.2 and find it in the printed copy. One sentence per results slide gets highlighter yellow #ffe98a: the answer.
Titles and captions use Newsreader; labels, tables and charts use IBM Plex Sans. Ink blue #23398f carries the rail, the RQ tags and the bars that hold the finding. Use it for a PhD or master's defense, a proposal defense, or a qualifying exam talk.
Use it for
- PhD dissertation defenses in front of a committee and external examiner
- Master's thesis defenses that follow a fixed chapter structure
- Proposal defenses where you present research questions and methods before the results exist
- Qualifying exam or candidacy talks that map a research plan chapter by chapter
- Lab meeting rehearsals of a defense, with backup slides ready for questions
Skip it for
- Lecture series and course slides; Seminar and Syllabus suit teaching better
- Case discussions for a business class; Harvard Style is built around exhibits and a protagonist dilemma
- Short conference talks with one headline result; TED Style gives a single finding more room
The presentation design prompt
This is the exact text that gets sent to your AI.
Create a presentation in the 'Thesis Defense' theme, a committee-facing research talk that follows the chapters of the dissertation. Background: white (#ffffff); panels #f4f5f8 with 1px #d9dce5 borders, square corners. Typography: 'Newsreader' (Google Fonts) 600 for slide titles at 30 to 34px and the thesis title at 40 to 46px, sentence case, left-aligned; Newsreader italic for figure captions and serif passages at 15 to 26px, line-height 1.5; 'IBM Plex Sans' for body text, labels, chart axes and tables at 12 to 17px. Ink #16202c headings, #333b48 body, #6b7280 supporting text. The signature is the chapter rail: a row of six equal segments across the top of every content slide, one per dissertation chapter (for example 1 Introduction to 6 Conclusion, named after the user's chapters), each a 3px bar over an 11px Plex Sans label. Finished chapters have #9aa6d6 bars and gray labels, the current chapter a solid ink-blue #23398f bar and a semibold #16202c label, upcoming chapters #d9dce5 bars and #9ca3af labels. On the title slide the rail sits at the bottom, fully inked, as the roadmap. Research questions get stable labels RQ1 to RQ3 in #23398f; each results slide carries its RQ as an outlined tag (1px #23398f border, 3px radius) plus its chapter. Figures carry thesis numbering and an italic caption below, such as 'Figure 4.2 Score change by classroom temperature.' Highlighter yellow #ffe98a marks exactly one sentence per results slide: the answer to the research question. Charts: ink-blue #23398f for the bars or line that carry the finding, #c3cae6 for context, #b45309 only for a baseline or comparison, a 1px #16202c axis, direct value labels, no legends or gridlines; sample size notes in 13px #333b48 beside the chart. Slide types: Title (department line, thesis title, candidate, date, a committee block with Chair, Committee and External examiner, then the rail); Research questions (RQ label, the question in Newsreader 22 to 24px, 'Answered in Chapter N' at the right); Method (numbered steps in bordered boxes joined by chevrons, the final step outlined in 2px #23398f, a figure caption); Results (RQ tag, a title that states the finding, chart left, highlighted answer right); Contributions and limitations (two columns, each point led by a bold phrase); Questions (a 60px 'Questions' title, a thank-you line, and an index of backup slides coded B1, B2, B3 in #23398f). Footer on every slide: a 1px #d9dce5 rule, candidate name, 'doctoral defense' and date bottom-left, slide number over total bottom-right, 11px #6b7280. Strictly avoid: university crests or logos, stock photos, gradients, drop shadows, rounded cards, dark backgrounds, more than one highlighted sentence per slide, bullet walls of full paragraphs, legends where direct labels work, 3D charts, numbering things that are not a sequence, centered body text, decorative icons, text below 11px. Use this theme for my slides. Ask me what the presentation is about first, then apply the theme to every slide.View this prompt and its data on GitHub
How to use this prompt
From copied text to a finished Thesis Defense deck in four moves.
- 01
Copy the prompt
Use the copy button, or open it pre-filled in Claude or ChatGPT with one click from the panel on this page.
- 02
Tell the AI your topic
The prompt instructs the AI to ask what your presentation is about first. A sentence or a pasted outline is enough.
- 03
Generate and iterate
Ask for more slides or swap a layout. The avoid list at the end of the prompt keeps Thesis Defense on-style while the content changes.
- 04
Or skip straight to a deck
SlideSpeak turns your topic or document into a finished Thesis Defense presentation, exportable as PowerPoint or PDF.
Common questions
Working with the Thesis Defense presentation design prompt in practice.
