editing wmf clipart files in office 2008

[Elahrairah]

One of the great things about Office 2004 was the ability to ungroup and manipulate the individual elements comprising a wmf image file, in much the same way one would arrange the individual parts of a scalable vector graphic. Unfortunately, since upgrading to 2008 this functionality seems to have been lost. Right-clicking (ctrl-clicking) the image brings up a dialog box that no longer includes the "edit..." option and all of the ungroup options are grayed out. This is very frustrating as I had come to use this feature quite heavily. Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated.

 

[John McGhie]

Sorry, you will need to install a graphics application that can edit
WMF/EMF.

The ability to edit vector graphics has been removed from Office 2008.

Please use Help>Send Feedback to let Microsoft know that you want the
feature back

Sorry.

One of the great things about Office 2004 was the ability to ungroup and
manipulate the individual elements comprising a wmf image file, in much the
same way one would arrange the individual parts of a scalable vector graphic.
Unfortunately, since upgrading to 2008 this functionality seems to have been
lost. Right-clicking (ctrl-clicking) the image brings up a dialog box that no
longer includes the "edit..." option and all of the ungroup options are grayed
out. This is very frustrating as I had come to use this feature quite heavily.
Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated.

--
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John McGhie, Consultant Technical Writer
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
http://jgmcghie.fastmail.com.au/
Nhulunbuy, Northern Territory, Australia

 

[Elahrairah]

Bummer. But thanks again for your help, John. That makes twice in 2 days! Much appreciated. Any suggestions for said graphics application? I've been using Inkscape under X11 to manipulate .svg images, but it won't import Windows Media Files. The Office Online catalogue is so extensive, it'd be a shame to give up such a good resource, what with all the lesson plans, flashcards, and handouts I'm always needing to make. Cheers again.

 

[John McGhie]

No, I am the least visual person here Ask Beth when she shows up, of
Clive

The pros use Adobe CS3, a chunky little $1,800. Or Illustrator, $600...

I am sure there are cheaper alternatives. Make sure they will handle both
WMF, and EMF!

I use CorelDRAW, but they stopped making Mac versions a while ago.

Cheers

Bummer. But thanks again for your help, John. That makes twice in 2 days! Much
appreciated. Any suggestions for said graphics application? I've been using
Inkscape under X11 to manipulate .svg images, but it won't import Windows
Media Files. The Office Online catalogue is so extensive, it'd be a shame to
give up such a good resource, what with all the lesson plans, flashcards, and
handouts I'm always needing to make. Cheers again.

--
Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Consultant Technical Writer
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
http://jgmcghie.fastmail.com.au/
Nhulunbuy, Northern Territory, Australia

 

[Phillip Jones]

I'm envious of these people with deeeep pockets! ;-)

No, I am the least visual person here Ask Beth when she shows up, of
Clive

The pros use Adobe CS3, a chunky little $1,800. Or Illustrator, $600...

I am sure there are cheaper alternatives. Make sure they will handle both
WMF, and EMF!

I use CorelDRAW, but they stopped making Mac versions a while ago.

Cheers

--
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Martinsville Va 24112 |[email protected], ICQ11269732, AIM pjonescet
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[John McGhie]

Just don't get near them in the pub, you'll find their arms never reach to
the bottom of those pockets... Particularly not after shelling out for CS3

I'm envious of these people with deeeep pockets! ;-)

--
Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Consultant Technical Writer
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
http://jgmcghie.fastmail.com.au/
Nhulunbuy, Northern Territory, Australia

 

[Phillip Jones]

I can laugh at your comment. But I was aiming my coment at the Op's
original post about owning a MacBook Air.

Just don't get near them in the pub, you'll find their arms never reach to
the bottom of those pockets... Particularly not after shelling out for CS3

--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Phillip M. Jones, CET |LIFE MEMBER: VPEA ETA-I, NESDA, ISCET, Sterling
616 Liberty Street |Who's Who. PHONE:276-632-5045, FAX:276-632-0868
Martinsville Va 24112 |[email protected], ICQ11269732, AIM pjonescet
------------------------------------------------------------------------

If it's "fixed", don't "break it"!

mailto[email protected]

<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/default.htm>
<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/90th_Birthday/index.htm>
<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/Fulcher/default.html>
<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/Harris/default.htm>
<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/Jones/default.htm>

<http://www.vpea.org>

 

[David Candland]

I have Illustrator and I'm unable to figure out how to get the ClipArt WMF file into an editable format. Office 2004 used to let me copy and paste into Illustrator when I needed to do an edit. Now in Office 2008, it simply pastes a raster format (jpg or png?) that is completely uneditable

I think MS cut the feature.

 

[David Candland]

Scratch that. Here's the process:
Right-click on the clip art image in Word, Save to desktop as PDF, open the PDF in Illustrator.

The the ability to edit the clipart hasn't been cut, just the process has become quite a bit more complex.

 

[John McGhie]

Hi David:

Depends what it is. You could edit the originals here:
/Applications/Microsoft Office 2008/Office/Media/Clipart/Clip Art/

They are in .pict format in Word 2008. But many of the images in the
Clipart folder above this are in .png or .jpeg format.

So much depends on what you grab

On the clipboard, Word holds the image as Picture, PDF and Drawing Object.
Picture is probably the .png version.

Hope this helps

Scratch that. Here's the process:
Right-click on the clip art image in Word, Save to desktop as PDF, open the
PDF in Illustrator.

The the ability to edit the clipart hasn't been cut, just the process has
become quite a bit more complex.

--
Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Consultant Technical Writer
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
http://jgmcghie.fastmail.com.au/
Sydney, Australia. S33°53'34.20 E151°14'54.50