Gradient - Why did you ruin a good thing

[Steve]

What took me about 15 seconds to do in the older version of powerpoint now
took me an hour and I still didn't get results..
All i wanted was a simple vertical light-dark-light gradient, but there are
so many pull down menus' angles and pre-fab'd samples that I can't make a
simple gradient fill.
You took a great powerpoint and just made it slower - everything about the
new menus adds time - before I could click and go, now its select a bar menu
then pull down another...
This was a step backwards.

 

[June Low [MSFT]]

Hi Steve

I'm sorry to hear you are having a hard time with our new gradients. I'd
encourage you to send feedback to us via Help > Send Feedback and help us
understand where your particular difficulty is.

In the meantime, to obtain a light-dark-light gradient, you should click on
the Add Color button in the Format Shape dialogue's Fill > Gradient pane.
You can then set the middle indicator to a darker colour than the other two.
The Style and Angle/Direction controls are to allow you to further customize
your gradient (e.g. going from dark to light horizontally across the shape
instead of vertically and the like).

I hope this helps.
- June
OfficeArt Tester, MacBU
Microsoft

 

[Jeff Chapman]

Steve - I haven't used Office 2004 much so I can't feel your pain (although
I am a long-time user of PPT for Windows in all its flavors); but I did
recently start using PPT 2008 for Mac. I tried creating a linear gradient
for a shape as you mentioned. It seemed pretty straightforward to me -
here's what I did:

1. Making sure that the toolbox is displayed, select the shape and click on
the "Formatting Palette" tab.
2. In the Quick Styles and Effects section of the Formatting palette, click
"More Options".
3. In the Format Shape dialog box, click Fill, Gradient, and under the
Color and Transparency section, click Add Color. There should now be
three color stops in the gradient sample bar. (Make sure that the
"Styles and Direction" setting is set to Linear before you try to
add colors.)
4. Click on the first and third color stops to adjust the colors to your
liking, and make sure that the Angle is set to 90 degrees. (This is a
live preview feature, BTW - if the dialog box doesn't obstruct the slide
view, you will be able to see the changes you make in real time and
correct them if necessary.)

That's really all there is to it. You can even skip steps 1 and 2 above if
you have right-click access, by right-clicking on the shape and selecting
Format Shape. It took me about 20-25 seconds to make the change in PPT 2008
using the above method, BTW. ;-) Again, I'm not familiar with the way that
PPT 2004 did it, but the steps involved seem pretty logical to me, and they
are pretty well in line with how PPT 2007 for Windows operates. Also, if you
use this method, there is no reason to mess around with prefab samples - you
can just do your own thing and make it look the way you like.

Jeff

 

[Eric Waldbaum [MSFT]]

Some other quick ways to get to the Format Shape dialog:

Double-click on the shape! (I find this the fastest way) and the Format
menu->Shape... option (while the shape is selected).

-Eric
MacOffice Testing
Microsoft

 

[Jeff Chapman]

Yep, thanks, Eric - double-clicking on the shape works nicely too. ;-)
All in all, it seems pretty intuitive.

The ability to set the transparency level for each individual color stop is
outrageous! There's really an incredible amount of control and leverage for
creative expression there. Nice work on this, MacOffice Team!

Jeff