Using Xara images in Word?

[tikka]

I am doing illustrations for a document that I am producing in Word 2000. My problem comes when deciding how to get my images created in CorelXara (& now Xara X) in to Word.

A straight copy paste obviously just produces a bitmap (even if paste as Xara object).

Enhanced metafile (EMF) isn't interpreted correctly by Word (not sure if Xara or Word is at fault).

Xara EPS is not recognized by Word as valid EPS (although Ghostscript interprets it fine).

Adobe Illustrator or Artworks EPS are recognized by Word (but crash Ghostscript) & are not as nice as working with a format that you can see on screen as well (bitmap preview is just not the same).

That leaves me with WMF which does a pretty good job - interpreted correctly, can view & resize in Word, prints cleanly. The only down size is that it doesn't allow for curves - so any curves are turned into a whole lot of short straight lines.

I was hoping that maybe Xara X would sort out the problems with EMF, but that doesn't seem to be the case. Does anyone have any bright ideas about what the problem is, if there is a workaround or a better solution?

Cheers,
Tikka

[tikka]

Thanks for all the suggestions people. I think the idea of using CMX has the most promise so I'll see if I can get my hands on a copy of CorelDraw & do some experimenting. Having said that it seems crazy that it has to be this hard to do something as potentially simple as this!!!

It would seem to me that the potential market for Xara would increase substantially if there was a simple way to reuse Xara created vector images in Office applications, either by improving OLE support or by providing a good export to a vector based file format supported by MS Office.

Thanks again,
Tikka

[georgerai]

Overview Pasting and Exporting WMF, EMF and Xara Pro Objects into MS Word
Xara Pro (4.01.5601) to word 2007


Ive had to do some experimenting to get the best print outcome in Word 2007 (used for technical reporting at work).
To save someone the hassle of working this out - here are some results:


I need to keep my images in a vector based format to keep the lines and text crisp and clean for technical reports. That leaves out using jpg, png or or any other bitmapped graphics formats.



Pasting EMF file format
EMF pro
Preserves mixed text fonts. For example mixing Symbol and Time new Roman fonts in the same line for electrical representation such as 10 Ohms


EMF con
Any text in boxes (for diagrams) gets messed up. The text moves and overruns the end of the box.
Pasting results in FUZZY IMAGE prints in word


Pasting WMF file format
WMF pro
Text in boxes maintains fidelity from Xara to MS Word.

WMF con
Mixed font text gets messed up. Font Symbol plus Times new roman becomes all Symbol font.
Pasting results in FUZZY IMAGE prints in word



Importing EMF image into Word
EMF and WMF Pro
Importing gives CRISP image and text PRINTS in word

EMF and WMF Con
Text in diagram box gets messed up - text spills over end of boxes.


Pasting XARA object into Word

Pro
Preserves image and text fidelity

con
images from Xara printed in word are FUZZY



SUMMARY for crisp text / vector graphics in word
-----------------------------------------------
Use import EMF or WMF into word for print quality
Try not to use text in boxes with diagrams created in Xara
(place text over or under the box to avoid text over-run through end of box in the final diagram in word)


DONT USE PASTE function (not emf, wmf or Xara object)
Pasting seems to result in bitmapped prints of vectored objects in Word.

[steve.ledger]

Good report and tips thanks.

One question, are you not able to present your reports in PDF format?
I'm just wondering why 'Word 2007'?

[georgerai]

If I print out a word document in PDF format - The pdf is simply a PDF printer driver and it faithfully preserves any graphic diagram translation errors - like the text overruns.


If you mean using or Adobe PDF editor or similar ( does anyone have any recommendations ?), its because I hadn't considered that as an option.
Are there any good / inexpensive PDF editors around (Fox edit ?)


Why using Word 2007 (instead of Word 2003 ?) or do you mean a PDF editor ?

Word 2003 presents some SERIOUS document stability issues when you go beyond about 20 to 30 pages with lots of figures, tables, citations, cross referencing and Table of contents.

Word gets its knickers in a knot - pictures start jumping around (loses its anchor points), cross referencing has problems, documents freeze etc.

Word 2007 has corrected most of these problems though it too still has some issues. The product is stable with up to about 70 megs per document.

I was forced to revert from word 2003 to word 2007 about 1/4 way through writing up a PhD due to document stability issues. Ended up having to split the total document into nine separate word documents with a total of about 450 megs ( I use a lot of pictures).

I had the same issues with word 2003 with a masters back in 95 but back then I had to live with the document instabilities (nightmarish - I wouldn't even wish MS on my worst neighbour )


George

.

[steve.ledger]

Actually what I was wondering was why you are copying from Xara Xtreme into Word at all when Xtreme is equipped and capable of exporting to many PDF standards including PDF/X

PDF is more widely used for document transport and professional printing than Word 2007.

[michele]

I was wrong... [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_rolleyes.gif[/img] If you have a small graphic and try to strech it too much it will lose it's image quality.

-Michele

[Ross Macintosh]

Tikka - the easy solution is to export your graphic as a tif, jpeg, or gif. These days almost every program is capable of inserting these formats.

Regards, Ross

<a href=http://www.designstop.com/>DesignStop.Com</a>

[Sean Sedwards]

WMF already has the ability to be much more efficient and use Beziers and ellipses (like AI or EPS files), however most programs choose a 'join the dots' approach. The enhancements in EMF are largely unrelated to that choice, so it's unlikely to be better.

OLE support in Xara is pretty grim and does little more than insert a 256 colour screen shot of the object. The dithering worsens the already poor 96 dpi, however you can improve matters by enlarging the drawing in Xara and reducing it by a corresponding amount in Word. The on screen appearance will be less good but the printed quality will be better. An alternative approach is to export as CMX and paste it as an OLE object from CorelDRAW. DRAW's OLE works seamlessly.

Regards - Sean

[jamesc]

Try PNG If the one you make is reasonably big you can shrink it to fit.

James



<font face="dom casual, verdana>James</font>