Excel 2016 All-in-One For Dummies (2016)
Book V
Charts and Graphics
Chapter 2
Adding Graphic Objects
In This Chapter
Understanding what graphic objects are and how Excel treats them
Managing graphic objects on the worksheet
Adding online images to the spreadsheet
Adding text boxes with arrows
Inserting graphics files in the worksheet
Adding WordArt text and SmartArt diagrams to the worksheet
Capturing screenshots of the Windows desktop as Excel graphics
Applying graphic themes to the worksheet
Just as charts can really help to clarify trends and implications that aren’t readily apparent in your worksheet data, graphics that you add to a worksheet can really spruce up your charts and make them read even better. Although you may often look at Excel graphic objects as chart enhancements, you can also use them to enhance regular spreadsheet data. Depending on the type of spreadsheet, you may even end up using graphic elements not simply as a way to embellish the data, but also as a superior way to actually present it in the worksheet, especially when the data requires diagrammatic presentation.
Excel supports two types of graphic objects: those that you create yourself from the Shapes gallery or with the SmartArt, Text Box, and WordArt or the Screenshot command buttons on the Insert tab of the Ribbon, and those created by others that you import with the Pictures and Insert Pictures command buttons. This chapter covers how to create graphics with text and text as graphics, as well as basic graphic shapes. It also covers how to import two different types of graphic images: Online graphic images downloaded from the Internet along with local pictures and digital photos stored in a variety of different graphics file formats that Excel can read.
Graphic Objects 101
It is important to understand that all graphic objects (including embedded charts as covered in Book V, Chapter 1), whether you create them or import them, are discrete objects in the worksheet that you can select and manipulate. To select a graphic object, you simply click it. Excel lets you know that the object is selected by placing white circular sizing handles around the perimeter. The program also adds a circular rotation handle that appears directly above and connected to the sizing handle of the graphic’s perimeter (the handle is on the top edge, in the middle) if the graphic can be rotated. On some drawn objects (especially 3-D ones), yellow shaping handles also appear at the places where you can manipulate some part of the object’s shape, as shown in Figure 2-1.
Figure 2-1: When you click a graphic object to select it, the rotation and circular sizing handles appear.
To select multiple graphic objects in the worksheet, hold down the Shift or Ctrl key as you click each object. When you select more than one object, any manipulations that you perform affect all the selected objects.
To deselect a graphic object, just click the thick, white cross pointer in any cell in the worksheet that it doesn’t cover. To deselect an object when you have several graphics selected at one time, click an unobstructed cell or another graphic.
Manipulating graphics
When you position the mouse pointer on a graphic object’s sizing handle, the mouse pointer becomes a double-headed arrow that you can then drag to increase or decrease the overall size and shape of the object. To constrain a graphic while resizing it, click the sizing handle and then press and hold down the Shift key as you drag. Holding down the Shift key restricts your dragging so that the graphic retains its original proportions as you make it bigger or smaller. To constrain the proportions of an object in two dimensions, hold down the Shift key as you drag one of the corner sizing handles.
When you position the pointer on a graphic object’s rotation handle, the pointer becomes a curved arrow pointing clockwise. As you prepare to drag the rotation handle, the pointer becomes four curved arrows in a circle pointing in the clockwise direction. You can then rotate the graphic to any degree in a circle that pivots around the rotation handle.
When you position the pointer on a graphic’s shaping handle (if it has one), the pointer becomes an arrowhead without any handle. You can then drag this pointer to reshape the side or section of the graphic. In the case of some 3-D graphic shapes, dragging the shaping handle rotates a part of the graphic in such a way that it alters the object’s perspective, thus changing the way it’s viewed.
To move the selected graphic object, position the mouse pointer somewhere inside the object’s perimeter. Then, when the pointer becomes an arrowhead with a black double-cross at its point, drag the object to its new position within the worksheet. To copy the selected object, hold down the Ctrl key as you drag the graphic. (When you press the Ctrl key, a plus sign, indicating that the object is being copied, appears above the arrowhead pointer.)
When working with graphic objects on a touchscreen, you can use your finger or stylus on the various handles to rotate, reshape, and resize your image. In addition, you can pinch and open your fingers (forefinger and thumb) to resize a selected graphic object, making it smaller and larger, respectively.
When moving graphics in a worksheet, you can make use of an invisible grid to help you position them. This is especially helpful when you’re trying to align one graphic with another (for example, when aligning two charts side by side in a worksheet). To turn on the grid, you do one of the following, depending on the type of graphic object:
· Choose the Snap to Grid option from the Align Objects button’s drop-down menu on the Format tab on the Drawing Tools contextual tab when the selected graphic object is a drawn graphic such as a predefined shape, text box, a piece of clip art, or WordArt. Choose the Picture Tools contextual tab when the selected graphic object is a shape, picture, clip art image, digital photo, or screenshot created with any of the options (Pictures, Online Pictures, Shapes, or Screenshot) on the Illustrations button’s drop-down menu on the Ribbon’s Insert tab.
· Click the Arrange button on the Format tab on the SmartArt Tools contextual tab followed by the Align button and then choose the Snap to Grid option from its drop-down menu when the graphic object is a piece of SmartArt.
After the Snap to Grid feature is turned on, whenever you position an object very close to an invisible horizontal or vertical gridline, it snaps to this line as soon as you release the mouse button.
You can “nudge” a selected graphic object into its desired position with a keyboard by pressing the arrow keys. When you press an arrow key, Excel moves the object just a very little bit in that direction. Nudging is very useful when you have an object that’s almost in place and requires very little handling to get it into just the right position.
If you no longer need a graphic object, you can get rid of it by clicking it to select the object and then pressing the Delete key to remove it.
Moving graphic objects to new layers
All graphic objects that you add to a worksheet lay on different invisible layers that reside on top of the worksheet and over the worksheet data in the cells below. This means that if you move a graphic object over a cell that contains an entry, the graphic hides the data beneath it. Likewise, if you draw a shape or add an image and then position it on top of another graphic object (such as an embedded chart or other shape or picture), it also covers up the graphic below.
Figure 2-2 illustrates this situation. In this figure, you see a photo of a smartphone partially covering a photo of a tablet computer on top of star shaped graphic that I’ve drawn on top of a screenshot of the Mouse Properties dialog box. The four graphic shapes are all identified in the Selection task pane displayed on the right side of the program window as SONY Windows Smartphone, Microsoft Surface Tablet, Explosion 14, and Mouse Properties dialog box, respectively.
Figure 2-2: Graphic objects on top obscure any worksheet data and parts of other graphics below.
You display the Selection task pane by clicking the Selection Pane command button on the Format tab on the Chart Tools, Drawing Tools, or Picture Tools contextual tab, depending on the type of graphic object selected.
Excel makes it easy to move the graphic objects on the same worksheet to other layers using the Selection task pane. Simply click the name of the object in this task pane that you want to move and then click the Bring Forward button (the one with the arrow pointing upward at the top of the task pane to the immediate right of the Hide All button) or the Send Backward button (the one with the arrow pointing downward right next to it) to move the object. Clicking the Bring Forward button moves the selected object up a level in the Selection task pane just as clicking the Send Backward button moves the object down a level.
Note that any graphic object that appears above others in the list in the Selection task pane obscures all the objects below it, provided that the objects’ check boxes in the task pane are not empty but contain eye icons (meaning that they’re visible in the worksheet) and that the objects overlap each other in whole or part in their placement on the worksheet.
If the Selection task pane is not open, you can use the Bring to Front and Send to Back command buttons on the Format tab on the Chart Tools, Drawing Tools, or Picture Tools contextual tabs to move them to new layers:
· Choose the Bring to Front option from the Bring Forward drop-down menu to bring the selected graphic object to the top of the stack.
· Choose the Send to Back option from the Send Backward drop-down menu to send the object to the bottom of the stack.
· Click the Bring Forward button to bring the selected object up to the next higher layer.
· Click the Send Backward button to send the selected object down to the next layer.
Figure 2-3 illustrates how easy it is to move a graphic object to a different level in the Selection task pane. For this figure, I clicked Explosion 14 in the list and then selected the Bring to Front option to put this shape on top of all the others.
Figure 2-3: Worksheet after moving the Explosion graphic to the top layer with the Bring to Front option.
Aligning graphic objects
When you’re dealing with two graphic objects, one on top of the other, and you want to align them with each other, you can use the options on the Align command button’s drop-down menu on the Format tab of the Drawing Tools or Picture Tools contextual menu after selecting both of them in the worksheet.
The alignment options on this button’s drop-down menu include
· Align Left to left align the graphic on the top layer with the one underneath
· Align Center to center the graphic on the top layer with the one underneath
· Align Right to right align the graphic on the top layer with the one underneath
· Align Top to top align the graphic on the top layer with the one underneath
· Align Middle to center vertically the graphic on the top layer with the one underneath
· Align Bottom to bottom align the graphic on the top layer with the one underneath
· Distribute Horizontally to equally distribute the selected graphic objects (three or more) horizontally
· Distribute Vertically to equally distribute the selected graphic objects (three or more) vertically
Grouping graphic objects
Sometimes you need to work with more than one graphic object (for example, the smartphone and tablet graphic objects in Figures 2-2 and 2-3). If you find that you’re constantly selecting two or more objects at the same time in order to move them or rotate them together, you can make life a lot simpler by grouping the graphics. When you group selected graphic objects, Excel then makes them into a single graphic object, which you can then manipulate.
To group a bunch of graphics together, select them all (either by Shift+clicking or Ctrl+clicking each one). After they are selected, right-click the object on the top layer and then choose Group ⇒ Group from the object’s shortcut menu or choose the Group option from the Group Objects command button’s drop-down menu on the Format tab of the object’s particular Tools contextual menu.
Excel indicates that the selected graphics are now grouped in the worksheet (and for all intents and purposes, are a single graphic object) by placing a single set of sizing handles around the perimeter formed by all the former separate graphics and by giving them a group number in the Selection task pane. You can then manipulate the grouped graphic as a single entity by moving it, sizing it, rotating it, and so forth, as you would any other object.
The great thing about grouping a bunch of different objects is that Excel never forgets that they were once separate objects that you could independently manipulate. This means that you can always turn them back into separate graphics by ungrouping them. To do this, right-click the composite graphic object and then choose Group ⇒ Ungroup from its shortcut menu or choose the Ungroup option from the Group Objects command button’s drop-down menu on the object’s particular Tools Format tab.
Excel shows that the composite object is once again separated into many different objects by displaying sizing handles around each object’s perimeter. You can then deselect them all and manipulate each one once again independently by selecting it alone before moving, resizing, or rotating it. If you decide that you want the now-independent objects to be joined as a group once again, you can do this by right-clicking any one of the graphics in the erstwhile group and then choosing Group ⇒ Regroup from its shortcut menu or choosing the Regroup option from the Group Objects command button’s drop-down menu’s Format contextual tab.
Figure 2-4 illustrates grouping in action. For this figure, I selected both the picture of the SONY smartphone and the Microsoft Surface tablet and then chose Group from the Group Objects button’s drop-down menu. As you can see, in grouping the two objects together into one, Excel created a new Group 1 object in the Selection task pane that consists of SONY Windows Smartphone and Microsoft Surface Table. After grouping the two graphics, not only will the tablet move whenever I reposition the phone, but they would also both resize when I modify any of the sizing handles, and it would rotate together if I were to manipulate the grouped graphics’ rotation handle.
Figure 2-4: Grouping the SONY smartphone and Microsoft Surface tablet images to turn them into a single graphic object.
Managing graphic objects in the Selection task pane
As previously discussed in the “Moving graphic objects to new layers” section earlier in this chapter, the Selection task pane that you display by clicking the Selection Pane button on the Format tab of the Chart, Drawing, or Picture Tools contextual tab on the Ribbon makes it easy to move graphic objects that overlap one another in some manner to different layers in the stack.
When dealing with a SmartArt graphic, you have to click the Arrange button on the Format tab of the SmartArt Tools contextual tab on the Ribbon to get access to the Selection Pane command button.
In addition to rearranging graphic objects on different layers, you can use this task pane to select particular graphic objects for editing or formatting as well as to temporarily hide their display in the worksheet:
· To select a graphic object in the worksheet, click its name in the list in the Selection task pane — to select multiple graphics, press Ctrl as you click their names in the list.
· To hide a particular graphic object in the worksheet, click the eye icon after its name (to close the eye), and to redisplay it, click this eye icon a second time to reopen its eye.
· To hide all the graphic objects (including embedded charts) on the worksheet, click the Hide All button at the top of the task pane, and to redisplay them, click the Show All button.
Click the graphic object’s name in the Selection task pane to select it for editing or formatting whenever the object is difficult to select directly in the worksheet by clicking its shape or image, which is often the case when the object’s part of a stack of graphics. If you want to rename the graphic from the generic name Excel gives it (Right Arrow 1, Right Arrow 2, and so forth), click the name in the Selection task pane and then edit or replace it in the text box that then appears. When you finish editing the graphic’s name, click outside the text box to apply the new name.
Inserting Different Types of Graphics
Excel makes it easy for you to insert five different types of graphic images into your worksheets using the options on the Illustrations button’s menu on the Insert tab:
· Pictures to import photos and other types of digital artwork saved locally on your computer, often in the Pictures library
· Online Pictures to download and insert photos and other types of graphic images saved online — these online images include clip art saved on the Office.com website, web images that you locate using the Bing search engine, or images that you’ve saved in the cloud on your OneDrive
· Shapes to draw predefined and free-form graphic shapes using any of the shape thumbnails displayed on the drop-down gallery attached to the Shapes option
· SmartArt to generate complex graphical lists and relationship charts (like organizational charts) using the gallery opened by selecting the SmartArt option
· Screenshot to take a snapshot of all or part of your Windows desktop and insert it as a graphic object in your worksheet
Inserting online images
Excel 2016 makes its easy to download pictures from the web using the Bing Image search engine and insert them into your worksheets. To download an image with Bing Image Search, open the Insert Pictures dialog box (Alt+NF) and then select the Search Bing text box, where you type the keyword for the types of images you want to locate. After you press Enter or click the Search button (with the magnifying glass icon), the Insert Pictures dialog box displays a scrollable list of thumbnails for images matching your keyword. (See Figure 2-5.) You can then click a thumbnail in the list to display a short description plus the size (in pixels) of the image in the lower-left corner of the Insert Pictures dialog box.
Figure 2-5: Selecting a web image to download into your worksheet.
Below the top row of thumbnail images, the Insert Pictures dialog box also displays a disclaimer informing you that the online images that Bing has returned in the search use what’s called Creative Commons. This licensing grants free distribution of what is otherwise copyrighted material under certain conditions (often noncommercial or educational use). The disclaimer then goes on to urge you to review the license for any image you insert into your worksheet so that you may be certain that you are in compliance with these conditions (always a good idea). After reading this disclaimer, you can close its text box by clicking its Close button with the x in it.
When you click one of the displayed thumbnail images, a short description plus the size (in pixels) for that image is displayed in the lower-left corner of the Insert Pictures dialog box along with a hyperlink to the source website (which you can click to visit this site to review the free use conditions of its Creative Commons license).
To get a better view of a particular image whose thumbnail is highlighted or selected in the list, click the View Larger button that appears in the thumbnail’s lower-right corner (with the magnifying glass with a plus sign in its icon). Excel then displays a slightly larger version of the thumbnail in the center of the dialog box while at the same time blurring out all the other thumbnails in the background.
To insert one of the located web images into the current worksheet, double-click its thumbnail if it’s not already selected in the list. If the thumbnail is selected, you can insert the image by selecting the Insert button or by pressing Enter.
If you use a social media site such as Facebook or the photo-sharing site Flickr on your Windows device, you can add these locations as options to your Insert Pictures dialog box (shown in Figure 2-5). Simply select the app’s icon that appears at the bottom of the Insert Pictures dialog box to connect Office with the particular app. You can then insert images from one of these sites after selecting its option in the Insert Pictures dialog box. You can also download pictures saved in folders on your OneDrive by clicking the Browse button to the right of the OneDrive heading at the bottom of the Insert Pictures dialog box.
Inserting local pictures
If you want to bring in an image such as a digital photo or a scanned image saved locally on your computer in one of its local or network drives, choose the Pictures option from the Illustrations button’s drop-down menu on the Ribbon’s Insert tab or just press Alt+NP. Just be aware that even though Excel does compress pictures by default, depending upon the size of the photo or digital image, inserting such a graphic can dramatically increase the size of your Excel workbook file.
This opens the Insert Picture dialog box similar to the one shown in Figure 2-6. Selecting a graphics file to insert into your worksheet in this dialog box works very much like selecting an Excel workbook file to open in the Open dialog box: Select the drive and folder containing the graphics file in the Navigation pane on the left. Next, select the file to insert by clicking the thumbnail of graphics image before clicking the Insert button to open it and insert its image into your open worksheet.
Figure 2-6: Selecting a local image to insert into your worksheet.
If you want to bring in a graphic image created in another graphics program that’s not saved in its own file, you select the graphic in that program and then copy it to the Clipboard. (Press Ctrl+C.) When you get back to your worksheet, place the cursor where you want the picture to go and then paste the image in place. (Press Ctrl+V or click the Paste command button at the very beginning of the Home tab.)
When you insert a picture from a graphics file into the worksheet, it’s automatically selected (indicated by the sizing handles around its perimeter and its rotation handle at the top). To deselect the graphic image and set it in the worksheet, click anywhere in the worksheet outside of the image.
Editing pictures
As long as a photo or other graphics image is selected in your worksheet (indicated by the sizing handles around its perimeter and a rotation handle at the top), you can make any of the following editing changes to it:
· Move the selected image to a new location in the chart by dragging it.
· Resize the selected image by dragging the appropriate sizing handle.
· Rotate the selected image by dragging its rotation handle (the green circle at the top) in a clockwise or counterclockwise direction.
· Delete the selected image by pressing the Delete key.
Formatting pictures
When an inserted graphics image is selected, Excel adds the Picture Tools contextual tab to the Ribbon and automatically selects its sole Format tab.
The Format tab’s command buttons are arranged into five groups: Adjust, Picture Styles, Background Removal, Arrange, and Size. The Adjust group contains the following important command buttons:
· Remove Background to remove the background from the selected clip art image.
· Corrections to increase or decrease the picture’s sharpness or brightness and contrast by selecting a new preset thumbnail image or by clicking Picture Corrections Options to open the Format Picture dialog box, where you can adjust these settings with its Sharpen and Soften or Brightness and Contrast sliders.
· Color to open a drop-down menu, where you can select a new color thumbnail for the image or select a transparent color that drops out of the picture.
· Artistic Effects to apply a special effect filter to the image by selecting one of the preset thumbnail images or by clicking Artistic Effects Options to open the Artistic Effects tab of the Format Picture dialog box, where you can select another filter to apply or reset the image by removing all previously applied filters.
· Compress Pictures to open the Compress Pictures dialog box, where you can compress all images in the worksheet or just the selected graphic image to make them more compact and thus make the Excel workbook somewhat smaller when you save the images as part of its file.
· Change Picture to open the Insert Picture dialog box, where you can select an image in a new graphics file to replace the picture. When replacing the currently selected picture with the new image, Excel automatically sizes and formats the new image with the settings applied to the old.
· Reset Picture button to remove all formatting changes made and return the picture to the state it was in when you originally inserted it into the worksheet.
You can also format a picture by opening the Format Picture task pane opened by right-clicking the image and then choosing Format Picture from its shortcut menu. Then, click the appropriate button — Fill & Line, Effects, Size & Properties, or Picture — to access the appropriate formatting options.
You can also use the command buttons in the Picture Styles group to format the selected graphic image. Click a thumbnail on the Picture Styles drop-down gallery to select a new orientation and style for the selected picture or select a new border shape on the Picture Shape button’s drop-down palette, a new border color on the Picture Border button’s drop-down color palette, or a new shadow or 3-D rotation effect from the Picture Effects button’s drop-down menu.
Figure 2-7 shows an imported photo I took of my partner at a Winning For Dummies slot machine as the image is being formatted in Live Preview with Double Frame, Black on the Picture Styles drop-down gallery. Note that in this style, Excel places the image in an inner light black frame surrounded by a much heavier outer frame.
Figure 2-7: Live Preview in the Picture Styles gallery enables you to see how a style affects your picture before you apply it.
Keep in mind that you can remove a uniform background in a selected picture by clicking the Remove Background button in the Format tab’s Adjust group. Excel then adds a Background Removal contextual tab to the Ribbon and applies a violet filter to the identified background of the selected picture. You can then adjust the violet filter to indicate the extent of the image background to be removed. Then, you click the Keep Changes button on the Background Removal contextual tab to close it and to remove the image’s background.
Drawing Graphics
The Shapes gallery along with the SmartArt, Text Box, and WordArt command buttons found on the Illustrations menu on the Ribbon’s Insert tab enable you to draw a wide variety of graphic objects. Some of these graphic objects, including the callout graphics on the Shapes gallery and all the SmartArt, Text Box, and WordArt graphics, enable you to combine text and graphics.
Drawing predefined shapes
The Shapes gallery, opened by clicking the Shapes command button in the Illustrations group on the Ribbon’s Insert tab (Alt+NSH), contains a wide variety of predefined shapes that you can draw in your worksheet simply by dragging the mouse pointer.
When you open the Shapes gallery, you see that the gallery is divided into nine sections: Recently Used Shapes, Lines, Rectangles, Basic Shapes, Block Arrows, Equation Shapes, Flowchart, Stars and Banners, and Callouts.
After you click the thumbnail of one of the preset shapes in this drop-down gallery, the pointer becomes a crosshair, and you use it to draw the graphic by dragging it until it’s approximately the size you want.
After you release the mouse button or remove your finger or stylus from the touchscreen, the shape you’ve drawn in the worksheet is still selected. This is indicated by the sizing handles around its perimeter and the rotation handle at the top, which you can use to reposition and resize it, if need be. In addition, the program activates the Format tab on the Drawing Tools contextual tab, and you can use the Shape Styles gallery or other command buttons to further format the shape until it’s exactly the way you want it. To set the shape and remove the sizing and rotation handles, click anywhere in the worksheet outside of the shape.
When drawing a rectangle or an oval, you can constrain the tool to draw a square or circle by holding down the Shift key as you drag the mouse. Note that when drawing a two-dimensional shape, such as a rectangle, square, oval, or circle, Excel automatically draws the shape with a blue fill that obscures any data or graphic objects that are beneath the shape on layers below.
In addition to drawing your own basic shapes, lines, and arrows from the gallery, you can draw block arrows, equation symbols, flow chart symbols, banners, and callouts by selecting them from their respective areas on the Shapes gallery. Note that, when you draw one of the callouts, Excel positions the insertion point within the selected callout shape, thus enabling you to then enter the text of the callout. After you finish entering the text, click somewhere outside the shape to deselect the callout. (See the “Adding text boxes” section that follows for information on how to edit and format the callout text.)
Adding text boxes
Text boxes are special graphic objects that combine text with a rectangular graphic object. They’re great for calling attention to significant trends or special features in the charts that you create. (See Book V, Chapter 1, for details.)
To create a text box, click the Text Box command button in the Text group on the Ribbon’s Insert tab (or press Alt+NSH followed by Enter). Your pointer’s cursor then appears as a thin vertical line with a short horizontal line crossing near the bottom. You can then drag this pointer to draw the outline of the new text box. As soon as you release the mouse button or remove your finger or stylus from the touchscreen, Excel draws the text box and places the standard insertion point in the upper-left corner of the box.
You can then start typing the text that you want displayed in the text box. When the text that you type reaches the right edge of the text box, Excel automatically starts a new line. If you reach the end of the text box and keep typing, Excel then scrolls the text up, and you then have to resize the text box to display all the text that you’ve entered. If you want to break a line before it reaches the right edge of the text box, press the Enter key. When you finish entering the text, click anywhere on the screen outside the text box to deselect it.
Keep in mind that although text boxes are similar to cell Comments in that they also display the text that you enter in a rectangular box, they do differ from Comments in that text boxes are not attached to particular cells and are always displayed in the worksheet. (Comments show only when you position the mouse pointer over the cell or select the comment with the Reviewing toolbar — see Book IV, Chapter 3, for details.)
Note that text boxes differ somewhat from other graphic objects that you add to the worksheet. Unlike other graphic objects in Excel, text boxes display two different border patterns when you select them: A dotted-line pattern is displayed when you click inside the text box, thus enabling you to format and edit the text, and a solid-line pattern is displayed when you click the border of the text box or start dragging the box to reposition it, thus indicating that you can format and edit the box itself.
Formatting a text box
After you’ve added a text box, you can format its text by changing the font, font size, font style, and alignment of the text (including its orientation); you can also format the text box by changing its background color and line style, object positioning properties, and — perhaps most important of all — its text margins.
To change the formatting of all the text entered in a text box, click its TextBox name in the Selection task pane or click its graphic object in the worksheet until the solid outline appears around the box, and then click the appropriate command buttons in the Font and Alignment groups on the Ribbon’s Home tab. Choose from the following options:
· Font or Font Size drop-down list buttons and the Increase Font Size and Decrease Font Size command buttons to change the font or font size of the text. Use Live Preview to see how the new font and font size looks in the text box.
· Bold, Italic, or Underline command buttons to add these attributes to the text in the text box.
· Font Color drop-down list button to apply a new color to the text in the text box.
· Align Text Left, Center, or Align Text Right command buttons to change the horizontal alignment of the text in regard to the left and right edges of the text box.
· Top Align, Middle Align, or Bottom Align command buttons to change the vertical alignment of the text in regard to the top and bottom edges of the text box.
· Increase Indent or Decrease Indent command buttons to indent text within the box’s borders or remove previous indenting.
· Orientation command button to modify the orientation of the text in the text box by selecting the Vertical Text, Rotate Text Up, or the Rotate Text Down option.
To change the formatting of some of the text in a text box, click the insertion point in the text box and select the text before you use one of these command buttons to modify its appearance.
To change the formatting of the text box itself, click its TextBox name in the Selection task pane (opened by clicking the Selection Pane button on the Drawing Tools Format tab) or click its graphic object in the worksheet until the solid outline appears around the box, then click the Drawing Tools Format tab on the Ribbon, and then choose among the following formatting options:
· Edit Shape drop-down list button (the one with the dots around the graphic object in the Insert Shapes group) to change the text box shape or edit the wrap points
· Shape Styles gallery to select a new outline, fill, and text color all at one time by clicking one of the gallery’s thumbnails (after using Live Preview to see how the new color scheme looks)
· Shape Fill drop-down list button to select a new color, gradient, picture, or texture for the text box fill or to remove any existing fill (by selecting the No Fill option)
· Shape Outline drop-down list button to select a new color, line weight, or line style for the outline of the text box or to remove its outline (by selecting the No Outline option)
· Shape Effects drop-down list button to select a new special effect such as a shadow, glow, or other 3-D effect using the options and palettes available from its drop-down menu
· WordArt Styles drop-down palette to apply a new WordArt style for the text in the text box by clicking one of the gallery’s thumbnails (after using Live Preview to see how the new WordArt text style looks)
· Text Fill drop-down list button (the one with the A with a line drawn under it) to select a new fill color, gradient, picture, or texture for the text in the text box or to remove any existing fill color (by selecting the No Fill option)
· Text Outline drop-down list button (the one with the pencil added to the A with the line drawn under it) to select a new color, line weight, or line style for the text in the text box or to remove its current outline (by selecting the No Outline option)
· Text Effects drop-down list button to select a new special effect such as a shadow, glow, or other 3-D effect for the text in the text box using the options and palettes available from its drop-down menu
When you first enter the text in a text box, Excel sets pretty scanty internal margins so that there’s not a lot of white space between the text characters and the edge of the text box. If you’re anything like me, one of the first things that you’ll want to do is add decent margins to the text box.
To do this, open the Format Shape dialog box while the text box is selected by right-clicking the text box and then choosing Format Shape from its shortcut menu. Then, click the Text Options tab followed by the TextBox button (the one third to the right under the Shape Options | Text Options labels) and enter the new values (in fractions of an inch) that you want to use in the Top Margin, Bottom Margin, Left Margin, and Right Margin text boxes. Also, select the Resize Shape to Fit Text check box to put a check mark in it if you want Excel to automatically resize the text box to suit any formatting changes you make to its text (such as increasing the font size, adding bold, or selecting a new text alignment).
Editing the text in a text box
You can edit the text in a text box as you would in any cell of the worksheet. To insert new text, click the insertion point at the appropriate place and start typing. To delete text, press the Backspace key to delete characters to the left of the insertion point or the Delete key to delete characters to its right. To delete an entire section of text, select it with the I-beam mouse pointer and then press the Delete key.
To spell check some or all of the text in the text box, select the text by dragging the I-beam mouse or Touch pointer through it and then click the Spelling button on the Review tab of the Ribbon (or just press F7).
To delete a text box from the worksheet, click its border to select the box (indicated by the solid as opposed to dotted outline) and then press the Delete key. Be sure that you don’t click inside the box because this selects only the text (indicated by the dotted outline), in which case, pressing the Delete key doesn’t get rid of anything but characters of text at the cursor’s position.
Adding an arrow to a text box
When creating a text box, you may want to add an arrow to point directly to another graphic object or to the part of an embedded chart to which you’re referencing. To add an arrow, follow these steps:
1. Click the text box to which you want to attach the arrow in the chart or worksheet to select it.
Sizing handles appear around the text box, and the Format tab on the Drawing Tools contextual tab is selected on the Ribbon.
2. Click the Arrow command button in the Insert Shapes drop-down gallery at the very beginning of the Format tab.
The Arrow command button is the second from the left in the Lines section of Shapes gallery (with the picture of an arrow). When you click this button, it becomes selected in the gallery palette (indicated by the button’s green shading) and the mouse or Touch pointer assumes the crosshair shape.
3. Drag the crosshair pointer from the place on the text box where the end of the arrow (the one without the arrowhead) is to appear to the place where the arrow starts (and the arrowhead will appear) and release the mouse button.
As soon as you release the mouse button or remove your finger or stylus from the touchscreen, Excel draws two points, one at the base of the arrow (attached to the text box) and another at the arrowhead. At the same time, the contents of the Shape Styles drop-down gallery changes to line styles.
4. Click the More button in the lower-right corner of the Shapes Styles drop-down gallery to display the thumbnails of all its line styles and then highlight individual thumbnails to see how the arrow would look in each.
As you highlight the different line styles in this gallery, Excel draws the arrow between the two selected points in the text box using the highlighted style.
5. Click the thumbnail of the line style you want the new arrow to use in the Shape Styles gallery.
Excel then draws a new arrow using the selected shape style, which remains selected (with sizing handles at the beginning and end of the arrow). You can then edit the arrow as follows:
· Move the arrow by dragging its outline into position.
· Change the length of the arrow by dragging the sizing handle at the arrowhead.
· Change the direction of the arrow by pivoting the mouse or Touch pointer around a stationary selection handle.
· Change the shape of the arrowhead or the thickness of the arrow’s shaft by clicking a thumbnail on the Shape Styles drop-down gallery or clicking a new option on the Shape Fill, Shape Outline, and Shape Effects button on the Format tab of the Drawing Tools contextual tab. Alternatively, open the Format Shape task pane (Ctrl+1) and then select the appropriate options after selecting the Fill & Line, Effects, Size & Properties, or Picture button.
· Delete the arrow by pressing the Delete key.
Inserting WordArt
The WordArt gallery, opened by clicking the WordArt command button in the Text group of the Insert tab of the Ribbon, makes it a snap to add really artsy text to the worksheet. The only thing to keep in mind when adding WordArt is that, just as its name implies, this text is really a graphic (art) object that behaves just like any other Excel graphic object although it contains only text!
You can easily add this type of “graphic” text to your worksheet by following these steps:
1. Click the WordArt command button on the Insert tab of the Ribbon or press Alt+NW.
Excel displays the WordArt drop-down gallery, as shown in Figure 2-8.
2. Click the A thumbnail in the WordArt style you want to use in the WordArt drop-down gallery.
Excel inserts a selected text box containing Your Text Here in the center of the worksheet with this text in the WordArt style you selected in the gallery.
3. Type the text you want to display in the worksheet in the Text text box.
As soon as you start typing, Excel replaces the Your Text Here text in the selected text box with the characters you enter.
4. (Optional) To format the background of the text box, use Live Preview in the Shape Styles drop-down gallery on the Format tab to find the style to use and then set it by clicking its thumbnail.
The Format tab on the Drawing Tools contextual tab is automatically added and activated whenever WordArt text is selected in the worksheet.
5. After making any final adjustments to the size, shape, or orientation of the WordArt text with the sizing and rotation handles, click a cell somewhere outside of the text to deselect the graphic.
Note that Excel automatically compresses the text to fill the shape and size of its text box. To put more space between the words and the characters in each word, make the text box wider by dragging the sizing handle on either side of the text box.
Figure 2-8: Selecting the text style for the new WordArt text from its drop-down gallery.
When you click outside of the WordArt text, Excel deselects the graphic, and the Drawing Tools contextual tab disappears from the Ribbon. (If you ever want this tab to reappear, all you have to do is click somewhere on the WordArt text to select the graphic.)
Figure 2-9 shows the WordArt label for the web image of the new Microsoft Surface 3 tablet after creating the text in the WordArt style called Fill - Blue, Accent 1, Outline - Background 1, Hard Shadow - Accent 1 in the WordArt gallery, and then formatting the text box with the style called Subtle Effect - Blue, Accent 1, selected in the Shape Styles gallery on the Format tab.
Figure 2-9: Formatted WordArt graphic added as a label for a downloaded photo and text box drawn with arrow.
Inserting SmartArt graphics
SmartArt graphics give you the ability to quickly and easily construct fancy graphical lists and diagrams in your worksheet. SmartArt lists and diagrams come in a wide array of configurations that include a variety of organizational charts and flow diagrams that enable you to add your own text to predefined graphic shapes.
To insert a SmartArt list or diagram into the worksheet, click the Insert a SmartArt Graphic command button in the Illustrations group on the Ribbon’s Insert tab (or press Alt+NM). Excel then opens the Choose a SmartArt Graphic dialog box (shown in Figure 2-10), where you select a category in the navigation pane on the left followed by the list’s or diagram’s thumbnail in the center section before you click OK.
Figure 2-10: Select the SmartArt list or diagram to insert in the worksheet in this dialog box.
Excel then inserts the basic structure of the list or diagram into your worksheet along with a text pane (with “Type Your Text Here” on its title bar) containing a text outline to its immediate left. Here’s where you enter the text for the various parts of the list or diagram (as shown in Figure 2-11). At the same time, the Design tab of the SmartArt Tools contextual tab appears on the Ribbon with Layouts and SmartArt Styles galleries for the particular type of SmartArt list or diagram you originally selected.
Figure 2-11: Adding text for a new organizational chart in the SmartArt text pane.
Filling in the text for a new SmartArt graphic
To fill in the text for the first section of the new list or diagram in the outline in the text pane that already contains the insertion point, simply type in the text. Then, press the ↓ key or click the next list or diagram section to set the insertion point there.
Don’t press the Tab key or the Enter key to complete a text entry in the list or diagram as you naturally do in the regular worksheet. In a SmartArt list or diagram, you press the Enter key when you want to insert a new section of the list or diagram (at the same level in hierarchical diagrams such as an org chart), and pressing Tab either indents the level of the current section on the outline (in hierarchical diagrams), or it does nothing except beep at you.
When you finish entering the text for your new diagram, click the close button (with an X) in the upper-left corner of the text pane (you can always reopen the text pane if you need to edit any of the diagram’s text by clicking the button that appears in the middle of the left side of the selected list or diagram after you close the text pane).
If the style of the SmartArt list or diagram you select comes with more sections than you need, you can delete the unused graphics by clicking them to select them (indicated by the selection and rotation handles around it) and then pressing the Delete key.
Formatting a SmartArt graphic
After you close the text pane attached to your SmartArt list or diagram, you can still format its text and graphics. To format the text, select all the graphic objects in the SmartArt list or diagram that need the same type of text formatting — remember you can select several objects in the list or diagram by holding down Ctrl as you click them — and then clicking the appropriate command buttons in the Font group on the Home tab of the Ribbon.
To refine or change the default formatting of the graphics in a SmartArt list or diagram, you can use the Layouts, Change Colors, and SmartArt Styles drop-down galleries available on the Design tab of the SmartArt Tools contextual tab:
· Click the More button in the Layouts group and then click a thumbnail on the Layouts drop-down gallery to select an entirely new layout for your SmartArt list or diagram.
· Click the Change Colors button in the SmartArt Styles group and then click a thumbnail in the drop-down Theme Colors gallery to change the color scheme for the current layout.
· Click the More button in the SmartArt Styles group and then click a thumbnail on the SmartArt Styles drop-down gallery to select a new style for the current layout, using the selected color scheme.
Adding Screenshots of the Windows Desktop
The Take a Screenshot command button in the Illustrations group of the Insert tab enables you to capture Windows desktop graphics and insert them directly into your worksheet. Before clicking this button, you need to open up the other application window whose document you want to capture as an Excel graphic object or set up the Windows desktop icons that you want to capture.
Then, switch back to the Excel 2016 program window and click the Take a Screenshot button on the Insert tab or press Alt+NSC. Excel then opens a Screenshot drop-down menu similar to the one shown in Figure 2-12.
Figure 2-12: Inserting a Windows screenshot of an open Word 2016 program window into your worksheet.
If you have application windows open on the desktop, a thumbnail of each window appears on this Screenshot drop-down menu under the heading Available Screen Shots. To capture one of the open window’s information as a graphic object in the current Excel worksheet, you simply click its thumbnail on this drop-down menu and Excel adds the window as a selected graphic in your sheet.
If you don’t want to capture any of the discrete application windows as graphics, you can use the Screen Clipping option that appears at the bottom of the Screenshot drop-down menu to select the section of the desktop to capture as a graphic. When you click the Screen Clipping option, Windows minimizes the Excel application window and displays the desktop with all of its windows and icons displayed but in a gauzy, hazy transparent mode. You then drag the black-cross pointer to select the section of the desktop you want captured as a worksheet graphic object. (As you drag, Windows removes the gauzy effect from the area you select.) When you release the mouse button, Windows immediately reopens the Excel program window with the section of the desktop added as a selected worksheet graphic.
Using Themes
With themes, Excel 2016 enables you to uniformly format all the graphics that you add to a worksheet. You can select a new theme for the active worksheet simply by clicking the thumbnail of the theme you want to use in the Themes drop-down gallery opened by clicking the Themes command button on the Ribbon’s Page Layout tab (or by pressing Alt+PTH).
Use Live Preview to see how the graphics you’ve added to your worksheet appear in the new theme before you click its thumbnail.
Excel Themes combines three default elements: the color scheme applied to the graphics, the font (body and heading) used in the graphics, and the graphic effects applied. If you prefer, you can change any or all of these three elements in the worksheet by clicking their individual command buttons in the Themes group at the start of the Page Layout tab:
· Colors to select a new color scheme by clicking its thumbnail of its color swatches on the drop-down palette. Click Customize Colors at the bottom of this palette to open the Create New Theme Colors dialog box where you can customize each element of the color scheme and save it with a new descriptive name.
· Fonts to select a new font by clicking its thumbnail on the drop-down list. Click Customize Fonts at the bottom of this list to open the Create New Theme Fonts dialog box, where you can customize the heading and body fonts for both Latin and East Asian text and save it with a new descriptive name.
· Effects to select a new set of graphics effects by clicking its thumbnail in the drop-down gallery.
To save your newly selected color scheme, font, and graphic effects as a custom theme that you can reuse in other workbooks, click the Themes command button and then click Save Current Theme at the bottom of the gallery to open the Save Current Theme dialog box. Edit the generic Theme1 name in the File Name text box (without deleting the .thmx filename extension) and then click the Save button. Excel then adds the custom theme to a Custom Themes section in the Themes drop-down gallery that you can apply to any active worksheet simply by clicking its thumbnail.