Add Patterns to Pie Charts

[Debbie_McDonald@adobeforums.com]

Aaaahhhaaha can I vent. (I'm mostly done).

I'm trying to bring in some excel charts into Indesign.

I've read to turn them into .pdf's. Or copy/paste them into illustrator and change to spot colors from there(which I opted for and is working fairly well if I only use solid colors). It is a little cumbersome having to go back and forth between stroke and fill ....each and every time... would love to know the shortcut key for fill. But got that to work.

My problem: I can only use one spot color and they have a pie chart with 9 slices... so I am trying to use patterns. The patterns do not fill the entire section. I have to recolor each and every teeny tiny stroke of a pattern to get it the right color. I have to make my own basic chart patterns... Basically I can't get it to work.

I've used photoshop for years but am brand new (2 days) to illustrator. Thought my photoshop exp. might give me an edge but am finding out...not so much.

I read the patterns and fills section of the documentation and well, I'm still having problems. Can anyone point me to a pattern tutorial that shows the average gal, that is under the gun how to use patterns in Illustrator.

Here's a wish: general shortcut keys are the same in photoshop, illustrator, indesign. For instance: ctrl+t to resize, ctrl+backspace to fill, etc...

I apologize for the negativity - mostly I LOVE ADOBE Products.

[Bob_Levine]

Just use tints. Besides, as someone who has done tons of charts, let me
suggest that you suggest to your client that the smallest five of those
slices be combined into one slice called "other." There's simply no way
a pie chart with ten slices is going to be effective.

Bob

[Stu_Bloom@adobeforums.com]

I feel your pain.

I also mostly love Adobe products and I mostly love Illustrator. What I love about Illustrator is the way it makes incredibly complex things incredibly simple to do. What I DON'T love about it is the way it makes incredibly simple things incredibly hard to do - and patterns is at the top of that list, along with arrowheads.

The other thing I don't love about it is the way the Illustrator team was allowed to go their own way on shortcut keys and ignore the more-or-less standard shortcuts the rest of the Adobe suite uses. Maybe someday I'll stop turning off the bounding boxes by trying to apply bold, but I doubt it.

Oh, but you wanted a solution to your problem <g>. In addition to tints, as Bob suggested, there are tons of patterns on Adobe Studio Exchange. Under Illustrator, choose "Swatches," then "Patterns and Textures." I've found everything I needed there and have thus been able to avoid learning how to create my own.

[Guy_Smiley@adobeforums.com]

[email]Stu_Bloom@adobeforums.com[/email] wrote in news:3bb53a22.1@webx.la2eafNXanI:

> arrowheads

InDesign's arrowhead functionality stinks, too.