Conversion of Illustrator Mac file to MS Word file in PC

[Lucille_Reilly@adobeforums.com]

I hope someone can give me instructions on how to do this.

I was at Kinko's today, drawing an illustration on the Mac version of Illustrator (oh my, don't ask which one; I know the system is Mac OS9.2). The tech guy then converted it to an EPS file and dumped it in a WinWord file (I have a PC, and Kinko's only has Illustrator for Mac).

I brought the file home, opened the Word doc just fine, EXCEPT: the drawing looks like a camera negative, while on black, instead of black on white! (I printed the drawing at Kinko's before finalizing the file and it was black on white.)

I have tried grabbing the drawing from Insert\Picture and Insert\Object, both to no avail. The first option gave me merely a box with some text in it--no drawing.

The only things I can come up with as to why this happened (but I really don't know:

1. The tech guy formatted it in Word to be a background picture (not needed).
2. I use Word 2000 (and Win98), and maybe the version at Kinko's is a later version.
3. Is there some kind of feature on Illustrator that produces a reverse-white option that you can't see until you try something like this?

I've not yet gone back to the tech guy with the file (what I've told him on the phone has left him stumped)--thought it best to ask here if anyone knows how to resolve it. This drawing is the ONLY thing keeping me from taking a book to the printer.

Thanks in advance for any ideas.

[Scott_Falkner@adobeforums.com]

The closest I've been to satisfied with Microsft Worst's import of Illustrator artwork is a rendered TIFF.

[lindsay_auchinachie@adobeforums.com]

I just figured out how to do this my self. But, this might be different because I am using OSX and Illustrator CS. When you save your file in Illustrator under the File menu there should be an option to Save For Miscrosoft Office. This makes the file a .png that can be read by Microsoft Office.
If you can't find the save For Microsoft option try a save as, and change the file extention (usually in Illusrator .ai) to .png extention and see if that works. Then import it into word.

Next time you want to layout a book you should use Adobe In Design or Quark Express (they have both at Kinko's) its much easier to insert pictures, Illustrations etc. Word is is a terrible program for laying out anything.

Good luck I hope this helps!