[R-SIG-Mac] How to put nice R graphics into powerpoint

Thu Feb 10 19:04:21 CET 2005

Hi All,

My guess is the supported vector format is Windows enhanced meta file,
which R for Windows will produce. Unfortunately, Microsoft Office is the
one thing most of us can't get away from, try as we might. As a result,
an argument could be made to have a device for this format on the Mac
side if the Windows code could easily be ported.

Dan

On Thu, 2005-02-10 at 09:20, stefano iacus wrote:
> On Feb 10, 2005, at 6:10 PM, Denis Chabot wrote:
> 
> > Hi Stefano,
> >
> > Bitmaps is what I'd like to avoid.
> >
> > Preview seems to be using QuickTime for the translation from pdf to  
> > pict, and the result is bitmap. Too bad though.
> yes, but as Thomas pointed out png is not that bad even with LaTeX.  
> What kind of vectorial format does PowerPoint support (if any) ?
> 
> I'm not used to PowerPoint, but for example, with KeyNote (the apple  
> counterpart) you can use pdf graphics directly and you still have an  
> option to export the slides in PowerPoint.
> Could this be another solution?
> 
> stefano
> 
> >
> > Denis
> > Le Jeudi, 10 fÃ©vr 2005, Ã  18:05 Europe/Paris, stefano iacus a Ã©crit :
> >
> >> You can load the pdf file produce by R in the standard Previewer of  
> >> Mac OS X and export to (almost) whatever format you like including  
> >> bitmaps
> >>
> >>
> >> stefano
> >>
> >> On Feb 10, 2005, at 5:29 PM, Denis Chabot wrote:
> >>
> >>> Thank you Andrew and Thomas,
> >>>
> >>> I have used png produced by Illustrator in much the way you  
> >>> described and the results were not very good. I'll try again because  
> >>> I don't remember if I was given an option to chose the overall size  
> >>> in pixels. If I can, then I'll increase the count. Alternatively, on  
> >>> my iMac at home where R11 is installed, I'll resort to saving  
> >>> directly in png but increasing the pixel count, as suggested by  
> >>> Thomas.
> >>>
> >>> Still, if the information in the pdf produced by R is vector based  
> >>> (it is still perfectly sharp when viewed at 1600% in Acrobat), why  
> >>> can't I find a way to transform such pdf in vector-based pict? That  
> >>> format must be able to handle such plots. After all, I also make  
> >>> plots in KaleidaGraph, and they were very small vector-based pict  
> >>> files. They looked gorgeous in Powerpoint at any zoom setting. I  
> >>> also use Aabel which gives you the option of saving plots as pdf or  
> >>> pict. I chose the later when I need to insert in PowerPoint, and the  
> >>> former for LaTeX. Quality is good either way. Maybe I'll check if  
> >>> there is a "graphics" discussion on Apple's site. If I manage to  
> >>> learn something useful I'll report back.
> >>>
> >>> Denis
> >>> Le Jeudi, 10 fÃ©vr 2005, Ã  17:13 Europe/Paris, Andrew Beckerman a  
> >>> Ã©crit :
> >>>
> >>>> Denis - I use the following rather convoluted method with OS  
> >>>> 10.3.8, Illustrator CS, and R2.0.1.
> >>>>
> >>>> command-c copies a figure from the quartz window.  Open this file  
> >>>> in preview and export it as a pdf file (don't know why i do  
> >>>> this....).  use illustrator, and the command <place> from the file  
> >>>> menu to insert it in a new document.  Choose <save for microsoft  
> >>>> office> from the file menu in illustrator. this produces a png file  
> >>>> that plays nicely, cross platform, with Word and PP. variations  
> >>>> abound, but the goal is to get something presentable in illustrator  
> >>>> and use its save for office option.....
> >>>>
> >>>> I noticed that preview has a png choice from export, but I've not  
> >>>> yet played around with its options to see if I can get the same  
> >>>> quality that the save for Microsoft Office option produces in  
> >>>> Illustrator.
> >>>>
> >>>> Cheers
> >>>> andrew
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> On 10 Feb 2005, at 15:50, Denis Chabot wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>>> Hi,
> >>>>>
> >>>>> I really like the nice vector-based pdf graphics I get in R.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> However, PowerPoint seems to be unable to read them as vector  
> >>>>> graphics and rasterizes them, making them quite "fuzzy" and ugly.  
> >>>>> Granted, the problem lies with Microsoft, but in the mean time  
> >>>>> what is the best workaround? I'd like to do better than producing  
> >>>>> png from within R (especially that only my iMac has X11, my very  
> >>>>> old PowerBook does not).
> >>>>>
> >>>>> I am still able to show vector graphics in pict format in  
> >>>>> PowerPoint. So it should be possible to extract the vectorized  
> >>>>> plot from the pdf and save it as pict, still vectorized.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> However opening the R-produced pdf in Illustrator and saving as  
> >>>>> pict produces a file quite a bit bigger than the original pdf,  
> >>>>> suggesting it was saved as raster pict instead of vector pict. It  
> >>>>> shows up in Powerpoint just as ugly as if it was inserted directly  
> >>>>> as pdf. This is true with Illustrator CS (aka v11 I think) used  
> >>>>> either under 10.2.8 or 10.3.7. It is also true when using  
> >>>>> GraphicConverter 5 and Preview (Jaguar's version, I think it is  
> >>>>> also true with the Panther version) to go from pdf to pict.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> I fired up Canvas (old, version 8) and it did manage to save  
> >>>>> something that was vectorized (i.e. very sharp when viewing at  
> >>>>> 400% in PowerPoint) but the empty circles I used as symbols were  
> >>>>> not filled blacks, the dashes of dashed lines had become "wiggly",  
> >>>>> text orientation was unacceptably changed, etc. etc.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> So does anyone know of a technique to produce vector graphics that  
> >>>>> insert nicely in PowerPoint, either directly from R or by  
> >>>>> converting a pdf produced by R into something else?
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Sincerely,
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Denis Chabot
> >>>>>
> >>>>> _______________________________________________
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> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>> -------------------------------------------------------------------- 
> >>>> -------------
> >>>> Dr. Andrew Beckerman
> >>>> Department of Animal and Plant Sciences, University of Sheffield,
> >>>> Alfred Denny Building, Western Bank, Sheffield S10 2TN, UK
> >>>> ph +44 (0)114 222 0026; fx +44 (0)114 222 0002
> >>>> http://www.shef.ac.uk/beckslab
> >>>> -------------------------------------------------------------------- 
> >>>> --------------
> >>>>
> >>>
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> >>
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