This is just a quick post to other designers who upon completion of a website are asked to provide other materials for their clients, and in this case – a letterhead template in Word.

In the past I have noticed taking logo and other line-art elements from Illustrator into Word creates ugly images when the final Word doc is sent to PDF (e.g., bit-mappy and rough).  So, I decided to go with the Windows Metafile.  I exported my artwork from Illustrator, set up the Template and even tested it in 2007 and 2003 Word.  It was looking fab.

Then I sent it to the client.

I got this weird email back about the address text not fitting in the line art.  I was surprised as this text was created IN Illustrator and formed part of the Windows Metafile image. 

See screen cap left from a scan.

<— Not right at all!

So the lesson: Apparently in some versions of Word, the Windows Metafile actually retains the type and line art elements so if the end user doesn't have the font you used, they get some weird results.

The answer: convert your line art text to outlines before you export to Metafile.  The Word document file size stays nice and low using the metafile and the artwork in PDF format stays crisp but you need to make sure there are no text elements in the illustration before you export!

<— How it should look

This month in Documentopia-land has been one of the busiest to date.  We just hope this doesn’t mean that next month we’ll be twiddling our thumbs!!

Well yesterday amid the turmoil of the day, we launched a cool, fresh website for a new start-up in the UK: Move4Ward.  The owner, Zoe, is a professional coach who helps teams and individuals through changing times in their life with critical and challenging coaching. 

We provided a website in a short timeframe to help Move4Ward quickly develop their online presence, as well as logo design, business cards and letterhead.