modifying charts/graphs in excel

[patti]

I'm new to excel and was wondering if its possible to customize and modify
the charts that are available in Excel throught the chart wizard? i.e, can i use
different colors than what is displayed or do i have to stick with the colors
that have been pre-defined?
is there an option to use graphics to represent values rather than the bars
(as in adobe illustrator)
can other graphics be used to make the charts more designer-ly?
thanks!

 

[Jim Gordon MVP]

Hi Patti,

Every single component of a graph can be formatted to your liking.

In general, single click the line, wall, axis, or whatever to select it,
then either double-click or control-click it to bring up the formatting
dialog box.

If it is the kind of thing that can have a picture (not a line, but say
a wall or a bar in a bar graph) you can use a pictures by choosing Fill
Color in the formatting dialog box. At the bottom there's Fill Effects.
Choose that and go to the Picture tab. From there you can navigate to
any picture on your hard drive. You can select one column at a time or
all of the columns in a series and format them at once. You have
complete flexibility.

Excel MVP Jon Peltier has tutorials and lots of helpful graphing
information here:
<http://peltiertech.com/Excel/Charts/index.html>

-Jim