Description of the new Recolor feature in 2007 Office programs

The 2007 Microsoft Office programs have a new way to recolor pictures and clip art with the new Recolor feature.

The Recolor feature replaces the older Recolor Picture feature that was available only in Microsoft PowerPoint. The new Recolor feature is available in the three primary 2007 Office programs. The new Recolor feature offers new features and capabilities.

In earlier versions of Microsoft Office, the Recolor Picture feature was available only in Microsoft PowerPoint. The Recolor Picture feature could be used only on vector-based graphics. The feature let you recolor every available color in the graphic. However, you could not use the feature on bitmap or raster graphics, such as JPEG or PNG picture formats.

The new Recolor feature is now available in Microsoft Office Excel 2007 and Microsoft Office Word 2007, in addition to Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007. The Recolor feature lets you recolor all kinds of graphics and vector and bitmap formats. Additionally, the feature offers more choices for the recoloring style.

However, the Recolor feature does not let you change individual colors in vector graphics, as the older Recolor Picture feature did. The Recolor feature changes the overall shade of the image by tinting the image a different color. Additionally, when you open a file from an earlier version of Office, the graphic is "flattened" and the recoloring is made permanent if the file contains a recolored vector graphic.

By using the Recolor feature, you can perform the following tasks:

• Recolor a picture to grayscale
• Recolor a picture with a sepia tone
• Lighten the picture and change it to a watermark-style graphic
• Recolor a picture to a high-contrast black-and-white picture
• Recolor a picture by using one of seven "Dark Variations" tints
• Recolor a picture by using one of seven "Light Variations" tints
• Recolor a picture by using a custom color of your choice
• Use the "Set Transparent" tool to select a color to be made transparent in a picture

To use the Recolor feature, follow these steps:

1. Click the picture that you want to recolor.
2. Under Picture Tools, click the Format tab.
3. In the Adjust group, click Recolor.
4. Move the pointer over the Recolor selections to preview the selection on the picture.
5. Click the Recolor selection to apply that selection to the picture.