This will change the colors of individual shapes within your SmartArt graphic, as shown in Figure 10.Alternatively, you may select the “Alt Text” option found in the “Accessibility” group of the object’s “Format” tab. Within the Colors drop-down gallery, choose the color thumbnail preview of your choice and click on it to apply to the SmartArt.This opens the Colors drop-down gallery, as shown in Figure 9. Click the SmartArt tab of the Ribbon and click the Colors button, as shown highlighted in red with Figure 9. To do so, select your entire SmartArt graphic. If you want, you can change colors of the individual flowchart shapes. As you can see in Figures 6, 7, and 8 above, all shapes use a single color.Figures 6, 7, and 8 below show you the flowcharts created using the three Bending Process graphic variants.įigure 6: Bulleted list converted into Basic Bending Process SmartArtįigure 7: Repeating Bending Process SmartArtįigure 8: Vertical Bending Process SmartArt Select any one of these three Bending Process graphics, and your bulleted list will convert to a SmartArt graphic.These are the only ones suitable for flowcharts.įigure 5: Bending Process graphics for flowcharts Choose from one of the three Bending Process graphics (highlighted in red within Figure 5). Make sure you scroll down the drop-down gallery so that you can choose flowchart variants. This brings up the Process drop-down gallery, as shown in Figure 5, below.Within SmartArt tab select the Process button, as shown highlighted in red within Figure 4. This activates the SmartArt tab of the Ribbon.From this menu, select the Convert to SmartArt option as shown highlighted in red within Figure 3.įigure 3: Convert to SmartArt option selected Select the entire bulleted list and right-click to bring up the contextual menu shown in Figure 3, below.Figure 2 shows a bulleted list with 10 steps. Make sure that the text meant for your entire flowchart is populated as a bulleted list.Our process which works only within PowerPoint is even easier: However, for this tutorial, we will not use the tab directly since that adds an extra step to the whole flowchart creation process. You will find the SmartArt tab on the Ribbon in PowerPoint 2011 (and also Word and Excel), as shown highlighted in red within Figure 1. Using SmartArt, you can create logical diagrams such as organization charts, process flows, list and cycle diagrams, matrixes, and more. SmartArt is a diagramming component that's included in Microsoft Office applications such as Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. You also cannot connect the last shape on your flowchart to the first shape and create a loop.īefore we proceed, a few words about SmartArt.There's no option to create one-to-multiple or multiple-to-one branches within these flowcharts.However, once you create a flowchart using the steps explained, it's easy to copy it and paste it within Word or Excel. The techniques explained on this page only work within PowerPoint.Before we proceed further, let us tell you that these SmartArt flowcharts are only useful for very simple concepts. While you can create flowcharts of all types in Microsoft Office applications quite easily using techniques explained in our Basic Flowcharts in Microsoft Office tutorial, there are ways in which you can create linear, non-branched flowcharts even more easily with just one click! These one-click flowcharts let you convert a bulleted list to a flowchart in an instant using the SmartArt diagramming feature.