Add Color and Style to the Gantt Chart
The Gantt chart is now built and formatted nicely, but could use some color. SmartDraw makes it easy to personalize your completed chart with color-coordinated palettes we call Themes and Quick Styles.
A Theme is a set of colors that is aesthetically pleasing with one another and is appropriate for business graphics. The current default theme for this Gantt chart is Tundra, which is a palette of shades of gray.
We can change the theme as desired by selecting a new one from the Theme group on the Home tab. To view the full menu of Themes, click the dropdown menu arrow within the Theme group of the Home Tab.
Clicking a different Theme instantly changes your Gantt chart's appearance. For this example, select the Pelagic Theme.
QuickStyles
The selected Theme affects the available colors of the Quick Styles and Fill menus, as they contain that match with the current Theme.
In our example above, the Pelagic Theme applies variant shades of light blue.
A Quick Style applies colors, line styles, font types, and more to all selected items. When the Theme is changed after having applied a Quick Style to an object, a parallel Quick Style is applied. In the image below, the box labeled "Quick Style Applied" has a lighter color, black text, and shadow even after the Theme has been changed from Greyscale to Brass.
Let's add color to different areas of the Gantt chart we made.
Style group of the Home Tab, click the Quick Styles button and choose a style. Note that SmartDraw considers the Task bars to be lines rather than shapes, so they will take the Quick Style's line properties, and not fill properties.
Our chart is now complete and ready for saving or exporting.