I want to find out if there's a way to do something with gradients in Visio. I tried it today and couldn't get it to work.
Imagine a 5x5 checkerboard pattern. Number the columns 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and number the rows A, B, C, D, E. We can identify any square by its row and column, e.g. the upper left corner square is A1, the one to its right is A2, and the one below it is B1.
Now imagine that the upper left square (A1) is medium blue, the upper center square (A3) in light blue, and the upper right square (A5) is white. Also, the bottom right square (E5) is medium yellow, and the middle right square (E3) is light yellow.
The color of square C3 (center middle) is the sum of A3 (above it) and C5 (right of it): light green. C1, E1, and E3 are colored similarly, so E1 is medium green, and C1 and E3 are light green, shaded respectively toward blue and yellow.
B1 has a vertical gradient from the blue of A1 above it to the bluish yellow of C1 below it. B3, B5, D1, D3, and D5 have similar vertical gradients from the color above to the color below.
A2 has a horizontal gradient from the blue of A1 on its left to the lighter blue of A3 on its right. A4, C2, C4, E2, and E4 have similar horizontal gradients from the color on the left to the color on the right.
That leaves squares B2, B4, D2, and D4. And that is where I got stuck. Each of these squares has a diagonal gradient that matches all four neighboring squares on the respective sides.
It seems to me I should be able to do this with a diagonal gradient from the color of the adjacent corner square to the color of the center middle square, but I couldn't get that to work. Is there a way to accomplish this?