adding a good resolution image/figure in ACM paper

Problem:

If you use \includegraphics in Latex and the included thing is a pdf file or a png/gif file, both will cause problems. Any image in pdf file has a clear resolution but upon uploading camera-ready paper on ACM, it throws an exception about fonts not being embedded. The png file is supposed to have at least 300 dpi resolution but it renders blurry on the pdf.

Solution:

The best thing is to have Inkscape installed. Use inkscape to create a new file and copy your Visio diagram in it. Then go to Edit -> Resize page to selection to make the image fit to paper. Before that, you can stretch the image until it is the desirable size. Then, Save as eps file. Check the option to embed fonts while saving eps. It is easy to include an eps file using the \includegraphics tag.

Using an eps file makes sure that the image is crystal clear and does not become blurry on zooming pdf.

There is also an issue of dotted lines becoming solid lines. To handle this first copy the image from Visio and paste as bitmap in Excel. Then copy from excel and paste in Inkscape. This way the dotted lines will be preserved.

How to include high resolution figures in Latex?

This could be the most frustrating and time consuming thing ever if you don't know how to go about it!

1. First get your image into Word. (If you are copying it from Visio, use Paste Special and choose Enhanced Metafile. This makes the image extra sharp and clear at every zoom level).
2. Then crop/resize it until you are satisfied with its size. Make sure you are currently in Print Layout with a 100% zoom factor.
3. Now you need to trim off the paper size to make it equal to the size of the image. For this, click on the image and go to the Format bar and check its height and width. Specify the same height and width in the Paper Layout using custom size. Also, reset all margins and gutter to 0. If Word pops an alert just Ignore.
4. Lastly, use Save As to save your word document as a PDF.(e.g. MyFigure )
5. Then in Latex, use the following code:

\begin{figure}
\centering
\includegraphics[width=\linewidth]{MyFigure.pdf}
\caption{This is my figure}
\label{fig:MyFigure}
\end{figure}