Can I take an image created in Illustratorand have it be on the Character Map? I need to useit as

I have an image that I need to use as a bullet many times for a specific client. Is there a way to take that image from Illustrator and convert it to something on the Character Map?

If by Character Map, you mean the Windows Character Map application, which lets you view the glyphs in a given font, then no, you can't do that with Illustrator.

In order for your bullet (a new glyph) to appear in the Windows Character Map application, it would have to be a glyph inside a font.

Illustrator does not provide the capability of directly editing font files. (Corel Draw does.)

So if you want to edit an existing font, or create a new font, you need a program that can edit and/or modify fonts.

In modifying fonts, you would be restricted by the limitations inherent in fonts: your custom bullet or dingbat would need to consist of a single simple or compound path, and could only receive one color, as any other text object.

The far more common approach to this problem is to use inline graphics. All of Illustrator's mainstrream competitors (and even InDesign) allow you to paste a graphic into a textframe, inline with the text, and have it behave as if it were a character in the text. Illustrator has never provided that commonplace feature.

If you use InDesign you can, as a ridiculously cumbersome workaround, create your text object in InDesign, paste the artwork element(s) inline. When done, copy the whole text object and paste into Illustrator. It will be pasted into AI as PDF content, meaning a Clipping Mask containing a bunch of individual pointType objects and the bullets as separate objects.

JET

Thank you. I decided to place the AI file as an inline graphic in the textframe, then copy and paste as a bullet.