How to convert layout elements to graphics

Question

I have many projects (mxd) and I´d like to convert ANY "live" elements like legends, scale bars, scale texts etc. into graphic automatically using arcpy. Is there a way? In questions and answers I could not find anything which would help me with that.

These elements have their names, e.g. Legend, Scale Bar and so on. If I wouldn´t want to convert all of them, how do I select which element to convert? Because there can be more elements with the same name, for example 3 legends with "Legend" as the name of the element. Could anybody help?

ArcGIS for Desktop 10.1 Basic, Python 2.7

Answer 1

You can use arcobjects for this by grabbing the element envelope and converting it to graphic:

This example shows how to do it for legend element.

Converting Legend to IGraphicsComposite in C#

// Convert legend to graphics
IPageLayout pageLayout = mxDoc.PageLayout;
IActiveView activeView = (IActiveView) pageLayout;
IGraphicsContainer graphicsContainer = pageLayout as IGraphicsContainer;
graphicsContainer.Reset();
IElement element = graphicsContainer.Next();
while (element != null)
{
    if (element is IMapSurroundFrame)
    {
        IMapSurround mapSurround = ((IMapSurroundFrame)element).MapSurround;
        if (mapSurround is ILegend)
        {
             ILegend legend = (ILegend)mapSurround;
             IGraphicsComposite graphComp = (IGraphicsComposite)legend;
             IEnumElement enumElem = graphComp.get_Graphics(activeView.ScreenDisplay, 
                                          element.Geometry.Envelope);
             ...
        }

   }
   element = graphicsContainer.Next();
}