Strange Lines Appear in the Background

[erichandley3]

Hello community,

I have this object with gray text on top of it. What I'm trying to do is "expand > merge" then delete the gray text so that it is on the white box and the letters inside will be transparent. When I go to delete the gray color, a strange white diagonal object appears in the background and I am unable to delete. Anybody know what is going on and how to fix it? I'm using the latest versions of Illustrator cc 2019 and can't figure this one out.

[barbara_a]

I don't think those are lines that would print or show. To me it looks like they are the highlight that indicates the bounding box for the letters. Because the top of the P, R, and T are not perfectly straight horizontally, and the bounding box is always rectangular, the blue lines are not touching the edges of the letters.

[erichandley3]

So the blue lines are the edge or bounding boxes of the actual letters, I just highlighted the letters to show what they're supposed to look like (The top photo is what the letters look like before deleting the fill color and the bottom photo is the left over white that would delete for some reason after deleting the gray fill). If you look closely at the letters there is a diagonal fill that shouldn't be there (close to the actual edge). The letters are perfectly straight and haven't been manipulated, so that exact little fill is what is the problem, if that makes sense.

[barbara_a]

What does the artwork look like when viewed in outline (View > Outline)?

[barbara_a]

If you deselect and View > Outline, do you still see the lines? If not, then they won't print.

[Myra Ferguson · Accepted solution]

Is GPU performance turned on in the Preferences? Go to Edit > Preferences > Performance to check.

[erichandley3]

Barbara, the artwork looked as it should in outline mode.

I knew it was going to be a simple fix, just didn't know where exactly to go. I took it off GPU performance like you said Myra, and now it works normally. Thank you both for your help! Appreciate it!