Help Inserting Pictures in Mac Word document

[aRKay]

I am not a skilled MS Word user and I am trying to insert some .jpg
pictures into a standard Mac word document. I am using Mac OSX 10.4.2
and Word 2004 v11.2. The problem is getting the pictures to insert, and
stay, where they were placed.

I must be doing something wrong so these are the steps I have been using:

- I place the cursor at the end of a sentence and mouse on

Insert/Picture/From file

and select the picture. and use the Insert button. Please note I do NOT
have the box checked that says "Treat picture layers as separate
objects" but the picture shows up in the word document.

- The picture is usually too large so I select the picture as an object
and use the upper right corner marker to resize the picture to about
what I need.

- While he picture is still selected, I right-click and then select
Format Picture and go to the sub panel called Layout. I have tried both
the Square and the Tight options.

This is where I then get in trouble trying to place the picture in the
right place in the document. Sometimes it is on the wrong page and I
cannot seem to drag it to another page. When I try it jumps to the top
of the page then I cannot move it down over other objects.

I deleted several then tried to insert them one at time and they then
got all jumbled and our of order.

Help! What am I doing wrong

aRKay

arkay at qsl.net

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur]

This is where I then get in trouble trying to place the picture in the
right place in the document. Sometimes it is on the wrong page and I
cannot seem to drag it to another page. When I try it jumps to the top
of the page then I cannot move it down over other objects.

I've always foundimage placement in Word (Mac or Windows) to be
extremely buggy. The only way I ever got some success with it is by
going to the advanced placement options and making sure that I had no
lock anchor, that the image would not be moved with the text and that
the alignements were relative to margins - not columns (which is usually
the default).

Corentin

 

[Daiya Mitchell]

What kind of document are you making? Do you need to wrap text around the
picture?

I would think the easiest thing to do would be to keep the picture "in line
with text" which basically means it acts like a text letter and you can do
just about the same things with it. Which also means you can't wrap text
around them, so that's a little annoying--all your pix are centered on their
own line, doesn't look that good. That's the default setting that pix insert
as anyhow.

All the other settings put the picture into the drawing layer and make it a
floating image. When selected, floating images have white boxes denoting
corners--inline images have a black line and black boxes at the corners.
Floating images are the ones that do all sorts of weird movements and won't
stay in place. Inline images act like a great big unbreakable chunk of
text.

If you need the pictures to float, so that you can wrap text around them, I
would still strongly suggest that you leave them in line with text *until*
all the other editing is done. Keeping them inline should make it easier to
keep them in order. Once the pic is in approximately the right place, change
the layout setting (one by one, from beginning to end), and then use
Corentin's advice if necessary. Ideally, at that point, you're done with
editing and nothing further happens that would cause the image to move.
(Save to PDF, quick!)

Possibly some useful info:
http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/DrwGrphcs/InlineVsFloating.htm
(hit refresh a few times in Safari, or use a different browser)
http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/DrwGrphcs/DrawLayer.htm
(hit refresh a few times in Safari, or use a different browser)
(written for Win but still true)

 

[Beth Rosengard]

Unless a picture is formatted as "Inline with text", it's a floating object
(as Daiya explained). This means that the picture is anchored to a
particular paragraph and in order to move it to a different page, you need
to move its anchor as well. When I say "anchor", I'm speaking literally.

Turn on the Show/Hide formatting tool and be sure you're in Page Layout
view. Click on the picture to select it. You will now see an anchor icon
to the left of the paragraph that the picture is anchored to. So, if you
want to move the picture to another page, you need to move the anchor as
well. Just click and drag it to the paragraph you want the picture anchored
to. This method will help keep images where you want them.

Formatting pictures as "inline with text" is even more secure (if not as
aesthetically pleasing) since the picture becomes a fixed object, just as if
you typed a character.

--
***Please always reply to the newsgroup!***

Beth Rosengard
MacOffice MVP

Mac Word FAQ: <http://word.mvps.org/MacWordNew/index.htm>
(If using Safari, hit Refresh once or twice ­ or use another browser.)
Entourage Help Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org>

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur]

Unless a picture is formatted as "Inline with text", it's a floating object
(as Daiya explained). This means that the picture is anchored to a
particular paragraph and in order to move it to a different page, you need
to move its anchor as well. When I say "anchor", I'm speaking literally.

Well you can also have the image floating without anchor and define its
position on the page (using either the default "left", "right", "center"
locations or more precisely throught he advanced options).
Without the anchor, the image can be positioned relatively to the page
regardless of what paragraph is flowing around it.

It's pretty convenient, but it triggers a couple of (known and reported)
bugs in Word that make the image jump all over the place (really) unless
you make sure the image is aligned to margins and not columns.

Corentin

 

[Beth Rosengard]

Well you can also have the image floating without anchor and define its
position on the page (using either the default "left", "right", "center"
locations or more precisely throught he advanced options).
Without the anchor, the image can be positioned relatively to the page
regardless of what paragraph is flowing around it.

Even if you specify alignment using either left/right/center or any of the
other advanced options, a floating picture will still be anchored to a
paragraph and will show the anchor icon in the margin of the document.
What's more, if you position the picture using, say, right alignment and
then manually move it somewhere else, the layout dialog will now show the
alignment as "other" and whatever advanced settings you used will reflect
the repositioning. IOW, if it's floating, it's floating and it *will* be
anchored somewhere . In order to make a picture keep it's alignment,
you'd have to make it "inline with text" and put it on its own
line/paragraph.

Beth

 

[aRKay]

Dalya,

Thank you and the others for the tip. The tip at

http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/DrwGrphcs/InlineVsFloating.htm

really helped. I was using he wrong option and I was not in the
Advanced panel's text wrapping options

The document is history of the cars I have owned with pictures. I have
spent way too much money on cars. HiHi

They are better behaved tonight.

aRKay

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur]

IOW, if it's floating, it's floating and it *will* be
anchored somewhere .

Yeah, it's kinda true... The image is indeed anchored to a paragraph,
though it can be placed 2 paragraphs before or after. The logical thing
for the UI would have been to anchor it to the page though, but that's
not an option.
:-\
Corentin

 

[Paul Berkowitz]

Yeah, it's kinda true... The image is indeed anchored to a paragraph,
though it can be placed 2 paragraphs before or after. The logical thing
for the UI would have been to anchor it to the page though, but that's
not an option.
:-\

....because there's no such thing as a page in Word...

--
Paul Berkowitz
MVP MacOffice
Entourage FAQ Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org/faq/index.html>
AppleScripts for Entourage: <http://macscripter.net/scriptbuilders/>

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[alex]

Another way of inserting picture in Word text document is through the
text box. This is an option I use all the time because this way I can
type in a figure legend that will move with the picture. Just insert
the text box where you want it and paste the picture in it (the cursor
should be put on a line inside the box, naturally); you can resize the
picture within the text box in a usual way. The text box itself is also
easy to resize. Then you need to format the text box by selecting
"tight wrapping" and unchecking "allow overlap" under "advanced" menu.
Concerning the anchor, it is possible to put it inside the text box and
then move the box freely. A nice feature of the text box is that it has
a default frame and the picture stands out in the text (this can be
removed, of course. BUT, text boxes also jump. Sometimes the only way
to tame them would be to cut it and then paste again in the desirable
place.
I have to agree with everybody that this thing is one of the weakest
points in Word plaguing it since Word 5 for Mac. I have never seen an
improvement in this domain with any subsequent version.