What is an "image shape"?

[kmewing]

I'm fairly experienced with Visio. Most of my knowledge comes from hands-on
experimentation.

I see a section in the ShapeSheet called Image Properties. My reference
book has only one line about this section: "Contains the properties for a
shape that is an image." This begs a naive question: What is an image
shape? I've searched my reference books, Visio help, and the Web and I've
not found a definition or other useful information.

Can someone give me a brief definition of an "image shape" in Visio? How is
this different from other types of shapes? Can you point me to any
references where I can read about this?

Thanks for any insight.

 

[David Parker]

If you insert an image into a page or shape, then an image shape is created.
That's all.

 

[kmewing]

So you're saying that if you simply drag a shape from a stencil onto a page,
the shape becomes an image? If that's the case, then I have another
question. In the ShapeSheet there's a section called "Image properties." It
contains cells for such things as tranparency, blur, brightness, etc. But,
when I change the values for these settings, the image on the page remains
unchanged.

I'd like to utilize the settings in "Image properties." Is there a trick to
getting these to work?

 

[David Parker]

I have just tried a jpg file in Visio 2007. The cell values changed my
image.
What version are you using, and what image file type?

 

[Paul Herber]

So you're saying that if you simply drag a shape from a stencil onto a page,
the shape becomes an image?

No, an image (jpeg, bmp, gif etc), not a Visio shape.

menu Insert -> Picture -> From File

 

[kmewing]

Yes, this answers the question. The "Image properties" section pertains to
imported images, not shapes dragged from a stencil.

and BTW, I'm using Visio 2003. Sorry for not mentioning that earlier.