Tutor Tips from ... the Computer Tutor

26 February 2008

Working With Images in Microsoft Word

It is common practice to insert pictures into Word documents. (You know - a picture is worth a thousand words.) When inserting JPG images into Word documents, you should strongly consider using the Picture option from the Insert menu, rather than doing a simple copy and paste. The reason for this is that Word handles pictures differently when they are cut and pasted compared with when they are inserted. When they are cut and pasted, photos are treated as TIFF files, which are typically much larger than JPG files, even if the original photos were JPGs.

For example, a twelve-page document with no photos takes approximately 72.5 kb on disk. Adding two photos using cut-and-paste techniques resulted in a file that was 435 kb in size. The same document, when the same photos had been inserted correctly (using Insert | Picture), shrank to 146 KB.

By inserting pictures in this manner you can save enormous amounts of hard disk space and communication bandwidth if the document has to be e-mailed. In addition, the file will load faster and you can make edits quicker.

Insert a Picture Using the Insert Menu

  1. Click the spot in the document where you want to insert the image
  2. Click Insert on the Menu
  3. Select Picture
  4. On the Submenu, select From file

When the Insert Picture dialog box opens, select your picture by highlighting it and clicking Insert. The picture will appear in your document.

Ideally, you should format your picture in a photo-editing program. Resizing the photo and decreasing its resolution will leave you with a smaller file to embed into the document. Photos can make a small 100 kb document grow into a 3 or 4 MB file. So, limit the number of photos and keep the file size of the images as small as practical. You will have very little control over the resolution of your images once they are in Word and, oddly enough, when you crop an image in Word, Word stores the entire image with the file, but places a “mat” around the cropped area.

Once you have the image in your document, you can use Word’s built-in photo-editing tools for simple changes and minor tweaks. Click the inserted picture, and then drag the sizing handles to resize the picture, if necessary. Drag the rotation handle to rotate the picture, if desired.

Changing the Picture Size
To resize a photo, you can click it and use the corner boxes to resize it. Or, if you need more precision, you can use the Format Picture dialog box:

  1. Right-click the picture and select Format Picture
  2. In the Format Picture dialog box, click the Size tab
  3. You can use the Height and Width boxes at the top to enter a size in inches or cm
  4. You can also use the Height and Width boxes in the scale section to specify the size as a percentage
  5. Deselect Lock aspect ratio if you don’t want to retain the current width to height ratio [Normally, you will want the aspect ratio locked, so the image won’t look stretched or squashed.]
  6. Click OK

Changing Picture Layout Options
Word provides you with a variety of options for changing the layout of your picture. For example, you can have the text wrap around the picture, or you can insert the picture inline with the document text.

To change the layout options, follow these steps:

  1. Right-click the picture
  2. Select Format Picture
  3. Open the Layout tab
  4. Select how you would like your picture to appear
  5. For advanced options, such as the amount of space around the picture, click Advanced
  6. To Format Text Wrapping, Click the Text Wrapping tab. Select the text wrapping style that you want, and then click OK.
  7. To Format Picture Position, Click the Picture Position tab. Select the horizontal and vertical positioning that you want, click to select the check boxes of the options that you want, and then click OK.

Adding a Caption to Your Picture
A caption will clarify your picture to readers. It can be used to attribute the picture to a specific source. It can help you reference the picture in other parts of the document.

To add a caption to your picture, follow these steps:

  1. Right-click the picture and select Caption
  2. In the Caption dialog box, enter your caption in the box labelled Caption
  3. Select a label for your caption or select Exclude label from caption
  4. If you don’t like the label choices, create a new one by clicking New Label
  5. Use the Position drop-down box to select the position of the caption. Your caption will appear beside the picture.

Adding pictures to a Word document need not be a tedious undertaking. With a bit of trial and error, you can create many exciting documents. Photo albums, life stories, and recipe books are a few of the places where pictures can enhance your words.