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Replacing photos
If you drag and drop a a photo file (from Windows Explorer or from the Bitmap Gallery) onto an
existing photo it will replace that photo, but keep the same container or frame size. This makes it very
easy to replace photos on templates. You can use the Fill Tool to adjust the size, position and angle of
the photo inside its outline. This is not true for photo documents
, where dropping a photo on the page will always import it as a new document.
When replacing a photo or bitmap this way, it is sized to best fit in the existing picture outline. If you hold
"Shift" when replacing a photo, the new one will fit into the same dimensions and rotation as the old
photo. This is useful where you've manually adjusted the scale or rotation of a fill and then want to
replace the image with another which has the same aspect ratio.
If there are multiple copies of the same photo on a page in the same soft group, for example a small
thumbnail and a larger version on a pop-up layer, when you drag and drop replace, all copies of the
photo in the soft group will be replaced by the new one.
Replacing multiple photos at once
Most of the web templates provided in the Designs Gallery will allow you to replace multiple images at
once, by dragging and dropping multiple image files from Explorer onto the canvas. Or use "File" > "
Import"
and select multiple images in the file dialog ("Ctrl + click" adds to the current selection, "Shift + click"
allows you to select a range of files).
The incoming photos are used to replace the images in the document. Replacement is performed left to
right and top to bottom (normal reading order). If you don't drag in enough photos to replace all the
replaceable photos, you can go on to import more photo files the same way. Replacement carries on
from the next un-replaced photo. Therefore you can quickly fill the design with your photos.
If you import more photos than can be accommodated on the current page, any following pages in your
design will have their replaceable photos replaced too, using the remaining incoming photos. If that would
still leave a surplus of incoming photo files, then the current page gets duplicated as many times as
necessary to accommodate all your photos.
This means you can very quickly build a photo gallery website showing your photos! Just choose a
gallery template from the Designs Gallery
, then import your set of photo files. The page is copied as many times as required to fit in all your
photos. Make sure you choose the reduced size option when importing a lot of large photos!
Using photos as fills
You can also use any bitmap as a fill style for any drawn shape. Simply drag the file over the shape
(which can be from your file system, or from the Bitmap or Fill galleries), and hold the "Shift" key down
before you drop. This will replace the existing color fill with a bitmap, fitted to the object. Again you can
use the Fill Tool
to adjust the size, angle and position.
Initial Photo size
When you import a large photo it's reduced in size to HD (1920x1080) resolution, if it's larger than that
(in print and animation documents you are prompted about this first). And it's sized to be a convenient
500 pixels wide on the page.
To reduce the size, just drag a corner handle using the Selector Tool, or enter a new width in the Selector
Tool InfoBar width field.
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