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About this lesson

Since a picture is really worth 1000 words, add pictures, change their appearance and do so much more with these fundamental slide objects.

Lesson versions

Multiple versions of this lesson are available, choose the appropriate version for you:

2010, 2013, 2016, 2019/365.

Exercise files

Download the PowerPoint presentation used in the video tutorial and try the lesson yourself.

Working with Pictures.pptx
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Quick reference

Topic

Inserting pictures from the Internet or your computer.

When to use

To insert one or more pictures onto a slide.

Instructions

Insert a picture off the Internet

  • On the Insert tab, within the Images group, click the Clip Art button.
  • Select the search method such as Office.com content.
  • Click the Results should be arrow and select a content type.
  • Type a search term into the search box, press Enter on the keyboard or click the search icon.
  • Click the image preview to immediately insert the image into the presentation, or
  • Click the arrow at the edge of the image preview to select from more options.
  • On the Insert tab, click Picture, and browse to the location of the picture in the Insert Picture dialog box, select the picture, and then click either:

Insert a picture from your computer

  • Insert to insert the picture directly, or
  • The Insert drop-down arrow and select Link to File. Make sure that if you link to file you distribute the pictures with the presentation.
  • To insert multiple pictures, click the Insert tab, and then click Pictures, and browse to the location of the picture in the Insert Picture dialog box, select the picture, hold down the Ctrl key and select other pictures with the pointer, and then click either:

Also note:

The Link to File and Insert and Link menu items in the drop-down arrow in the Insert Picture dialog box perform the same function. In the Clip Art task pane, you have the option to filter the results by type, such as illustration, photograph, video or audio.

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  • 00:05 Sooner or later you’re going to need to add pictures to your slides and probably sooner rather than later. Now the pictures can be
  • 00:10 inserted off your computer or off the internet. Adding from the computer is a simple as selecting the insert tab, the picture button, and
  • 00:19 the dialog box pops up, this is my granddaughter, browsing to a picture on the hard drive and then directly inserting. Or we can also
  • 00:28 drop the little insert arrow down and link to the picture; remember though if you link to a picture and you distribute your presentation, you must
  • 00:36 distribute the picture with the presentation or it will not appear and that’s very unprofessional. So the best option is to make sure your pictures
  • 00:43 are saved in the same folder as your presentation, so that if the folder is transferred to another computer the images will appear in that
  • 00:50 presentation. Notice also that you can further filter the picture type that you’re looking for by dropping down the little arrow here and selecting
  • 00:58 a picture format. Now to insert pictures off the internet, select the clipart button and type a search term into this search bar. Now you can
  • 01:09 search for all media types or you can filter it if you need, say, an illustration, which is often a vector drawing, or an audio file, a photograph,
  • 01:18 and so on. The check box here allows you to include online clipart and I recommend that you check this box if you’re connected to the
  • 01:26 internet; you’ll get a lot more results. So we select in the search box, type in what we’re looking for, and then we get a range of results
  • 01:36 displayed as thumbnails. Now I’d like a photograph so I’ll select that option alone and search again. So we can see a preview of the
  • 01:45 picture and if I click on any of these thumbnails it will instantly insert that picture onto the slide. Hovering our mouse over the thumbnail allows
  • 01:54 us to see a preview of information about the image, including its size and dimensions. If we click the little drop down arrow we get further
  • 02:02 options to directly insert the graphic on the slide or even to copy it to the clipboard and there’s also the option to make the graphic available
  • 02:09 offline if you suspect that at a later stage you’re not going to be connected to the internet. Now remember you must always respect the
  • 02:16 copyright of the owner of the image and that’s particularly important when you use online graphics or particularly online search engines,
  • 02:24 external to PowerPoint such as Google and Bing, because you’re not always sure who the owner is. However, if you do it within
  • 02:32 PowerPoint, and online clipart, you have a lot more comfort in terms of copyright. Now with the picture on our slide, and the format tab selected,
  • 02:41 we can change picture styles, add a correction, a colour, or an artistic effect. And we can also remove the picture background, which is the
  • 02:51 subject of another video. So let’s browse through some of the effects that can be applied. Corrections allow us to soften or sharpen the
  • 03:00 image and change the brightness and contrast. Colour will change the saturation or the tone or the color itself. Artistic effects, and notice the
  • 03:10 image updates as we move our mouse over those various options, and the various pictures styles plus borders and various picture effects.
  • 03:19 Notice that this picture layout button is all about SmartArt graphics, and that’s the subject of another video. So on the format tab we go to the
  • 03:27 picture effects, soft edge, and we can apply a 25 point effect. Now you need to practice with these options because you may not always get
  • 03:35 the result that you want. But also notice that options such as a faded edge can be applied but if we then change to an effect such as a metal
  • 03:43 frame, it may undo the previous effect applied, because it’s an edge effect of a different kind, yet if we add an artistic effect such as a pencil
  • 03:51 sketch, it does respect the soft edge that we previously applied, and so that’s something that you’ll have to experiment with to understand how
  • 03:58 the various effects work together. Now a really great feature is the reset picture button and that’s the subject of another video, but the little
  • 04:06 drop down arrow allows to either reset the pictures itself, or both the picture and its size if you change it in any way, and most importantly
  • 04:14 is that it’s not really an undo, but a reset. You could close this presentation and open it in a year’s time and still reset the picture. So
  • 04:23 PowerPoint’s not a high end graphic program but it’s certainly not too bad. It’s easy to insert pictures, it’s easy to apply various effects, and
  • 04:30 even to reset the whole picture, but remember always to respect the copyright of the owner of the picture, particularly outside of PowerPoint,
  • 04:37 and be careful that if you link to an image from within a presentation, you must distribute those pictures with the presentation, preferably in the
  • 04:45 same folder, or people won’t be able to see your images when the presentation is opened.

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