Using “Clip Art”

Another useful feature in “Word” is the ability to insert “Clip Art”, and other graphics into our “”Document””.
Hundreds of “Cliparts” are included in “Word”, but we can insert our own images.
We can edit properties of a “Clip Art” to a more personalized version.

Insert “Clip Art”

To insert “Clip Art” in the versions 2003 and XP, we click “Insert” (“Insert“) – “Picture” (“Picture“) in the menu bar.
This opens the “Task pane” on the right side of our “Document”.
In the “Search text:” we type a keyword and click the “Search” (“Search“) button.

As soon as we press the “Search” (“Search“) small images and illustrations appear in the “Task pane”.
Place the cursor in the “Document” where you want to insert “Clip Art” and click on the “Clip Art” you want to add.

To insert “Clip Art” in ’97 and 2000 versions, click on “Insert” (“Insert“) – “Picture” (“Picture“) in the menu bar and choose “Clip Art”.
This opens the “Clip Art” gallery.
Choose a category.
Right-click the image of your choice, and select “Insert” (“Insert“).

Insert other images

Inserting other images is easy.
If you click on “Insert” (“Insert“) – “Picture” (“Picture“) in the menu bar and select “From File” (“From File“).
In the dialog that appears, navigate to the folder containing the image.
Select the image, and click the “Insert” (“Insert“) button.

The “Picture toolbar”

	Insert figure		color choice
	increase or decrease contrast		increase or decrease brighteness
	Crop		anticlockwise
	Stroke		compress photos
	text wrapping		Format Figure
	transparent		undo

Most of these buttons are clear, but I’ll give a bit more explanation.
Insert Figure: This button opens a dialog where we can choose a picture / photo on our PC, to be inserted.

Color choice: Clicking this button gives us a dropdown menu with four choices:
1. “Automatic” (Default, displays the image in its original colors)
2. “Grayscale” (Displays the image in shades of gray)
3. “Black & White” (You can use if you have a black / white printer)
4. “Watermark” (“Washout” in 2003 and XP) (use if you want the image in the background and this should serve as a watermark, over which you want to type).

Increase or decrease contrast: Increases or decreases contrast of colors.

Increase or decrease Brightness: the brightness of the picture is thus increased or reduced.

“Crop”: With this button we can keep interesting pieces from our image and delete the rest.
Click and drag above the edges or corners of the image.

Rotate Anticlockwise: seems clear, with each click on this button, the image rotates 90 degrees left.
(Only in version 2003 and XP)

“Stroke”: Clicking this button opens a menu with different edges, which we can use to put our picture into a frame.

“Compress Photo”: can be important to our “Document”, but not to overload with super-size photos. It is usually used to upload “Documents” with images on the Internet.
(Only in version 2003 and XP)

“Text wrapping”: clicking on the button opens a menu from which we select how the image looks in the text afterwards.

“Format Picture”: Opens a dialog box with several tabs, where we have all the features to alter our image. We also use “Image” button in the toolbar.

“Transparent”: This button can be used in .jpg and to make parts of our image “Transparent”. Not for “Clip Art” images.

Undo: Clicking this button displays the image in its original form.

The “Format Picture” dialog box

The “Format Picture” dialog box has six tabs that can be used to edit our image: “Colours and Lines” (“Colors and Lines“), “Size” (“Size“), “Layout” (“Layout“), “Picture” (“Picture“), “Textbox” (“Text Box“) and “Web”.

In the “Colors and Lines” tab (“Colors and Lines“) we determine the colors to fill our image and its borders.
Click the arrow next to the “Color” box.
Choose a color or click “Fill effects”, which is again a dialog, where we have more possibilities to determine the background of our image.

In the “Size” (“Size“) tab, we can resize our image.
In the “Layout” (“Layout“) tab, we determine the text wrapping for our image.

In the “Picture” (“Picture“) tab, we can trim the figure, determine a gray value, and enter the brightness and contrast of our figure.
In the “Web” tab we can enter alternate text to display in place of images in Web pages when the images are not displayed.

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