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Crop a picture by an exact measurement in PowerPoint

July 15, 2013 by Ellen Finkelstein 3 Comments

Usually, you crop a picture by selecting the picture, clicking the Format tab, and clicking the Crop button. Then you drag the crop handles. This process works well for many situations.

But if you want to end up with an exact measurement — let’s say to fit the picture into a predefined space — you can do that as well.

Here you see a slide that uses the Frame shape. It’s great for framing photos. The inside is not filled but of course you can place a photo in that blank space. At the bottom of the slide, you see a red arrow pointing to the frame shape’s yellow handle. This handle lets you adjust the width of the frame and therefore the size of the inner space.

At the upper-right, you see a shape that I’ve inserted inside the frame. I adjusted the yellow handle so that the inside rectangle is exactly 1.5″ wide by 2″ high. This gives me the dimensions that I need for my photos.

Find the exact size of any object on a slide

First, how do you discover the exact size of that inner rectangle — or any object for that matter? Here are the steps:

Select the object.
Click the Format tab.
Look for the size in the Size group. You can see this on the right.

Alternatively, right-click the object and choose Size and Position. Look on the Size tab of the Size and Position dialog box that opens.

So here you can see that the size I want for my photos is 2″ high by 1.5″ wide. Of course, the problem is that I need to crop all of my photos to that size. Although the photos themselves might all be the same size, I want headshots and I’ll need to crop so that all of the photos fit into the frames.

Crop to an exact measurement

Remember, I want to crop a photo to make it a headshot. It needs to fit into the 2″ high x 1.5″ wide space in my frame. This will involve cropping the image to get rid of the parts that I don’t want — and leave just the head.

Start by resizing the photo so that the head of the person was approximately the size I needed, but the full photo was larger. Always resize by dragging on a corner handle so that you don’t distort the photo.

PowerPoint 2013 makes this quite easy, but you can do it in earlier versions, too. Here are the steps that I used in PowerPoint 2013:

Right-click the image and choose Format Picture. The Format Picture taskpane opens on the right.
Click the Picture icon at the top. Doing so displays settings for picture corrections, picture color, and cropping. If necessary, expand the Crop section.
There are 2 sections. You’ll use the Crop Position section for this operation. Crop position sets the final width and height of the image and also lets you specify how much you want to crop off from the edges. In the Crop Position section, enter the desired size of your image in the Width and height boxes.
Your picture may not be properly centered. Use the Left and Top boxes to move the cropping border. Click the arrows up or down to easily make fine adjustments.

Here are the steps for PowerPoint 2007 and 2010:

Rich-click the image and choose Size and Position. The Size and Position dialog box opens.
On the Size tab, use the Crop From boxes — Left, Right, Top, and Bottom — to crop off the amount you need. Use the Height and Width boxes at the top (in the Size and Rotate section of the dialog box) to figure out how much you need to crop off.
To see the result, click the Close button. You’ll probably need to make a few adjustments to get the result that you want.

Here’s the final slide.

How to resize and crop pictures in PowerPoint

February 15, 2012 by Ellen Finkelstein 6 Comments

I’ve discovered that some people don’t know how to resize images in PowerPoint and also don’t know how (or when) to crop an image. These are basic and important skills and you’ll use them even in other programs, because they are universal.

How to resize an image

Sometimes you insert an image and it’s the wrong size. You resize an image when it’s the right shape/proportion, but just the wrong size. To resize an image select it so that you see “handles” on the corners and sides. The image to the right has an arrow pointing to one of the handles.

Then click and drag a corner handle inward or outward.

ALWAYS USE THE CORNER HANDLES TO RESIZE AN IMAGE! The side and top handles are useless and should not exist. Using a side or top handle will distort the image and make your people look fat or undernourished. Just say no to the temptation and read on below where I explain what to do if the shape of your image needs to be adjusted.

If you resize an image too much, especially to make it larger, you run the risk of losing resolution. The image will look grainy (and unprofessional). Check your images in Slide Show view to see if they are still clear. If not, find a different image that has more pixels.

In the image to the right, the proportion is good; only the size is too big So, I moved it to the lower-right corner of the white area and used the upper-right corner handle to make the image a little smaller. Here’s the result.

How to crop an image

But what if you need to reshape an image? Maybe it’s too wide or too high. That’s a different issue with a different solution. You need to crop the image. When you crop the image, some of it will be hidden (or perhaps lost forever). But that’s the only way to get the shape you need without distorting the image. [Read more…]

Highlight one part of an image in color

September 25, 2011 by Ellen Finkelstein 4 Comments

Highlighting a part of a grayscale image in color really makes it stand out!

Here are the steps:

Find a photo that you want to use and insert it.
Select the photo, then copy and paste it to duplicate it.
Select the original photo and choose Format tab> Color and choose the first swatch (Saturation 0%) to make the photo grayscale.
Now select the copy, and go to Format tab>Remove Background. I have a video tutorial here. Use the buttons to remove everything that you want to be grayscale. Keep everything that you want to remain in color. (Tip: Zoom in to more precisely choose what you want to keep and what you want to remove.)
Move the copy exactly on top of the grayscale version.
For ease of use, select both photos and group them (Ctrl + G).

Instead of making the original photo grayscale, you can apply other effects, such as blurring or other effects from the Artistic Effects drop-down list. Ric Bretschneider wrote a blog post a while back that uses a similar technique to create a blurred background.

How to get a Photoshopped look by fading in an image

June 13, 2011 by Ellen Finkelstein 8 Comments

Adobe® Photoshop® can create great effects, but you might not have or know the program. You can get a nice Photoshopped look in PowerPoint by fading in an image on a slide, like this:

While PowerPoint doesn’t have this feature directly, you can add a rectangle with a transparency gradient that gradually reveals more and more of the image. First, I give you the instructions in writing, then I have a video that you can watch of me creating this effect in PowerPoint 2010.

1. Insert the image

Use a solid background for your slide. Then, insert an image that doesn’t take up the entire slide. Decide which side of the image you want to fade in. In the above slide, I placed the image on the right side of the slide and wanted to fade in the left side.

Move the image to the back of the order because you want it to be behind the text and the transparency gradient. Right-click it and choose Send to Back>Send to Back (or Order>Send to Back)

Complete the rest of the slide if you haven’t already done so.

2. Add a rectangle

Insert a rectangle. It will be on top of the image, but might also be on top of other text or content on the slide. It needs to be on top of the image, but below other content. If it’s on top of the other content, right-click the rectangle and choose Send to Back>Send Backward (or Order>Send Backward).

Place the rectangle on the side of the image that you want to fade in. For a left fade, resize it to the same height as the image. The rectangle’s width should cover about one-half of the image’s width. I’ve selected the rectangle so you can see its boundary. (Yours will probably be a different color, but you’ll change that in the next step.)

3. Add a transparency gradient

To remove the border, right-click the rectangle again and choose Format Shape (Format AutoShape in PowerPoint 2003).

In PowerPoint 2007 and 2010, click the Line Color category and choose No Line.
In PowerPoint 2003, On the Colors and Lines tab of the Format AutoShape dialog box, click the Line Color drop-down list and choose No Line.

To create the transparency gradient, you’ll create a gradient fill. Here are the steps for all 3 PowerPoint versions. The instructions assume a fade-in on the left, as shown in the above slide.

PowerPoint 2010 and 2013

Click the Fill category and choose Gradient Fill. By default, you’ll have 3 gradient stops (places where the gradient changes).
Set the Angle to 0%.
I removed a stop. To remove the middle stop, just drag it off the bar. But 3 stops can give you more flexibility and control.
Click the leftmost stop and choose the slide background color from the Color drop-down list. Set the Transparency to 0% (which is probably what it already is). It’s position should be 0% (all the way to the left).
Set the 2nd stop to the same color and set the Transparency to 100%. Set the Position to 100% (all the way to the right).

Here you see how the settings look in PowerPoint 2010. Feel free to adjust the placement of the stops to get the result you like.

PowerPoint 2007

Click the Fill category and choose Gradient Fill. By default, you’ll have 3 gradient stops (places where the gradient changes).
Set the Angle to 0%
I deleted the middle stop. Click the Gradient Stops drop-down list, and choose Stop 2. Then click the Remove button.
From the drop-down list of stops, choose Stop 1 and choose the slide background color from the Color drop-down list. Set the Transparency to 0% (which is probably what it already is). Its Stop Position should be 0%.
Set the 2nd stop to the same color and set the Transparency to 100%. The Stop Position should be 100%.

PowerPoint 2003

In the Format AutoShape dialog box’s Colors and Lines tab, click the Fill Color drop-down box and choose Fill Effects.
On the Gradient tab, choose One Color.
From the Color 1 drop-down list, choose the slide background color.
In the Transparency section’s To box, set the transparency to 100%.
In the Shading Styles section, choose Vertical
Choose the upper-left variant and click OK twice.

Watch a video of me creating this effect!

Have you used this technique? Leave a comment!