Our design templates often contain images that serve as examples for illustrative purposes or are gray placeholders that you can replace with your own images. Here we show you how to place images or replace existing ones in InDesign.

General notes on picture frames in InDesign

So that you can incorporate your images into our design templates in a targeted manner, you should understand the basic principle behind the use of images in InDesign:

The areas intended for images in a design are defined in InDesign using frames. These can be rectangular frames, elliptical frames or polygon frames. The frames serve as placeholders, so to speak - as containers that define exactly where you can insert images and on which area they are displayed.

Usually, you insert images into the frames that are at least the same size, usually even larger than the frames. You can move, scale or mirror an inserted image within the frame. Areas of your image that extend beyond the frame are not displayed in the design. In this way, you determine which image section you want to display.

To understand the picture frames: Activate the normal view via the shortcut W. The frames are displayed in the form of colored contours for the images that have already been inserted. The default setting is blue and is based on the color of the layer you are currently working on.

Activate the selection tool using the V shortcut and double-click on an image. You will now see an additional brown frame next to the blue frame. This is the outline of the entire image. Drag the image larger using a handle on the brown frame, for example - you will see that this changes the image section displayed in the frame. If you remove the image, the frame remains and is represented by a blue outline and a cross.

To quickly fit the image into your frame, right-click>Customize and select one of the corresponding options, for example: Fill frame proportionally.

So when you are working with images in InDesign, always pay attention to whether you are editing a frame or the content of a frame. Both components can be scaled, rotated, moved or removed separately.

Placing images in frames, replacing existing images

There are three ways to insert your own images into the already prepared frames of our design templates and thus replace the existing images. It is best to activate the normal view first (shortcut W).

Option 1 (to place an image): Select an image on your computer and drag and drop it into a frame.

Option 2 (to place an image): Select a frame. Open the place dialogvia Ctrl+D or Cmd+D or via File>Place. Select an image on your computer and open it.

Option 3 (to place several images in different frames at the same time): Open the Place dialogvia Ctrl+D or Cmd+D or via File>Place. Select several images on your computer and open them. You have now loaded your mouse pointer with the images you have selected. You can see this by the fact that one of the images is displayed directly next to the mouse pointer. Now click on a frame to place the image there. Then click on other frames to place the other images.

Tip: If you have loaded your mouse pointer with several images, you can use the arrow keys to select other loaded images. Press the Esc keyto remove loaded images from your mouse pointer.

Tip: When using the Place dialog, you can activate the Show import optionscheckbox for further settings; depending on the selected file type, this will give you even more precise setting options for placing the content.

Fill frame proportionally and adjust image section

After you have placed your images in the frames, the image sections are most likely not yet as you would like them to be.

To adjust the image section, you should first fill the frame proportionally in most cases. To do this, right-click on a placeholder to open the context menu and click on Fill frame proportionally under Customize.

For further adjustments, activate the selection tool (shortcut V) and double-click on the image to be edited. You can now scale and rotate the image using the handles on the brown frame. Sometimes a horizontal or vertical mirroring is also required. To do this, right-click to open the context menu. Under Transform, you will find the options Mirror horizontally and Mirror vertically.

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