Skip to main content

How to edit photos in Photo Center

While Photo Center is not meant to replace your photo editing tools, it does offer several ways to edit your images.

Note

When you import photos into Photo Center, each image already contains some metadata that is not editable within Photo Center. For example, orientation, color, and space. Image Resizer respects this metadata and presents your image as defined. To change this metadata, you must edit the metadata outside of Photo Center and reimport.

Procedures

Editing Metadata

To edit image metadata, take the following steps:

  1. Hover over an image thumbnail. A menu displays at the bottom of the thumbnail.

  2. Click the pencil icon icon_edit.jpg. The Edit image details page opens.

  3. Fill in or update the available metadata fields.

  4. Click Save.

Tip

You can also publish or unpublish an image from the Edit image details page. Use the radio buttons below the image in the left pane.

Bulk editing

To edit metadata for multiple images at once, take the following steps:

  1. Hover over an image thumbnail. A menu displays at the bottom of the thumbnail.

  2. Click the checkbox to select the image. An action bar appears at the bottom of the page and indicates the number of selected images.

  3. Repeat steps 1 and 2 for all the images for which you want to edit metadata.

  4. Click Edit images on the action bar. The Edit image details page opens and shows the selected images in the left pane.

  5. Fill in or update a metadata field.

    Note

    When editing multiple images, the Copy to all copy-to-all.pngbutton displays below each metadata field.

  6. Click the Copy to all button to copy the metadata field value to all the selected images.

  7. Repeat steps 5 and 6 for all the metadata fields you want to edit across all images.

  8. Click Save.

Cropping

To crop photos using Photo Center, take the following steps:

  1. Hover over an image thumbnail. A menu displays at the bottom of the thumbnail.

  2. Click the pencil icon icon_edit.jpg. The Edit image details page opens.

  3. Click the crop icon crop-light.png at the top left of the page. The Crop page opens.

  4. Drag the cropping edges and the cropping area to adjust the image.

    Tip

    Select an aspect ratio from the Aspect Ratio drop-down menu to obtain a precise cropping area for the selected format. For example, select the 16:9 aspect ratio to fit most TVs and computer monitors.

  5. Optionally, use the zoom and rotation controls on the bottom left of the page for greater precision.

  6. Click Crop.

  7. Click Save.

When you crop an image, Photo Center creates another image as a derivative of the original image, which includes the original metadata fields and values. The ID field in the Edit image details page displays a link to the original image.

Establishing a focal point

Arc XP relies on the Photo Resizer tool to serve an image in an appropriate size and resolution, depending on where it is being displayed. Occasionally, Photo Resizer must auto-crop an image to fit the destination format. Photo Center enables you to set a focal point in your image to ensure that Photo Resizer does not leave out the essential parts.

To add a focal point to an image, take the following steps:

  1. Hover over an image thumbnail. A menu displays at the bottom of the thumbnail.

  2. Click the pencil icon icon_edit.jpg. The Edit image details page opens.

  3. Click the Set focal point icon_set_focal_point.jpg icon on the top left of the page. The Set a focal point window opens.

  4. Click any part of the image to set the focal point.

  5. Click Set focal point.

  6. Click Save.

Setting a focal point in Composer

When you add an image to your article in Composer, you can set a focal point for the image. If the image already has a focal point defined in Photo Center, the focal point you select within Composer overrides the original focal point only for your article. The original focal point remains unchanged.

To set the focal point within Composer, take the following steps:

  1. Navigate to Composer.

  2. Open a story that contains an image or create a story and insert an image.

  3. Click the image in the Composer editor. An action menu displays on the top-right of the image.

  4. Click the Set focal point icon_set_focal_point.jpg icon on the top left of the page. The Set a focal point window opens.

  5. Click any part of the image to set the focal point.

  6. Click Set focal point. The image displays the selected focal point in Composer editor.

In this section: