Cropping Graphics

Once you have placed a graphic in your document, you may decide to crop it. Cropping means to cut off part of the graphic so it doesn't show in your document. To crop a graphic, follow these steps:

1. Make sure the Picture toolbar is open. You can right click on the graphic and select Show Picture Toolbar if it is not.
2. Click on the Crop tool on the Picture toolbar.
3. Click on one of the graphic's handles with the mouse pointer.
4. Drag the handle toward the center of the graphic, stopping when you have cropped the desired amount.
5. You can turn off cropping by again clicking on the Crop tool.

You should realize that cropping a graphic in Word does not make any changes to the actual graphic. Instead, cropping means that you are simply telling Word how much of the original graphic you want displayed. If the graphic is embedded in the document, then cropping it is not a way to reduce file size because the full, complete graphic is still saved with the document. If you want to crop a graphic and reduce file size, then you will need to crop it in a graphics program (outside of Word) and insert the edited graphic in the document.