How do you re-link images?

[bend52910565]

I can't figure out how to re-link images in Captivate. In other Adobe software, this is a PIECE OF CAKE. Why does it have to be so difficult?

[Captiv8r]

Re link them to what, exactly?

Normally you insert an image and are pretty much done with it at that point. What you are describing seems as if you are hoping to achieve some sort of ongoing relationship with the images? Where you might be constantly fiddling with them in an image editor such as PhotoShop or Illustrator?

Cheers... Rick

[bend52910565]

Thanks for the quick reply, Captiv8r​!

Yes, I'd like to re-link images for editing/updating images outside of Captivate. (Maybe Captivate wasn't made for graphic fiddlers like me?)

But do the images ever become un-linked, like they do in InDesign (for example) when a file is not correctly packaged? Conversely, when you originally add an image into Captivate, is it immediately embedded into the file?

[Captiv8r · Accepted solution]

Hello again

It is my understanding that all images are directly stored inside the Captivate CPTX file. I believe that process also converts them all to PNG format internally.

If you have someone on the other side of the world that would open your CPTX file, all the images would still be inside. No need to ensure that you properly linked them up or anything.

When you locate the image in the Captivate library, you may right-click it and you should see an option to either edit the image, or there will be an Edit With option. So perhaps you inserted a BMP image. You right-click and choose to edit the BMP with perhaps Windows Paint. And if you had a .GIF image, you could repeat the process but use a different editor. It's been my experience that Captivate remembers the choice. So future edits to the BMP file type would open Paint while future edits to the JPG or whatever would open the editor assigned or selected last for that file type.

Hopefully this helps... Rick

[RodWard]

When you insert an image into a Captivate CPTX file, Captivate remembers the path to the original location of that image file ON YOUR SYSTEM. 

This means if you make an edit to that image OUTSIDE of Captivate (e.g. doing something to the image in PhotoShop) and save the changes, then the image version still inside the CPTX and the one outside on your hard drive will be out of sync. 

All you have to do within Captivate to sync them up again is find the image in the Captivate Library, right click that line item and choose Update from the context menu.  If you happen to be looking at the image on a slide in the Captivate Edit view, then after saving the update you'll see the image on the slide change to the latest version saved on your hard drive. 

Note that this Update option doesn't come up when you right click the image on the slide. only when you right click the image in the Library.  However, if you have a lot of images in the Library, right clicking the image on the slide and then selecting Find in the Library is a good quick way to immediately find the image you want to update.

By the way, this right-click > Update option is also available for other types of files in the Library, including audio, video and SWF.  However, SWF gives you a nice little red ball indicator next to items that have been changed outside the CPTX to let you know they need to be updated. (Items that are in-sync have green indicators.)  It would be lovely if images and other files also had these same indicators, but that might slow Captivate files down too much.

[Lilybiri]

Captivate is not InDesign... where packaging and relinking is necessary all the time.

A recommendation which I didn't see yet in the answers (maybe I missed it) is to use the possibility to have roundtripping with native PSD-files as much as possible.  Explore that feature and many more, before judging an application which is new to you with the same standards as other Adobe applications. Compare Photoshop with Audition or Animate CC and you could vome easily to same conclusions about differences. Captivate is meant to be an eLearning authoring tool, which means that file size is a lot more important (especially if you aim mobile devices) than for a desktop publisher like InDesign. Captivate has great roundtripping functionality, not only with Photoshop (which is the best) but also with Audition, Illustrator, PhoneGap and for the last version TypeKit. It supported SVG before PS included export to SVG, OAM, used to have roundtripping with Edge Inspect and Edge Animate (now killed by Adobe). Sorry for my ranting.... I never judge an application unless I have explored it really in depth, will not tell that it is sublevel if I don't know the ins and outs. Use the right tool for its purpose, I prefer Framemaker to InDesign as well for long course.