Inspiring

Answered

How do you lock the Image Frame and Contents frame together?

Forum|Forum|15 years ago
December 21, 2010
10 replies
65112 views

Hi

InDesign CS4 question.

I should have asked this a long time ago, but I got used to just dragging a big image frame and then switching to the white selection arrow and moving the contents to where I want it and then dragging the cropping frames to the size.

Then positioning the image and within it.

But there are time when I just want to drag the image to another location.

Sometimes I can and sometimes I can't.

When it will not move the two frames at the same time how do I lock them together.

I really looked for a solution but I must not be describing what I'm trying to do because I can't find anything.

Any help appreciated!

Mike

Correct answer Petteri_Paananen

That's a feature called Content Grabber but it wasn't there with InDesign CS4...

by the way, if that bothers you, you can always hide Content Grabber on View>Extras menu.

Chardb

Known Participant

I am using the CS version. I too am sick of never knowing how to move a graphic. Its always a hit and miss. A majority of the I end up moving the frame and not the graphic which is almost never what I want. I mena how often is it that you want to move the frame but not the graphic?

Why can't the graphic to locked to the frame as a default? Then if you are the more advanced type, then you can undo the option. This would be far more efficient.

M

Migintosh

Legend

If you have an image in a frame, you can move the frame with the Select tool (black arrow), and the image will move along with it. If you want to move the image without moving the frame, you need to do one of three things:

Switch to the Direct Select tool (white arrow).
Double-click with the Select tool.
Use the Select tool and have the Content Grabber active. Wait to click until the cursor is above the donut, and the cursor turns to a hand.

The only way I can move the frame without moving the image is to use the Direct Select tool, drag a marquee around all corners of the image frame, and then click only on an edge of the frame. It's a little hard to do that, since if you click on the image, you will move the image and not the frame. If your image has a clipping path and you click on a portion of it, it will edit the clipping path as you would edit a bezier shape. You have to click right on the frame edge to move the frame without moving the content. If you click within the frame, even after selecting the whole frame with the Direct Select tool, you will move the frame and contents together.

Is this working differently for you?

L

Laubender

Community Expert

Hi together,

I think, the cause of this problem is:

Container frame is selected with the Selection Tool (black arrow)

Switch to the Direct Selection Tool (white arrow)

Then all path points are selected.

Simply hitting the A key on the keyboard will do this.

( Also by intentionally changing the tool by clicking the Direct Selection Tool (white arrow) )

The container frame will be shifted and not the image if you:

1. Use the arrow keys.
2. Do dragging if the cursor hovers over the edge of the frame.

This will be indicated with a / at the cursor icon.

Regards,
Uwe

Jocelyn_Simmons

Participating Frequently

Yes! Thank you to Petteri_Paananen for actually answering this:

That's a feature called Content Grabber but it wasn't there with InDesign CS4...

by the way, if that bothers you, you can always hide Content Grabber on View>Extras menu.

I've been sick and tired of never knowing when I click on a linked image in InDesign if I'm going to select the FRAME or the IMAGE INSIDE the frame. It is awesome to now know how to turn off the ability to select the contents and only select the FRAME and toggle it on and off. This was endlessly annoying.

coolbana

Participant

I've had the same issue. I finally figured out, if you "pick up" the image from near the middle, the cursor changes to hand, and you're moving the image without the frame. If you pick it up from nearer the edges, the cursor is a black arrow with a box near it, that one moves the image and frame together. Hope this helps.

Petteri_PaananenCorrect answer

Inspiring

That's a feature called Content Grabber but it wasn't there with InDesign CS4...

by the way, if that bothers you, you can always hide Content Grabber on View>Extras menu.

L

L2L0

Participant

hey it might be to lat but i found how to do it you have to right click on the image and go to fitting then frame fitting option and there will be a check box that says Auto-Fit click it and now every time that you want to re-size your box he image will re-size automatically to the box.

home this helps

NohjekimAuthor

Inspiring

Hi

Thanks for the response.

I did eventually figure out that I could drag the box to where I wanted it and then right click and select fit image to frame.

I never did figure out why it sometimes just moves with the frame be default and sometimes it doesn't.

I'll look at what you suggested though, and I'll set it to start with so it does it automatically.

Thanks again.

Mike

Peter Spier

Community Expert

I've reread this and a poosibilty we missed earlier is yo ar moving the frame with the direct select tool, That could happen if you've double-clicked, too.

NohjekimAuthor

Inspiring

I'll try both of these things.

Thanks for the help.

Merry Christmas

Mike

Peter Spier

Community Expert

And to you..

NohjekimAuthor

Inspiring

Hi again.

Yes the blue frame drags and the image just moves out of the box as I drag it away.

I've started with Aldus PageMaker and moved through may versions of Adobe PageMaker and then into InDesign and I never saw anything like this until I installed InDesign CS4 on my new PC.

As I said it doesn't do this all the time, only once in a while. I have no idea if this somehow relates to how my video works, I've had lots of other strange things over the years.

Like not being able to get PageMaker to refresh the screen without having to switch back and forth between windowed and full screen every time. I had this on several computers.

That's why I thought it was some command that I was triggering somehow.

I haven't had a chance to see if deleting and reimporting the image again will clear it up but I'm guessing that it will.

If I find out I'll come back and let you know.

I'm retired (72) and don't spend a lot of time in InDesign now, but I still do an job once in a while.

Mike

Peter Spier

Community Expert

If it continues to happen, I suggest you trytrashing your prefs. See Replace Your Preferences

You should also be able to select the frame and choose fitting aoptions to get the image back inside (ore use one of the buttons on the control panel). But this still sounds like a case of two frames. These aren't converted Pagemaker files with keylines around images, are they? Pagemaker required a separate stroked rectangle that was grouped with the image by the plugin. ID can stroke the image frame directly, but I suspect a converted file might still have the extra rectangle, particulary if the two parts had been ungrouped (that used to drive me crazy when I did ads for real estate brokers and auto dealers with lots of photos when I worked for a newspaper that was PM-based).

NohjekimAuthor

Inspiring

What happens is that when I grab the frame and drag it the image is just left behind and becomes invisible since it only shows when It's inside the frame.

As I said when this happens I have to drag a big frame to find it again.

Then I have to move the contents to where I want them and then size the frame fit the space.

But now that I know it's not some kind of feature that I wasn't aware of I'll try deleting the picture and importing it again.

Thanks again for the help.

Mike

Peter Spier

Community Expert

Are you absolutely certain the frame is moving, and not the image? Each has an independent bounding box The one for the frame matches the color code assigned to the layer, the one for the image is differernt -- for the deafult layer 1, this would be light blue for the frame and brown for the image) Is there a stroke on the frame so you could tell?

I'm wondering if you might be double-clicking the frame before moving, that would select the content and switch to the direct select tool, so you would be moving the image and leaving the frame behind.

NohjekimAuthor

Inspiring

Well then it's some kind of glitch.

I'm running Windows 7 64 bit, I had to upgrade from CS2 because it wouldn't run in 64 bit Windows.

The next time I have it happen I'll try just deleting the image and place it again and see what happens.

I really thought it was some new feature that I had not seen in earlier versions.

As I said I tried to make it do it today on purpose and couldn't get it to do so.

I must do something that triggers it but I don't know what.

Thanks for the help.

Mike

Peter Spier

Community Expert

It sounds almost like you have two frames, one in front of the other.

NohjekimAuthor

Inspiring

Hi

I should have described it better.

I know it normally works this way but sometimes since I switched to CS4, I have done something that makes the frame and the image independent and I don't know how I got it that way.

Once this happens I can drag the frame using the black selection tool and the image stays behind. I can't get them to move as one unit again.

I don't know what I do to create this condition.

I just tried to do it on purpose and couldn't

I figured this was some feature I wasn't aware of.

As I said, I didn't have this until I upgraded to CS4.

Maybe it's just some kind of glitch, but I assumed that I was hitting some key or something that caused this and that there was a command to make them rejoin.

Mike

Peter Spier

Community Expert

I've never seen that happen, and as far as I know it shouldn't be possible.

Peter Spier

Community Expert

Use the selection tool (black arrow) for positioning the frame. The content will come along for the ride. The dierect select tool is for manipulating the content inside the frame.

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