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The Microsoft Clip Organizer is a clip-organizing tool that helps you keep all your image, sound, and motion files in one place, arranged according to topic. To launch the Microsoft Clip Organizer, click the Clip Organizer link at the bottom of the Insert Clip Art task pane. Figure 14-4 shows the Microsoft Clip Organizer as it first appears.
Figure 14-4. Click the folder of the collection you want to view.
The layout of the Microsoft Clip Organizer resembles that of the Windows Explorer; you can easily see the number of collections available for your selection. You'll use the following items to help you locate and work with the clips you need:
Figure 14-5. The Clip Organizer has a new look and feel in Word 2002.
To choose a clip from the Microsoft Clip Organizer, simply navigate to the clip you want and select it in the view window. The image is selected and a down arrow appears along the right edge of the image. Click the down arrow to display the drop-down menu; a range of choices appears, as Figure 14-6 shows.
How will you use the Clip Organizer to work with your images? Most of the things you'll do in the Clip Organizer have to do with organizing and accessing your images. For example, you can use the Clip Organizer to do the following:
Figure 14-6. Right-click an image and choose an option to work with your Gallery images.
To access Web tools for working with Clip Organizer images, select the clip art image in the view window, click the down arrow, and choose Tools On The Web from the drop-down menu. The Microsoft Clip Organizer eServices window appears, and you can explore the various offerings on the site.
Over time, you might find that you have a group of images that qualify as "favorites." You can save those clips to your Favorites collection so that you can access them easily. Here's how:
Figure 14-7. You can drag a copy of an image to your Favorites folder to keep a collection of files you use often.
Tip - Copy images from the Task Pane
You can copy an image from the Insert Clip Art task pane to your Favorites folder in the Clip Organizer by clicking the image down arrow and choosing Copy To Collection. When the Copy To Collection dialog box appears, you can choose your Favorites collection (or another collection as applicable) and click OK. The image is then copied to the specified collection.
If you're using your own clip art collections or you want to use clip art from a previous Office version, you can have the Clip Organizer search and add clips automatically. To add the clips to the Clip Organizer, follow these steps:
Figure 14-8. The Clip Organizer will search all available folders on your computer unless you specify otherwise.
The Clip Organizer also gives you the option of adding images manually, that is, by selecting the ones you want to add and specifying where they go. You can also add keywords that you'll use to refer to the images later. To add images on your own, follow these steps:
Figure 14-9. You can add your clips to the Clip Organizer manually by navigating to the folder you want and choosing a destination collection.
You can create a new collection in two ways: by clicking New in the Import To Collection dialog box or by choosing File, New Collection in the Clip Organizer. The New Collection dialog box appears, where you can choose a parent folder, if necessary, and enter a name for the collection (see Figure 14-10).
Figure 14-10. You can create new collections in the Clip Organizer to store clips specific to your interests or industry.
Tip - Review clip properties
For some of your documents, you'll need to look carefully for just the right images to fit the design and layout of your project. In these cases, you might want to see the file type, the size, the orientation, and any keywords associated with the image. To view the properties of an image, select the image and choose Preview/Properties from the drop-down menu. The Preview Properties dialog box displays file specifications and lists the full path to the file, along with any caption and keywords entered.
Keywords are important in helping you find the images you want. Each of the files in the Clip Organizer is assigned a certain number of keywords—these words help characterize the image so that the Clip Organizer knows what to display when you enter a certain word in the Search box. Keywords are what make it possible for you to enter cat in either the Microsoft Clip Organizer or the Insert Clip Art task pane and display the images of cats included in the collections.
To display the keywords for a specific image, follow these steps:
Figure 14-11. You can review, add, edit, or delete keywords in the Keywords dialog box.
Tip
If the Clip Organizer acquires files you don't want included, you can select and delete them using the image drop-down menu. Click the file you want to delete, and you'll see two delete options on the drop-down menu: You can delete the clip from the selected folder, or you can delete the file from the Clip Organizer completely. If you choose the first option, the image is deleted without any further action from you. If you choose the second option, the Clip Organizer alerts you that the action will cause the image to be deleted from all collections on your system. Click OK to proceed, or press Esc to cancel.