Rearrange, Align and Resize Objects
An object is any text box, picture, shape, chart, or other item that you insert into and work with on the slide. Often, an object you add to a slide may seem to be misaligned or misplaced with respect to other elements, affecting the overall arrangement and look of your presentation. Using Zoho Shows' various alignment, arrangement, and positioning options you can precisely move, resize, align, and rotate objects within the slide area and avoid having them overlap or merge with one another during the slideshow.
Important: If you need to apply the same changes to all the slides then you can do so within the Slide Master. Altering properties in the Slide Master will provide a consistent look to your presentation and prevent you from repeatedly aligning, rearranging, moving, and editing the object placeholders on each and every slide in your presentation.
Before you move onto the steps, check out the sample slide deck below created using the different alignment and positioning options available in Zoho Show such as flip, rotate, and distribute to provide a consistent look to the presentation. You can also save, share, and reuse these slides in your own presentations.
Align objects on a slide
Imagine that you have a slide with several randomly placed pictures scattered around, and you want to impose a more logical order to them. With Show's alignment options, you can arrange your objects either horizontally (left, right, and center) or vertically (top, middle and bottom) on the slide in no time.
To change the alignment of objects on a slide,
- Select the objects (text box, shape, picture, etc) you want to align. You will see the FORMAT mode open on the right pane.
- Select the Arrange tab within the pane and click Align dropdown to choose how you want to align your object.
- There are two ways to align an object - Align to Slide and Align to Shape. You can also use Grids/Guides to align objects accurately on slides.
- Align to Slide: Aligns objects with in relation to the slide, i.e., either to the horizontal or vertical plane of the slide.
- Align to Shapes: Aligns two or more objects (shapes/pictures/text boxes) with in relation to each other This option will only be available if you've selected multiple objects rather than a single object.
Choose the direction in which you want to align the object.
To align objects horizontally (left, right, centre),
- Click Left
to align the selected objects either to the left of the slide or shape.
- Click Center
to align the selected objects either to the center of the slide or shape.
- Click Right
to align the selected objects either to the right of the slide or shape.
The GIF below shows that the images are aligned to the left, center, and right of the slide.
The GIF below shows that the images are aligned to the left, center, and right of the shape.
To align objects vertically (top, middle, bottom),
-
Click Top
to align the selected objects either to the top of the slide or shape.
-
Click Middle
to align the selected objects(either to the middle of the slide or shape.
-
Click Bottom
to align the selected objects either at the bottom of a slide or shape.
The GIF below shows that the images are aligned to the top, middle, and bottom of the slide.
The GIF below shows that the images are aligned to the top, middle, and bottom of the shape.
Resize an object
Many of the images or shapes that you insert into your slide may at first seem too large to fit or perhaps too small to see properly. In these cases, resizing can be as simple as clicking and dragging the side handles and edges of the object. However, with the use of Size values such as Width and Height , you can alter the size of your objects to fit exact proportions.
To resize an object on a slide,
- Select the object (text box, shape, picture, etc) you want to resize. You will see the FORMAT mode open on the right pane.
- Select the Arrange tab within the pane and navigate to Size to resize your object in the following ways:
- To resize by width and height: Use the Up and Down arrow to set the required size value or manually type in the pixel value within the text box.
- To resize by aspect ratio: Resizing an object with respect to a common aspect ratio fits them to the exact proportions and size of the picture within the set object frame/box. Knowing the aspect ratio helps you to adjust the size values to match with all other slide objects even before you start working. To do this, enable the Maintain Aspect Ratio checkbox. You will see the default Width and Height values of the selected object on the slide.
Your object will be resized to the required value in the slide. You can also use the boundary box of the object placeholder to manually resize objects.
Resize manually using the boundary box (of a placeholder)
By default, the objects such as pictures, shapes, video files, and twitter feeds that you add to your slide will be placed within a placeholder that appears as a box with a dotted border.
To resize an object manually,
- Select the object in the slide. The placeholder box will appear along with four corner handles and four side handles on the edges.
- Use any of the following options to resize:
-
To reduce the size of the object, drag any of the handles inward.
-
To increase the size of object, drag any of the handles outward.
-
To maintain the width-height proportion of the object placeholder, press and hold the Shift key while you drag any of the four corner handles.
-
To resize equally on opposite sides of the object placeholder, press the Shift key while you drag one of the four side handles.
Rotate an object
There are several situations that may require you to rotate an object on the slide. For example, to explain trigonometry concepts with angles and shapes, to create different patterns of the same image, or to explain the simple concept of clockwise/anti-clockwise rotation. The rotation tool can be useful in all sorts of situations.
To rotate an object on slide,
- Select the object (text box, shape, picture, etc) you wish to rotate. You will see the FORMAT mode open on the right pane.
- Select the Arrange tab within the pane and navigate to Rotate field. You can set the desired rotational value using below ways:
- Turn the rotation slider to set the desired rotational value (in degrees) or type in your rotational value within the text box.
-
You can also use increments of 90 degrees to rotate your object. Clicking the
icon will rotate your object 90 degrees to the right and the
icon will rotate your object 90 degrees to the left.
The object will appear rotated in the slide. You can also manually rotate the object by selecting the object placeholder and turning the rotation handle on top in the direction you wish to rotate and to the amount of degrees you want.
Move the position of an object
If you want to place your slide objects in an exact location on the slide , then one of best options is to specify the object's position. Using the position option, you can set the horizontal and vertical values of the selected object to precisely fix two objects in the same position or level or order with respect to each other on the slide.
To move/position a slide object,
- Select the object (text box, shape, picture, etc) you want to position. You will see the FORMAT mode open on the right pane.
- Select the Arrange tab within the pane and navigate to Position field to set the horizontal and vertical values using Up and Down arrows or type in the required pixel value inside the box.
The object will be moved to the required position within the slide. You can also manually move the object by clicking the border of the object placeholder and dragging it to a new position while holding the mouse button.
Distribute objects evenly
Imagine you have a set of objects sitting in a row or a column and you want them to spread out at equal distance from each other on a straight line. This is the perfect time to use the Distribute option. Distributing objects is the best way to make a cluttered slide to look more clear and organized.
To distribute objects evenly on a slide,
- Select the objects (text box, shape, picture, etc) you want to distribute. You will see the FORMAT mode open on the right pane.
- Select the Arrange tab within the pane and navigate to Distribute field. There are two ways to distribute your object: Horizontal and Vertical.
-
Click Horizontal button to distribute the selected objects equally on a horizontal plane (side-by-side) so that the space between all of them is equal.
-
Click Vertical button to distribute the selected objects equally on a vertical plane (above and below) so that the space between all of them is equal.
The objects will be spread out evenly on the slide.
Flip an object
Creating mirror images of your pictures can be a great way to make your slides more interesting. The Flip option lets you make a reflection of the original image in the reverse direction. This can be used to make fun patterns, or just to flip an image towards the preferred direction.
To flip an object on a slide,
- Select the object (text box, shape, picture, etc) you want to flip. You will see the FORMAT mode open on the right pane.
- Select the Arrange tab within the pane and navigate to Flip option. There are two ways to flip your object:
- Horizontal reverses the object horizontally (right to left or left to right).
-
Vertical reverses the object vertically (top to bottom or bottom to top).
Rearrange an object
Sometimes after adding text, you might go back in and add pictures or other objects to your slide. When you do this, you may notice that one object overlaps with another. This often results in the text going beneath the picture and no being visible on the slide. This overlapping can be avoided by using the Arrange option. Arranging or ordering objects will help you bring objects that have been hidden back to the forefront.
To rearrange an object on slide,
- Select the objects (text box, shape, picture, etc) you want to rearrange. You will see the FORMAT mode open on the right pane.
- Select the Arrange tab within the pane. You can arrange the slide objects in four directions (To Front, Forward, To Back, and Backward):
-
Click
to move the selected objects in front of all other objects
-
Click
to move the selected objects one level above all other slide objects.
-
Click
to move the selected objects behind all other slide objects.
-
Click
to move the selected objects one level below all other slide objects.
The objects will be rearranged on the slide in the order you specified.
Check out the presentation below created using different alignment and positioning options such as flip, rotate, and distribute on Zoho Show. Feel free to save, share, and even reuse them in your own presentations!
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