Anchored Items in QuarkXPress

by Sandee Cohen

I get a phone call like this once a month. “Help! I have a picture box on my page in QuarkXPress that I cannot move. The box only has three handles. What’s going on?”

The caller has an anchored object. These are picture or text boxes that are anchored to a paragraph of text. The benefit of anchored items is that they move along with the text of a story.

Creating Anchored Items

1.
Draw the text or picture box to be anchored. Make sure you are in the Item tool.

2.
Select the box and choose Copy from the Edit menu. (This copies the entire item, not just the contents.)

3.
Switch to the Content tool. 

4.
Position your insertion point in the text where you would like to anchor the object.

5.
Choose Paste from the Edit menu.

Voilá! You have just anchored the item to the text.

Changing anchored objects

Click on the anchored object. You should see three handles as shown below. These handles can be used to resize the box. You can also change the size using the measurements palette.

If the object is a picture box, you can reduce, enlarge or crop the picture as usual. If the object is a text box, you can type any text you want.

Positioning anchored objects

Select the anchored object and look at the measurements palette or choose Modify from the Item menu.

The default is to anchor the object from the baseline up. The alternate is to anchor the object from the ascenders down as shown below.

Enhancements

1.
Place the indent here character (Command-Backslash) between the object and the following text. That sets the object off from the rest of the paragraph.

2.
Kern between the object and the following text to add more space.

3.
Drag across the object and choose Baseline Shift from the Style menu to raise or lower the object.

Adding Runaround

Once an object is anchored you cannot apply a runaround. You can, however, add a runaround before you anchor the object.

Before anchoring the object, choose Runaround from the Item menu. Choose Item from the Mode pop-up menu. Put the runaround amount you want in the Top box. Anchor the object as usual. The runaround amount will be applied to all four sides.

Tips for working with anchored objects

•
To get rid of an anchored object, put your insertion point to the right of the object and press the Delete key.

•
You can delete an anchored object but you can’t “export” it back into a regular object.

•
You can only anchor rectangular objects.

•
You cannot link text into or out of an anchored text box.

•
The anchored object must be 2 points thinner than the column or text box into which it is anchored.

Sandee Cohen is a consultant/trainer in the field of desktop publishing based in New York City. She is also co-author of The QuarkXPress Typographer’s Manual to be published by Business One Irwin. She is available for consulting and training assignments and can be reached at (212) 677-7763.  •