Understanding handles

The bounding boxes of selected text paths, lines, and boxes have small white squares called item handles. You can use these handles to resize and rotate a selected item.


Item handles

To resize an item, click and drag its item handles. To rotate an item, click and drag just outside one of the item’s corner handles. The mouse pointer changes when you move it over or near a handle to indicate which action you can perform:

QuarkXpress example resize rotate box Understanding handles

You can use item handles to resize or rotate an item.


Picture handles

When you select the Picture Content tool and click a picture box that contains a picture, the picture displays with large circles for handles. These handles are called picture content handles. When you click any part of the picture overlay, you can use the Move pointer QuarkXpress icon picture move pointer Understanding handles to move the picture within its box.

QuarkXpress example Picture and box handles Understanding handles

Picture box displaying picture content handles

Picture content handles display even if the selected picture exceeds the size of its box (see illustration above). The picture displays beyond the box boundary. You can crop the image by resizing the picture box.

You can use picture content handles to resize or rotate a picture without changing the size or angle of its picture box.

  • Resize pointers: QuarkXpress pointers resize Understanding handles
  • Rotation pointers: QuarkXpress pointers rotate Understanding handles

QuarkXpress example Picture rotate Understanding handles

Rotated picture in an unrotated box

If you want to move a picture box or see what its crop looks like without the transparent overlay, press the Command/Ctrl key. This temporarily dismissed the overlay and allows you to interact with the box as if the Item tool were selected.

Note: If you click and drag with the Picture Content tool when the mouse pointer is positioned over a spot where a picture box handle and picture content handle overlap, only the picture is resized or rotated. If you want to move the item handle, select the Item tool.

Understanding handles