No Stilly. The carriage returns under discussion are NOT NECESSARILY associated with images, image placement, or image format. They occur randomly throughout documents and are an obvious Word "bug;" and they could affect almost anything, although we don't really know what they may do. Like spirits and gods - because we don't understand them or know where they come from or why they visit us. They are a "feature" that is NOT SUPPOSED TO BE THERE. I have confirmed that Microsoft doesn't believe in them, and refuses to admit that they exist.

Helen and I seem to be the only true believers, so we may form a cult - although I haven't asked. Some rituals have already been developed. Do we have any virgins prepared to volunteer? (I also haven't asked if Helen wants virgins, so we'll go slowly here.)

But for picture management, an easier way (IMO) is just to go to View|Tools, Toolbars, and check the "Picture" toolbar. Once this toolbar is "turned on," the toolbar will pop up whenever you click on an image, and should disappear when you click off the image. It probably will pop up on the window, but if you drag it once up onto the top toolbar it will appear and disappear there. All the tools are right there, and you can choose any "tool," but if you click the little "paint bucket" you get the "format" tools on tabs in a single window, exactly as you get by clicking Format|Picture; and the toolbar also has Crop, Rotate, Commpress (in versions that have it) and a couple of other "picture tools" immediately accessible on the toolbar.

John