Placing content

About placing content

A file of a supported file format can be dragged and dropped onto the page to place it.

Alternatively, multiple items can be dragged and dropped onto the page to load them onto the Place panel. They can then be placed, one at a time, in their top-to-bottom order from the panel or in any order you choose.

The selected item on the panel can be placed at its native dimensions or arbitrary dimensions by tapping or dragging in the document view, respectively.

Tips for placing content

Placed images are added as image layers rather than pixel layers. This allows the original image data (e.g., the native resolution, color space and color profile) to be kept. Some brush operations (e.g., retouching) will automatically rasterize image layers to the document resolution; selection manipulation on an image layer will require manual rasterization via the Layers panel. You can control automatic rasterization behavior using the Assistant. On export to PDF, the image data is re-embedded into the PDF file.
Placed documents offer a Page Box option among their details on the Resource Manager panel. Use this option to choose how the page displays (e.g., with/without bleed, objects only).
Use the scale slider to ensure correct scaling of CAD-derived PDFs or PDF/PSD adverts.
For an Affinity document, PDF or PSD file, it will be listed on the Layers panel with a type of 'Embedded document'.
The placed content can be rasterized at any time via the Quick Menu (or the Layers panel).
A file's embedded color profile will always be converted to the Affinity document's current working space.
For unprofiled placed images, the color space is assumed to be RGB.

Once placed in your document, you have the option to replace the content, retaining its position, as well as edit placed content.

Supported file formats for placement

Many industry-standard file formats can be placed.

Documents
- Affinity Photo 2/Designer 2/Publisher 2
- Adobe Illustrator (AI)
- Adobe Freehand (10 and MX)¹
- Adobe Photoshop (PSD)
- Adobe InDesign (IDML)
- Microsoft Excel (XLSX)
- PDF
- DWG/DXF
- RTF⁵
- Plain text⁵
Images
- BMP
- EPS
- GIF
- HEIF/HEIC/HIF⁴
- JPEG
- J2K,JP2
- JPEG-XR/JXR (WDP/HDP)
- PNG
- RAW²
- SVG
- TGA³
- TIFF
- WEBP
- OpenEXR
- Radiance HDR

¹ Multi-page Freehand files open with each page concatenated onto a single page. Add file extension .fh10 or .fh11 in Finder to import. Text import is not supported.

² Raw images are processed automatically.

³ Supports transparency.

⁴ For iPhone images, the HEIC file may include an upsampled depth map, loaded as an editable second layer. For Canon EOS models (1 DX MkIII, R5 and R6), HIF files (HDR 10-bit PQ-encoded) are supported.

⁵ See Importing text for information about placing textual documents.

Tips for specific file formats and content

Content type	Comments
Affinity Designer files with multiple artboards	Once placed, you can choose which artboard to display by opening the placed document's details on the Resource Manager panel and setting Artboard.
Affinity documents, PDFs and PSD files	The file will be listed in the Resource Manager panel as either an Embedded document or Linked document depending on the Image placement policy set during initial Document Setup.
PSD files	A bitmap representation of the file will be displayed; the file content will not be interpreted. This will generally give better results on output and also negates the requirement to have correct fonts installed. You can still edit the layers of the placed PSD, although if edits are made the file will be interpreted again and its appearance may change (for example, if a font is missing).
PDFs, SVGs, PSD and EPS files	If these are placed as embedded documents, you can edit them within Affinity. If edits are made, these files will be converted to Affinity documents and the original data will not be retained; you will not be able to write the embedded file out to its native file format and make it linked. Other features such as using PDF Passthrough will also then be lost. Please note that the Resource Manager will always display the original file's source filename and location should you need to refer back to it.
Affinity documents, PDFs, SVGs, PSD and EPS files	If these are placed as linked documents, you will not be able to edit them directly within Affinity. However, any edits made to the files will be picked up by Affinity and will be reported as Modified on the Resource Manager panel. You can then tap the entry on the panel and select Update to match the external changes that were made.
Multi-page Affinity documents, InDesign (IDML) documents or PDFs	After placing a multi-page document and with it selected, you can choose a different page/spread to display by opening its details on the Resource Manager panel and setting Artboard.
Placed PDFs	These offer a PDF Passthrough option on the placed document's details on the Resource Manager panel, which defaults to Passthrough for exact reproduction within your own PDFs. If that's not possible, the Interpret option is selected. A bitmap preview of the PDF’s contents is displayed while editing your document in Affinity.
Password-protected PDFs	Placing a password-protected PDF will prompt you to enter the file's password. The password is then requested whenever you open the parent document. When the parent document is exported, the resulting PDF does not have to be password-protected. If you wish to protect the exported PDF, ensure you set the required password(s) and restrictions on Affinity's Export dialog.
Placed PDF, DWG or DXF files containing layers	These offer a Layers option on the placed document's details on the Resource Manager panel, from which you can choose which of the placed file's layers are visible or hidden in your Affinity document. For example, a layer of a DWG or DXF file might contain notes or more technical information, such as component labeling, that you want to omit for a less technical audience. For PDFs, changing layer visibility will automatically change from PDF Passthrough to Interpret.
Microsoft Excel Workbook spreadsheets (XLSX)	These can be placed directly in Publisher as tables. When placing, tap on the page (instead of dragging) to preserve the original appearance of the file.

To place content:

From the Designer Persona, open the Document menu and tap Place.
On the dialog that appears, do one of the following:
- Tap Place from Files, navigate to and select the files you wish to place, then tap Open.
- Tap Place from Photos, navigate to and tap the photos you wish to place, then tap Add.
If you selected multiple files or photos, the Place panel will appear and display them. The topmost item on the panel is automatically selected to be placed next.
(Optional) Select a different item.
Do one of the following:
- Tap in the document view to place the item at its native size.
- Drag in the document view to set the size and position of the item.
The item is removed from the panel.
If additional items are awaiting placement, do one of the following:
- repeat from step 3. The panel will close when it contains no more items.
- on the context toolbar, tap Cancel to cancel further placement and close the panel.

To scale a placed image/document:

Select the image or document.
From the scale slider (shown next to the tool icons), either:
- Drag the slider.
- Tap just above the slider to reveal a numeric keypad on which to enter a percentage scale, relative to the placed item's current dimensions.

To return squashed content to its original aspect ratio:

With the content selected, double-tap on one of its edge handles to reset its aspect ratio.

To replace content: