Insert Any Image Type Into SOLIDWORKS Electrical - With Video Instructions

In SOLIDWORKS Electrical, inserting a picture (rather than attaching one) requires the photo to be of type BMP or DIB. Inserting is a better method than attaching because if the original image gets moved to a different location on your hard drive or network, and you’ve merely attached the image, your document will no longer show the picture.

Traditionally, we have always thought that the only way to insert non-supported pictures was to convert the image types by opening the picture in Microsoft Paint and saving the work as the BMP file extension. It seemed tedious, and you end up with duplicate images on your hard drive just due to the file types.

I have had a number of people tell me they don’t like converting to BMP for inserting because the image quality can diminish, and I haven’t had a good solution for anyone who wants to keep their images as .jpegs or .pngs but doesn’t want to attach them…

Until now!

I recently discovered a nifty trick that allows you to insert any image type (such as .png, .jpeg, .gif, .tiff, etc.) with ease. Credit goes to a person in Germany who found the method and made a YouTube video—in German. The video is a few years old, but it is new to me, and so you don’t have to learn a lifetime’s worth of German just to watch the video and learn what to do, here’s the trick: Open the image in Paint before trying to insert it in SOLIDWORKS Electrical. Leave Paint open while you insert the picture, but once it’s inserted, you can close Paint. That’s it! No conversion is necessary. While Paint is still a required step, the arduous task of resaving the file as a different type is not required, saving you time and restoring the full quality of your images.

I have re-recorded the process in English for your viewing pleasure. See the video below to watch this process in action!

Brian Cooke
Sr. Application Engineer, Electrical
Computer Aided Technology, Inc.