Camera in Excel feature
In my attempt to find what was new in Excel during 2024, I asked CoPilot to provide me what it knew was new. One feature was the linking a cell to a shape which was interesting to me and reminded me of the camera in Excel feature.
This feature is not a well-known feature and cannot be found in the menu system. I had to pull it into the Quick Access toolbar at the top. The image below is that of the quick access toolbar found in the upper left-hand corner. Due to using the Snipping tool, it is greyed out.
How do you get this?
Well, first click that tiny down arrow that will be at the end of the Quick Access tool.
You should now get a tiny menu box. Look for “More Commands…”
(Why this image suddenly blow up, I don’t know.)
In the box after, “Choose commands from:”, select the option “All Commands” so that you can find the Camera icon.
Scroll down the middle box and find the Camera icon. “Add” the camera to your Quick Access toolbar using that “Add>>” button.
After making your selection, you can then click on the “OK” button. You can scroll through this list to see what else might pique your interest. Just keep in mind about the risk of cluttering up that Quick Access toolbar.
What does the Camera icon do?
It simply makes a special picture of whatever group of cells you highlight. With that special picture copied, you can paste it somewhere else in the spreadsheet. Then, when the original cells change, that special picture will update, unlike a regular picture.
Let’s put some imagery here to make it clearer.
This is an image of a bunch of cells showing dates and egg prices in a spreadsheet. The data ends at row 540 (my clipping was not done well). This data is on the “FRED Graph Eggs” tab.
This image is actually a Camera picture placed in the “Sheet1” tab. Note the upper left corner of the table is not snugged up in A1
To make this really interesting, I’m going to do a Camera shot of just the bottom part of the eggs data:
I copied and pasted the Camera image on top of a group of cells colored in grey.
Now watch me move that image.
I’ve moved the image away from the grey cells.
So who cares about this Excel Camera feature?
Well, say you are adjusting or changing some variables, input or data and you don’t want to move around the spreadsheet to find that section that you are keeping an eye on. You want to be able to make changes and see right away the result, right on that tab.
Sometimes files can get really big so maneuvering around can get tedious every time you make a change.
In the examples I have chosen, the last date for egg prices was 11/1/2024. Say a new data point comes in but you don’t want to find that tab with the original set of data. Below is the image of the Camera picture updating with the latest data point. I didn’t have to redo the Camera image copy and paste: the data just automatically updated itself.
This Camera feature is not new, but I thought it was interesting. I have used it before to see quickly the resulting updates in calculations when I change certain variables. Having that image of a certain section of the spreadsheet beats moving back and forth between tabs.
New feature: linking cell to a shape
This Excel feature seems to be new in 2024 and right now strikes me more as a curiosity. I really haven’t come up with a good use for it yet. I have an idea, but I need to test it out.
Here’s an image of a rectangular shape with a red outline and a date text 1/1/1980 laid against a blue background.
When I move the rectangular shape away from the blue background, the date text traveled along with the shape.
But look in the formula bar: the shape references another cell A2 found in another tab “FRED Graph Eggs”. It is kind of hard to see that the reference is tied to the rectangular shape but look further to the left of the formula bar and you will see “Rectangle1” which is the name of the shape.
Why would I use the shape feature?
At present time, I haven’t used this (I have used the Excel Camera feature many times) but I do have an idea. I would have to play around though to see if it would work as I have imagined it.
There are other new features but those are for another post. I wanted to start out with an old feature that you might not be using but could find it useful.
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