Mark up a picture

Draw, point and write on a photo or a screenshot in a note — and change your marks whenever you like.

Open the picture's markup tools: use the picture's ✎, or choose Edit and Annotate from its menu.
Pick a tool and mark up the picture.
Save when you're done. The marks appear on the picture in the note.

The tools:

Pen and marker for freehand lines.
Text to type a label onto the picture.
Arrow, line, rectangle and ellipse to point things out.

Draw with the mouse or trackpad.

Draw with Apple Pencil, using the system's tool picker.

If you close the markup tools with changes you haven't kept, NotaBene asks before throwing them away. Removing a single mark with the bin or ⌫ doesn't ask; you can undo it.

Crop a picture

Choose Rectangular Selection (the dashed rectangle) in the markup tools.
Drag across the part of the picture you want to keep. A frame with handles appears; nothing is cut yet.
Drag a handle to move that corner or edge, or drag inside the frame to move it.
Choose Crop Selection at the end of the bar.

Return or ⌘K crops as well, and Escape takes the frame away.

Choosing another tool takes the frame away without cropping. If you save while a frame is still up, the picture is cropped to it first. Undo brings the whole picture back.

Your marks stay editable

The marks are kept beside the picture, not burned into it. Open the picture again and every mark comes back exactly as you drew it — the same line, the same corners, the same width — however many times you return to it. You can move a mark, change it or remove it weeks later.

The marks belong to the picture's name, so they stay with it when you rename it, and they reach your other devices with the note.

Tip: Search finds the words you typed onto a picture.