How do I correctly insert an image/figure and have the text "flow around" the image/figure in latex?

Question

I've been struggling with this. I wanted to insert an image and have it 'near' the text that discusses it, but have the text on that page wrap/flow around the image.

The image I've converted into eps format. I initially tried to use the figure environment (\begin{figure}...), but that merely placed the image at the top or bottom of the page without any text beside it, leaving a large portion of the page empty.

I did some digging on the web and identified the 'wrapfig' package, it seemed a likely solution, but I get a series of errors, and the image appears at the end of the document.

The errors:

Package wrapfig Warning: wrapfigure used inside a conflicting environment on input line 297.
Package wrapfig Warning: Stationary wrapfigure forced to float on input line 303.
Package wrapfig Warning: Stationary wrapfigure forced to float on input line 306.

Which continues for several lines.

What's odd is that one occasion, after compiling, the image appeared exactly where I wanted it, and then on the next it didn't.

[Added a minute or so later] The latex code I have currently:

\begin{wrapfigure}{r}{0.2\textwidth}[h]
  \begin{center}
    \includegraphics[width=0.18\textwidth]{vec-perp.eps}
  \end{center}
  \caption{A}
\end{wrapfigure}

Answer 1

I just went through my document, commenting it out in sections, hoping to find the environment it was complaining about...in the process, I unintentionally introduced a blank line that I didn't have before. Apparently, the environment it was complaining about was the environment before the figure. I didn't have a blank line between the previous part, which was an itemize environment.

So...this, for example, is 'broken':

Ingredients for the Banana-Grape Bread Recipe

\begin{itemize}
  \item Bananas
  \item Grapes
  \item Eggs
\end{itemize}
\begin{wrapfigure}{r}{0.2\textwidth}
  \centering
    \includegraphics[width=0.18\textwidth]{banana-grape.eps}
  \caption{BananaGrape Bread}
\end{wrapfigure}

And inserting a empty line:

\end{itemize}

\begin{wrapfigure}{r}{0.2\textwidth}

Clears up my problems. Along the way I learned all sorts of things, yay! On the other hand, I'm pretty sure I don't have a clear understanding of environments yet. Time to spend some time reading, I reckon.

Answer 2

wrapfigure does not need the [h] specifier.

you need to include the wrapfigure package in your preamble:

\usepackage{wrapfig}

then, put the wrapfigure call above the text you want to wrap into, like this:

\begin{wrapfigure}{r or l}{width/height} \centering \includegraphics[width/height]{graphic.filename} \caption{foo} \end{wrapfigure}

a real world example:

\begin{wrapfigure}{r}{1.5in}
\centering 
\includegraphics[width=1.5in]{smile.jpg}
\end{wrapfigure}