A system and method of processing an image comprises receiving a definition of at least one region in the image, where the region definition has a location specification and a type specification. The method further comprises displaying the boundaries of the at least one defined region according to its type specification, receiving a definition of a visible area in the image, the visible area definition having a specification of margins around the image, generating an image layout definition comprising the region definition and the visible area definition, and saving the image layout definition. The image layout definition may also be used as a template to conform image documents to a specified layout.