WP research - can the excerpt accept an image?

[ashleychampagne]

Can the excerpt accept an image? Or have the API call the media from the media library? Can you call an unpublished post?

[ccarvel]

trying first with 'featured image' added to post (have added images to cherokee and 'ephraim'--patrick will let me know if that can be called/formatted ok, or if not, I will create/borrow an advanced excerpt php function that permits addition of html img src tag that won't be mangled by wordpress stripping/prettifying the characters like < = " etc