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Print Screen

Print Screen is a built in Windows feature that allows screen capture in a graphic format. On most Windows keyboards there is a key in the top right hand area that says Print Screen.

When you press the Print Screen Key, the entire screen is captured into the Windows Clipboard. That means into memory.

A good next step is to open the Paint Accessory in the Accessories Programs List. Most Windows instalations have this automaticly installed.

When Paint is open select Edit/Paste and the entire screen will be pasted as a new file to work on.

It is going to be big and wide and include all the buttons and borders of whatever Program you have open. In this case I am using Corel Painter to work on a file called Water Lillies.

The next step is to select the part of the screen you want to keep, if not all of it.

Use the Select rectangle box in the upper right area to pick out the Water Lillies this time and leave the rest out after selecting go to Edit/Copy and close the file.

Open a new blank file and select Edit/Paste, now you have captured what you want and can trim the picture carefully or change it in any way you wish. You may want to save As a .jpg (jpeg) for photographs and .gif for screen captures of text and Windows elements.

If you have a more advanced image editor you can do more. But Paint and Printscreen cost nothing and will do the job.

There are practical reason to use these features. When showing people how programs work or when seeking help, screen captures are worth a thousand words. It is a good way to capture and edit forms for printing out.

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