by Jordan Cropper

Created on: April 21, 2009

Screen capturing is something we've probably all had to do at some point, whether to illustrate an important point in a series of steps on a computer, to copy and image between two applications that simply won't get along, or for a whole host of other reasons. There are many ways and methods of screen capture available; here are just a few of them.
1) Good Old Print Screen (PrtScn)

The print screen key, located just to the right of the function keys on a standard desktop keyboard, is the simplest method of screen capture, even if at one point some of us thought it would indeed print out the contents of the screen. It simply copies the contents of the screen, as though you've just taken a picture of it, and allows it to be pasted into various applications, such as an office program or MS Paint. However, the print screen key is a basic, imprecise option, but it is free, it is there on all computers, and it is simple press the key, click paste, and the picture appears.
2)The Snipping Tool (Windows Vista and up)
The snipping tool is essentially a slightly more complex version of the veritable print screen key. Rather than pressing a key, you open the snipping tool from the start menu. The tool then allows you to select a specific area to copy to the clipboard, the whole screen or a specific window or the taskbar. The newly captured image is then opened in a simple editor, which is there to allow you to add hand drawn images and the like using an on-screen pen to the screen capture, presumably to make what is going on clearer. The editor also allows the 'Snip' to the sent via email direct from the the editor, or for the snip to be saved as a .PNG, .JPEG, .GIF or even a .HTML file, to facilitate further editing or use in most applications due to these commonly supported file formats.
3)Jing (Windows and Mac, available from www.jingproject.com

Jing is a free download available from the JingProject's website. The main draw with Jing, in contrast to the two tools mentioned thus far, is that it allows you to capture video. The free version of Jing saves your videos as flash files (*.flv), which can then be easily uploaded to a webpage. Indeed, Jing is built around that idea. It contains built in support for Flikr and YouTube, allowing you to instantly upload screen capture videos and pictures to these websites. Jing also allows you to send these over Instant Messengers such as AIM and MSN, or to save to your computer and email. The pro version of Jing is $15, and adds features such as being able to save screen capture videos as the popular MPEG format, and also removing the Jing logo from your images.
So there you have it; three utilities that allow you to capture images from your screen, to share with the world what only you used to be able to see.

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