by A W Drake

Created on: February 21, 2010

There are many reasons to want to take a screen capture from your monitor, which may include getting someone to remotely troubleshoot an issue, to use as a graphic on a web page, or as part of an online tutorial. Whatever the reason for taking a screen capture the method is the same and will only take a few moments to do.

To take a screen capture follow these simple steps:

•    First either navigate to the web page you want to capture, or open the software you want to capture an image of.
•    Now press the CRTL and Print Screen button on your keyboard. (The name of the print screen button may be shortened to something like 'PrtScn'). Pressing the Alt button can work equally well instead of Crtl.
•    Click on the 'Start' tab to the bottom left of your screen and let the cursor hover over 'all programs'.
•    Now go to 'Accessories' and from the drop down list go to 'Paint' and open the application.
•    Once the Windows graphics software is open press Crtl-V to copy the screen capture into the program.
•    Click on File>Save as, then in the window that opens give the screen shot a name, choose the file type you prefer ( Jpeg, Bitmap, or PNG are the most useful), then press save.
•    You now have your screen shot.

If you are planning to do a lot of screen captures it can be inconvenient to continually navigate to Accessories> Paint, so placing a link on the desktop of your PC can save time. Navigate again to Paint but instead of left clicking to open it, click on the right mouse button. From the drop down menu choose 'Send To' then click on the desktop option. You will now only need to double click on the icon on your desktop to open Paint.

Although Paint is useful if all you want to do is save a screen capture, if you intend to manipulate the image then using a more advanced graphics program is recommended. This does not have to cost a thing because there are some excellent open source software packages that are free to  download and use.

For straightforward changes such as resizing or cropping the image, Paint.net would be a good option. It has many advanced functions, is reasonably intuitive to use and can do far more than just working with screen shots.

If you are planning to do something more advanced with the image you have captured then Gimp is another free to use graphics package. This is a highly respected graphics program but is less intuitive to use than Paint.net, so is perhaps for those who have more understanding of using graphics software.

As well as free graphics programs there are also a number of open source screen capture software options. Possibly one of the most versatile is Greenshot. As well as being able to capture a full screen image Greenshot also allows you to capture either just a window or to define the region of the screen to save. Instead of pasting the screenshot into a graphics program, the screen shot is saved directly to your hard disk as an image. This can then be opened into your chosen graphics software.

Creating a screen capture is a straightforward process and can be used for a variety of purposes. Using software other than what comes with Windows allows more flexibility in what you capture and what can be done with the saved image.

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