How to Save a Screen Shot As a .jpg
An excellent way to tell customers how to use your software, online product or website is by including pictures of your screens or web pages as part of your instructions. They can then see how their screens are supposed to look and where to find controls. Windows provides built-in features for saving screen shots as JPGs, an image format popular because of its small file size.
Snipping Tool
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Click the “Start” button and choose “All Programs” and then “Accessories.” You may need to scroll down the pop-up menu to find “Accessories.” Then click “Snipping Tool.” The Snipping Tool dialog appears and your cursor turns into a cross.
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Click the “New” drop-down from the Snipping Tool dialog to choose the type of screenshot or snip you want to make. By default, “Rectangular Snip” lets you select rectangular areas. Choose “Full-Screen Snip” to snip the entire screen, “Window Snip” to select a specific window or “Free-Form Snip” which allows you to draw an irregular shape.
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Draw rectangle around the screen area that you want to capture, if you chose “Rectangular” or “Free-Form.” If you chose “Window Snip,” click on the window that you want. If you chose “Full-Screen Snip,” the entire screen is automatically captured. Your selection appears as a screenshot in the Snipping Tool window.
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Mark up the screenshot as needed; use the Highlighter tool or the Pen tool for this. To erase your marks, use the Erase tool.
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Click the “Save” icon to display the Save As dialog box. Navigate to the location in which you want to store the screenshot.
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Enter a name for your screenshot, which is called “Capture” by default. Note that the default file type for it is a JPG. If that option is not showing under “Save as Type,” click the drop-down and choose it.
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Click the “Save” button to save your screenshot as a JPG file.
Print Screen Method
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Press “Shift-Prt Scrn” to capture elements of a screenshot that do not normally show up with the Snipping Tool, such as menu pop-ups. This puts a copy of the entire screen, including cursors and menus, into the computer's clipboard.
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Click the “Start | All Programs | Accessories | Paint” to display the Paint dialog.
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Click the “Paste” icon. The entire screen appears in the Paint document window. Use the Paint tool to edit the image as needed.
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Click the “Save” icon to display the Save As dialog box. The default format is PNG. Click the “Save as Type” drop-down and choose “JPG.”
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Navigate to the location in which you want to store the screenshot. Enter a name for your screenshot, which is called “Untitled” by default.
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Click the “Save” button to save your screenshot as a JPG file.
References
Tips
- You can also use "Alt-Prt Scrn" to capture a screenshot of an an individual window, however it will not capture menu pop-ups or cursors.
Writer Bio
Aurelio Locsin has been writing professionally since 1982. He published his first book in 1996 and is a frequent contributor to many online publications, specializing in consumer, business and technical topics. Locsin holds a Bachelor of Arts in scientific and technical communications from the University of Washington.