Taking Screenshots the Easy Way
Freeware, Images, Windows December 19th. 2007, 7:13pmI’ve mentioned this software before but I feel compelled to show you all why this software has made my list of software I install on a fresh format. This software is MWSnap, a program for taking and manipulating screenshots. When you first open the program, you’re greeted with this:
On the left, you have your main options for screenshots and on your right, you have a preview. Each of the screenshots have hotkeys that you can learn by click ‘Capture’ on the menu bar. All of the options are pretty self-explanatory except the ‘Window/menu’ option, which you’ll learn to love fast.
When you select this option, the screen freezes and you have a dotted box that selects whatever menu or window you’re cursor is hovering on.
This assures for a clean cut every time, quickly and easily.
And if you’re feeling fancy, you can garnish it by adding a cursor from the ‘edit’ menu:
MWSnap has some interesting tools that come in handy at random times:
I’d say the ruler is the one I use most often.
It’s floats above all other windows and lets you measures them by pixels. Don’t worry, it goes vertically as well.
And while I chose to use ColorPic for my color picking software. MWSnap’s color picker isn’t half bad.
There are only two downsides that I’ve found to this application. First being the lack of ability to crop… that to me is odd but I just open it up in IrfanView and take care of it that way. The other issue is multiple monitors. Unfortunately, MWSnap only recognizes the primary monitor. I don’t really have a work around for this, I just deal with it and drag windows I need to take screenshots of over to my primary monitor.
This software has saved me tons of time, I hope you enjoy it as much as I do!
December 21st, 2007 at 5:14 pm
Tyler,
Have you had any success with Faststone Capture?
5.3 is the free version. Since then they have gone shareware.
FS Capture has a built in editor that allows for cropping as well as drawing and adding text boxes to the captured image.
The program can also be used to capture menu windows including pointer and highlighted item if desired. I personally like the control window as I can set it ‘always on top and it only measures about 50px x 250 px (fits nicely in blank toolbar areas)
Unfortunately there is no ruler tool. But there is a magnifier and color picker tool. You can also add a custom watermark and you will get pixel width and height when defining a rectangle capture.
I’m not expecting you to switch programs. I just thought you might like to present this to your readers as a possible alternative.
Downloads of free version are still available.
http://www.pcworld.com/downloads/file_download/fid,64857-page,1-c,downloads/download.html#
-D
You can s
December 21st, 2007 at 5:33 pm
Awesome, thanks for the tip. I’ll look into it. I’m always looking for good alternatives.
December 24th, 2007 at 10:27 am
Sorry about that.
I was out of my mind for a bit. I’ll restrain myself next time. Please remove the offending comment.
Derek
December 29th, 2007 at 2:56 pm
I use Firefox plugins for doing all of the tasks you mention here, screen capture, ruler, color picker.
They rock.. do a quick search for these… ColorZilla, FireShot, & MeasureIt.
December 29th, 2007 at 3:07 pm
Yes but MWSnap only weighs in at 417kb and has many more features
Though I use fireshot for quickies.
December 31st, 2007 at 12:38 am
i use data beckerdrw. btw nice info