March 01, 2004

Curious George: Screen shots? I just got a new computer, and I have what appears to be the latest version of XP. How do I make a screen shot? (more inside)

I've tried pressing the obvious keys (and pressing some not-so-likely ones, just in case); I've searched Help to no avail. This is bothering me. Has Windows made it impossible, or am I missing something obvious?

  • Print screen captures the image then you have to paste it to your photo editing software.
  • For some reason, though, print screen is doing nothing.
  • Go here, get IfranView, it's a greatlittle free tool. After you set it up, click on options, then capture. You can save it in several different ways, locations, etc. It's a nifty little tool.
  • Sorry, I'm html challenged this morning, it's www.ifranview.com
  • (Also, "Listen to the rhythm of a gentle bossanova. You'll be dancing with them to before the night is over! Happy agaiiiiiiin..." And, of course, "Piglet! Flamingo! Dingo! Liza Minelli!" It's really a shame Babelfish won't do Swahili).
  • And thanks!
  • welcome hope it works for you.
  • i've got my head stuck in the cupboard!!
  • Hit Print Screen four times in quick succession. That'll do it.
  • 4 times...? in my copy of XP i only have to press the print screen button once. then i open PSP and dump it in there so i can save it as a jpeg or whatever. irfanview is awesome tho', get that anyways. it's an excellent default viewer with a tonne of faboo features.
  • Hahahahahha, beniamnio. That's just cruel.
  • I've always used alt-print screen for some reason. Used that last night in XP and it worked. (Then pasted into Photoshop.)
  • Alt-prtscreen gets only the open active window. Printscrn gets the entire screen.
  • Seriously, though, print screen is doing nothing (I'm not totally computer-illiterate; it's my computer that's the problem), and alt-print screen isn't doing anything either. Irfanview works perfectly, though.
  • And I really don't want to whine, but it'd be sort of nice if you'd read the post and comments before saying something snarky next time. Is "Hit print screen, dumbass" really an appropriate response to "I've hit print screen, and it's doing nothing"?
  • for what it's worth, assuming everything on your system is working correctly, the "print screen" button just captures an image of whatever is currently on your monitor, except for the mouse pointer. it saves it to the system clipboard, rather than automatically creating a file somewhere or sending the image directly to the printer. once you've copied the current view by hitting the button, you need to paste this image somewhere. i'm assuming that things are working correctly, but you expected something to happen when you hit the button. you might see a momentary screen flicker, but that's it. it's in memory. once you paste it somewhere (paint, photoshop, what-have-you) you can see the image. you really shouldn't need to use a 3rd party solution, unless the irfanview does something windows doesn't do on its own (like capture the mouse pointer as part of the image?) so, maybe the button would be better labeled if it said "capture screen" rather than "print screen"...?
  • Babywannasofa - Is this new computer a laptop? To save space on the keyboard, they might assign several fucntions to a single key. You may need to use the Function (Func) key in combination with Print Screen. Hit Func + Print Screen, dumbass.