How to Take a Screenshot

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By Gottaloveit
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This screenshot was taken from eHow.com

It's quite easy to take a screenshot these days as Windows has a built in screenshot capture button. If you want to get fancier with your screenshots, you can purchase third party software to assist. Note: this article is written assuming that the reader is on a Windows platform PC.

Difficulty: Easy

Instructions

Step 1

~~Have your screen set so it looks exactly what you want to snapshot~~

You'll need to have the items you're hoping to capture right on the screen in order to take a screenshot. You're ENTIRE screen will be in the snapshot, toolbars and all.
Step 2

This screenshot was taken when I was writing this article

~~Press the 'Print Scrn' button on the top row of your computer~~

The 'Print Scrn' button might look differently on your computer, depending on who made the computer keyboard. Regardless, look for a key that says 'Print Screen' 'PRT SCR' or something like that.

Although you may think (quite logically) that the 'Print Scrn' will send what's on the screen to the printer, that's not quite right. Pressing the 'Print Scrn' button actually stores your entire screenshot in your computer's clipboard so that's where it will sit until we use it in the next step.
Step 3

~~Paste your screenshot into any program you wish~~

Press the standard Windows keys of 'Control+V' to paste the screenshot into your program.
Step 4

~~To get more precise screenshots, consider purchasing third party software~~

The Windows screenshot utility is fine if you're trying to take a screenshot of the whole screen but, for more precision or snapping just a portion of the screen, you might consider something like SnagIt (see resource section).

Comments

surly-mac said

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on 7/30/2009 Screenshots are great for a variety of reasons and How to Take a Screenshot makes it easy to get it done. Thanks for an informative and well written article.