Talk:Screenshot

spelling: Screen Shot
OS X names them "Screen Shot [date...].png", so clearly screen shot should be an accepted spelling? 180.222.70.25 (talk) 01:28, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Debe ser muy buena pues las capturas de imágenes tienen que reflejarse en un mayor ángulo Daniela marcela daza (talk) 06:13, 18 August 2017 (UTC)


 * ejk6cjT4U-f 188.113.235.96 (talk) 19:46, 11 November 2023 (UTC)

how-tos on screenshots be moved to wikibooks?
Should the how-tos on screenshots be moved to wikibooks? --Faradn
 * I think so yes, i rewrote the intro to something a lot better, i also wrote alot of new tutorials about how to capture screens such as in xwd(1), however wikipedia articles should be aimed at someone willing to familiarice themselves with the subject, it is not a how-to, which this page has become. So yes, i agree with you that it should be moved, however i dont know where yet, perhaps in some yet-to-be-written book about common computer concepts and hot to apply them Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 15:15, 2004 May 6 (UTC)

Windows video screenshots
The simplest way to achieve this is to use a DirectShow video mode with overlay rendering turned off within the media player. For example, using Media Player Classic this can be done by selecting VMR9 (windowed). This method is far more straightforward, and produces smoother video than turning off hardware acceleration within Windows display properties.

Another way these images can be captured is to turn off the hardware overlay. Because many computers have no hardware overlay, most programs are built to work without it, just a little slower. In Windows XP, this is disabled by opening the Display Properties menu, then clicking, "Advanced", "Troubleshoot", and moving the Hardware Acceleration Slider to "None." However, this should only be done if the turning off overlay rendering within the media player cannot be achieved.

Reverting by Patrick
Patrick, you reverted my edits here citing "rv some unexpl deletions", however i fail to understand how i did not make it clear what i was doing here by saying "Almost a complete rewrite [...]".

You see, there is a big difference between deleting something and rewriting it, let's take a simple example to further explain this, i'll make up a sample text thats similar to the text on Screenshot but has different content:

Original text

 * Mary has:
 * A little lamb
 * a flute

Rewritten text
Now, if i were to rewrite it it would be somewhat like this:


 * Mary has a little lamb and a flute.

What you would write
However, if you were to see that you would probably change that to:


 * Mary has a little lamb and a flute.
 * Mary has:
 * A little lamb
 * a flute

You see once a rewrite has been made it is utterly pointless to insert the old text as well as the new text, which is precisely what you did, after your rewert those particular paragraphs you had an issue with the page looked like this: ( bold text inserted by me )


 * Screenshots, screen dumps or screen captures can be used to demonstrate a program, a particular problem a user might be having or generally when computer output needs to be shown to others or archived, the most common of the three is a screenshot which commonly means outputting the entire screen in a common format such as PNG or JPEG.


 * Applications:
 * demonstrating a program
 * making an image file of an image shown by a program, in the case that that program does not have this feature itself; the screenshot can then be cropped to the image itself; a limitation is that for large images that do not fit on the screen one can not store the whole image; however, one can store it in pieces and then paste these together with a graphics editing program. This is rather cumbersome. To reduce this problem one can temporarily set a higher screen resolution.


 * Sometimes a screenshot does not work on a movie still presented by a movie viewer.


 * If the system seems frozen one may be looking at a full-screen screenshot image.


 * A screen dump is when the display system dumps what it is using internally upon request, such as XWD X Window Dump image data in the case of X11 or PDF in the case of Mac OS X. Finally a screen capture commonly means to capture the screen over an extended period of time to form a Video file.

Here is the current text:


 * Screenshots, screen dumps or screen captures can be used to demonstrate a program, a particular problem a user might be having or generally when computer output needs to be shown to others or archived, the most common of the three is a screenshot which commonly means outputting the entire screen in a common format such as PNG or JPEG, a screen dump is when the display system dumps what it is using internally upon request, such as XWD X Window Dump image data in the case of X11 or PDF in the case of Mac OS X. Finally a screen capture commonly means to capture the screen over an extended period of time to form a Video file.

Questions

 * 1) Why did you insert the same statement about demonstrating a program in again, it was already in the above paragraph.
 * 2) In what way were my deletions of redundant content unexpl ( probably unexplained in proper english, elaborate if it is some as of yet unknown word ).

Granted, i deleted some things which i thought were totally pointless to put there, such as "If the system seems frozen one may be looking at a full-screen screenshot image". I dont know about you, but that just doesnt sound like something that should be in an article about screenshots. Why do you feel the need to explain to people that if they open a screenshot on their computer, then try to click on items on the screen their computer is in fact not unresponsive, they are just clicking at an image of their previous screen.

Sound redundant to me anyway. Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 16:48, 2004 May 12 (UTC)

Response
Yes, demonstrating a program need not be put twice, I made a crude repair last week.

The frozen screen remark seems useful to me.

The other deletions you still have not explained at all, they are also useful content and no duplication. Part of it falls in the category "when computer output needs to be archived", but expands on that. If you want to change the formulation we can see whether it is an improvement. If there is something you do not understand, you can ask.

--Patrick 21:56, 12 May 2004 (UTC)


 * Okey, i'll expain it all the way through then:

Applications:
 * demonstrating a program
 * Applications merged, demonstrating a program merged.


 * making an image file of an image shown by a program, in the case that that program does not have this feature itself; the screenshot can then be cropped to the image itself; a limitation is that for large images that do not fit on the screen one can not store the whole image; however, one can store it in pieces and then paste these together with a graphics editing program. This is rather cumbersome. To reduce this problem one can temporarily set a higher screen resolution.
 * This is just wrong in so may ways, it's completely getting outside the whole subject, take an image of a image, crop image, puzzle images togather blablalba
 * It is on-topic (application of screenshot) and you do not mention any error in it. And it does not say image of an image, but image file of an image.--Patrick 10:12, 15 May 2004 (UTC)
 * Thats not the point, it's badly written
 * That seems to be a confirmation that your "it's completely getting outside the whole subject" is nonsense. Further you state that is is "wrong in so may ways", but you can not point out any error. Therefore you change to "badly written". If that is the case you should  edit it.--Patrick 20:56, 15 May 2004 (UTC)


 * Sometimes a screenshot does not work on a movie still presented by a movie viewer.
 * If you really need to add this merge it below like in ===windows limitations or something


 * If the system seems frozen one may be looking at a full-screen screenshot image.
 * re-ha-illy? ;) maybe we should put some text on Art telling people that if landscapes move too little they may be looking at a landscape painting, in any case these one-liners are redundant and really make the article look unprofessional, if you can put them nicely in a paragraph so they make sense and convey some useful information ( which IMO this is not ) sure, but i think it's just redundant in it's current form
 * A painting looks different from the real view, so the comparison breaks down.--Patrick 10:12, 15 May 2004 (UTC)
 * Yes, but it's still something thats so painfully obvious that it doesnt belong.

--Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 21:16, 2004 May 14 (UTC)

Cute
The illustrative screenshot of the Wikipedia screenshot article is cutely meta, but it's not the best illustration of a screenshot. It's a little confusing, actually. Maybe somebody could post a screenshot of a desktop?


 * Good point. There probably are some around. I'll check.  — Omegatron 18:25, 27 September 2005 (UTC)


 * There are tons:


 * Plus Category:Fair_use_screenshots. Take your pick.  We should probably have two or three.  Maybe one desktop in one OS, one closeup of a window from another OS, etc.  — Omegatron 18:39, 27 September 2005 (UTC)


 * It's cute, but it's also a self-reference, so should probably be removed. &mdash; AnemoneProj e ctors (talk) 22:26, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Pre-Mac OS X screenshots
I have a Mac running System 7 (7.1 to be specific) and I can confirm that you can take screenshots by hitting Cmd + Shift + 3. It saves them in PICT format on the root of the hard drive. If someone can confirm the behaviors of Mac OS 8 and Mac OS 9, I'm sure it would be appreciated. ~ Oni Lukos c 18:30, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

Okay, I've confirmed that Cmd + Shift + 3 works on OS 9.1 and saves in PICT format, but I forgot to try Cmd + Shift + 4 and have not had access to any earlier versions yet. ~ Oni Lukos c 22:32, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

⇧⌘3 works in all versions of Mac OS. Dread Lord C y b e r S k u l l ✎☠ 12:59, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

⇧⌘3 does NOT work in the latest OS/X (Mavericks) - it does nothing (or, makes a "bump" kind of invalid sound, depending on what application has focus when you press it). Control-⇧⌘3 does still work (saves to clipboard, not a file). 120.151.160.158 (talk) 12:20, 2 July 2014 (UTC)

videos
so "screen capture" allows you to record videos of the screen? what software is used for that? i can't find any. — Omegatron 18:28, 27 September 2005 (UTC)
 * I know Lotus ScreenCam is very old but works fine in Windows 2000. --Mateusc 14:22, 24 October 2005 (UTC)
 * Lotus Screencam is now better known as Camtasia Studio, I believe SmUX 00:15, 12 March 2007 (UTC)


 * I've added a new section "Video screen captures", hope it helps. Peter S. 23:57, 12 February 2006 (UTC)


 * Yeah, I'm sure it *will* help when someone actually puts in some of the "multitude" of programs that "fill the void" as links so people like me (who came to wiki to find links) could use them :-P SmUX 00:03, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

Small question...
For screenshots of XP, OSX, BeOS, Amiga, and so on and so forth one has to display them using the fair use header and have a good reason for them to be up, whereas for KDE, Gnome, etc one doesn't. I get that.

However...

My laptop's screen looks nearly identical to OSX Tiger with a modified wallpaper. There's a dock at the bottom, no recycle bin, it's using Mac-looking icons in the systray, and the windows themselves look like Aqua windows except that the max/min/close buttons are on the righthand side of the window. It's even set up to windowshade things.

I'm running XP Professional (with a few tweaks).

If I took a screenshot of my desktop, would it be considered a shot of software copyrighted by Microsoft, even though I've gone to every effort for the appearance to not be that nasty Chiclets interface XP defaults to?

Or would it be considered to be copyrighted by OSX's Aqua default? But it's NOT a Mac at all, so how could it be? Perhaps as a derived work from Apple's desktop?

I actually have a reason. I was considering some sort of article about desktop customisation, and thought that a screenshot of an XP laptop screen that looks just like OSX would be a good illustration of the concept (especially as mac-faking is one of the most popular applications of desktop customisation, shortly after filling it with bad holiday theme stuff and making it as black as possible).

Aside form all this, I have a raised eyebrow about whether or not Microsoft or Apple can copyright a desktop. Maybe they can copyright a particular screenshot they took themselves, but the desktop is not a creative work and thus not protected by copyright. It's a utilitarian work, no matter how pretty, and, realistically, any claim to have copyright on a desktop is just as absurd as a claim to have copyright on a real physical desktop. Don't get me wrong, I understand that Wikipedia errs on the side of caution, even if it does seem a bit silly sometimes and underscores the idea that all our IP laws need to be torn down and rebuilt from scratch with a mandatory refusal to accept input from Microsoft or Disney.


 * They can copyright the artwork used within the OS; they can copyright their source code; they might patent some methods, but they can't copyright any specific screenshot you might take because it is not an "original work of authorship" because a human has to author it for it to be subject to copyright protection. What you are looking at when you take a screenshot was "authored" by their code.  They might have some possible rights in derivative works if they have copyrights in images on your screen at the time you take the screen shot (perhaps some of the icons); but it's not likely they would pursue them.  In any event, it'd probably easily pass fair use if it ever became an issue, but like I said, they more than likely do not have any copyright in any particular screen you might see.  Peyna 14:00, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

Copyright section
Has there been any court cases over screenshots and/or videos of programs? The article says 'some companies believe...' so that makes me think no, but if so it'd be a good thing to cite. 151.201.218.248 03:59, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

If you take screenshots in an "all rights reserved" page, then you most probably are breaking copyright laws!!!--WOLfan112 (talk) 17:10, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

Bad advice?
From section 1.3.1 (A Step by Step Guide):


 * Click the "Save as type" drop-down and select "JPEG (*.JPG;*.JPEG;*.JPE*;.JFIF)".

This is bad advice, in my opinion: it will probably result in some loss of image quality which could likely be conserved in PNG.
 * I agree - but then the whole "how to" aspect of the article needs to be moved somewhere else. Cpc464 10:56, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

WinDVD doesn't use Overlays?
In the article it says that certain players don't require hardware overlays to be on, and WinDVD is listed as one of those programs. However, when I turn overlays off, it says that it can't compile the overlay (Obviously), and that the file won't run. It suggest lowering the screen resolution and color compression, which didn't make any difference when I'd done them. Are you sure that the article is accurate in its statement? If it is, what am I doing wrong? JBK405 05:46, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Format NPOV
I take issue with the statement "("GIF" and the other three bitmap types are often not suitable for full-color screenshots because they discard color information; "JPEG" is never suitable for screenshots because it blurs borders.)" for two reasons. Not all users run at bit depths above 8bpp, so a GIF file may be more than suitable for certain environments. Other bitmap types can contain full 24bpp data, so the statement is doubly false. Additionally, a screen may not contain GUI elements or other high-contrast, line-art elements that are poorly handled by JPEG wavelet compression. Any objections to removing this line? Alvis 04:59, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Consoles?
This article doesn't make a single mention of anything about consoles (phones, TVs, Playstations, Gamecubes, Xboxes, etc.), and yet I see screenshots off Atari 5700's all over the place! I think someone should add a section about consoles. I see screenshots of them everywhere (try taking a look at IGN or GameSpy). --&#91;&#91;User:Red Pooka&#124;&lt;span style=&quot;border: 1px; border-style:solid; padding:0px 2px 2px 2px; color:red; background-color:yellow; font-weight:bold&quot;&gt;Red&lt;/span&gt;&#91;&#91;User talk:Red Pooka&#124;&lt;span style=&quot;border: 1px; border-style:solid; padding:0px 2px 2px 2px; color:yellow; background-color:red; font-weight:bold&quot;&gt;Pooka&lt;/span&gt;]]]] 15:15, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

I would also like to see something on how to screen capture from consoles. I would also like to see how to screen capture from a Nintendo DS.

Pixelmetric website
This article was strewed with external links in the text leading to tutorials on the website of Pixelmetrics, a commercial package to make screenshots. I removed all the references. Husky (talk page) 19:50, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Screen capture digital
I see no comment on capture of digital display images. I used GrabClipSave analog but it won't capture digital. My system is digital graphics card and digital LCD.

A third way to turn off the overlay in Microsoft Windows ...
... is to first start another application which will hog the overlay (e.g. Show a movie on Windows media Player), then start the application from which you want to capture the screenshot (e.g a video on Win DVD). This technique is especially useful for sports action as the captured image is de-interlaced. My thanks to Chiew Heng Wah http://www.codeproject.com/audio/capvidscrn.asp Clive Harris 17:58, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

Agreed; this is a very simple technique that I have been using for years. Personally, whenever I need to temporarily disable the overlay, I just run Karsten Sperling’s little app Alpha (which also has the nice benefit of giving Windows a transparent command line). Also, when a TV app like the one in ATI’s MMC is running (usually in the corner of the screen), the overlay is occupied, so getting screencaps of videos becomes trivial. Synetech (talk) 01:35, 27 November 2009 (UTC)

Article is now misleading.
Section 2.3 (which, until 19 Jan 2007, described how to capture a screenshot in Windows using the Print Screen key) was removed by AbsolutDan, on the grounds that Wikipedia is not an instruction manual. Fine, except that now the whole article is generally misleading. Someone who didn't know better would think that the only way to get a screenshot was to download software from the External Links section. --63.25.237.21 20:07, 26 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Note I did indicate in the edit summary that it was a rough cleanup. Please feel free to fix it. --AbsolutDan (talk) 00:37, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Taking Screenshots from Video Games
How do people take screenshots from video games, so that there's nothing outside the screen in the whole shot taken? --PJ Pete


 * just the question I was looking for (specifically to put this in). There's a program called FRAPS which *very* effectively records the audio and video in DirectX games as you play it (even giving information overlaid as it's doing so *in-game* for you).  It records it in a high quality format which of course results in huge files, but if you want to give it out it doesn't take long to compress the video to a better format/filesize with VirtualDub :-)  FRAPS is available at http://www.fraps.com/ and I recommend it, it's a fun little program :-) SmUX 00:02, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

Isn't taking screen shots in video games, breaking copyright laws.--WOLfan112 (talk) 17:11, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

could someone
i think this page was vandalized —The preceding unsigned comment was added by A380 Fan (talk • contribs) 23:02, 10 March 2007 (UTC).

Screenshot from Photoshop?
A question was posted on the Computing Reference Desk (here) regarding the portion of this article that indicates that Photoshop (among others) can be configured to capture a screenshot. I have found references indicating how this can be done using the GIMP and IrfanView, but nothing regarding Photoshop. Can anybody confirm that the capability exists? Thanks. --LarryMac 01:32, 7 April 2007 (UTC)
 * As far as I know, Photoshop has no built in screenshot functionality. The program itself does not make such an option obvious, and google searches for the most obvious keywords return no results. As far as I'm aware, GIMP, PSP, and IrfanView are some of the apps that definately include such functionality --daranzt 13:58, 7 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I've taken the liberty of editing that section of this article, and will also further respond on the Computing Ref Desk. --LarryMac 14:38, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Historical information needed
This article really leans heavily towards modern use of screenshots and has almost no historical information or perspective. The use of screenshots for programs such as games goes all the way back to the Atari 2600 (maybe earlier?). And there is most likely some interesting information that could be included in this article such as how many people have been mislead over the years by screenshots for games that were from an alternate platform. Eventually game makers had to put a caption like "Screenshot from Amiga" on game boxes or "Actual IBM PC screenshot". Plus there is the whole thing of using screenshots from pre-rendered in game videos to try to make a game look better. I don't have any references to this stuff that I could use, but I'll try to add a bit to the article that is generally accepted. -- Suso 23:06, 2 June 2007 (UTC)


 * This was a good start, but we really need those references. Also, if the history portion is going to be mostly about controversies, it might be good to adjust the section title accordingly. Thmazing (talk) 23:47, 13 May 2008 (UTC)Thmazing

A question has been bugging me...
I think that there should be a section in this article that talks about taking screenshots from video games onto a computer, from machines like Xbox and things along those lines. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.163.21.195 (talk) 06:02, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

DVD's with CSS and Screen Capture - Inacurate Statement?
"DVDs are often encrypted using a patented algorithm called Content-scrambling system or CSS, making it much more difficult to take screenshots of them." Is this accurate? Primary reason you can't capture is probably due to the fact that an overlay is being used and not because of CSS.

Can anybody care to comment on this? 124.168.216.45 (talk) 11:11, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

iPhone
Do we really need an iPhone section? There are dozens of other devices that have a screenshot capability. Either way, I'm pretty sure there should be a Ubuntu section before the iPhone. Eugeniu B (talk) 05:10, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Split: Screenshot software
The section about screenshot software would be more appropriately split off into a new article called Screenshot software allowing it to be expanded. It would also allow for the list of screenshot software to be expanded. --Hm2k (talk) 15:26, 18 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I decided it would be best to keep information about what screenshot software is within the article, however I think the "List of screenshot software" should be split instead. No response will form consensus. --Hm2k (talk) 11:02, 18 November 2009 (UTC)
 * I agree with this idea. Splitting the Screenshot Software from the general article will improve the flow and function of the page. -- SeedAI  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.149.113.165 (talk) 20:18, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Oppose I disagree with splitting. Let the list grow before splitting it. Since it is half year that this topic is not followed up, I consider this issue as concluded. I'm going ahead and deleting the split tag. Fleet Command (talk) 17:26, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

"excluding the mouse pointer"
Why is this given as a feature of screenshot software? It's the hard-coded behaviour of the Windows (and I think also Mac OS X) built-in screen capture facility. Surely the section should concentrate on how these programs improve on such built-in facilities? -- Smjg (talk) 10:06, 13 November 2009 (UTC)


 * Actually, it is not the behavior of the screen capture function. In most modern systems, the mouse cursor is automatically excluded from screencaps because video cards have hardware cursors. That is, the cursor is rendered by the video card directly to the screen, rather than being drawn to the frame-buffer by software. Therefore, when you capture the screen, the pixels of the cursor are not actually present. (You can also see this demonstrated by for example using software turn the gamma/etc. of the display down; the cursor will remain unaffected and bright.)
 * One solution to capturing the cursor is to configure the video card/OS to use a software cursor—if possible. Another solution is to manually draw the cursor on the screencap at the mouse pointer’s current position as screencasting software does.
 * Synetech (talk) 01:57, 27 November 2009 (UTC)

Capturing Images from Overlay Surface
The article has the following line under the Windows section
 * However, some third-party applications can capture overlay images.

I’m not sure if that is correct or at least clear enough. VLC can “capture an overlay video” by writing the frame buffer to a file, but that only works because VLC is the video player; it is the one generating the display. VLC cannot use its screen-capture function to capture an overlay video from another source (eg WMP), and other apps cannot capture VLC’s video when played on the overlay surface.

So if the above sentence is indeed correct and complete, someone will need to elaborate with an example or two. Synetech (talk) 01:46, 27 November 2009 (UTC)


 * This line was written by me. As an example take a look at CapTrue website Strop4 (talk) 05:28, 5 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Nope; I just tested it and it that cannot capture overlays or the cursor. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Synetech (talk • contribs) 02:33, 14 June 2010 (UTC)

Screenshots are not just for computers
Various articles on Wikipedia itself use the term to refer to screen captures of Television programs, yet the opener seems to think they only come from computers. Later sections mentions TV screenshots, but since those are not described at any earlier point, it seems to come out of nowhere. I'll tweak the intro slightly, but we need a section on TV screenshots. — trlkly 00:42, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Mac OS X
There is currently a sentence in this section that reads (emphasis added): "This utility might only be available when the Mac OS X developer tools are installed." Does anyone have a source for confirming or denying whether the developer tools need to be installed? An uncertain statement like this has no place here. --danhash (talk) 19:33, 13 September 2011 (UTC)

Illegal
Can you please tell me whether taking screen shots on "all rights reserved" games, such as war of legends Legal or not!!!!!!!!!--WOLfan112 (talk) 19:31, 8 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Please see [Fair Use] ... 'reproduction of part of a particular work may be considered fair, such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research.' ... four factors should be considered in determining whether or not a particular use is fair.

1. The purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of commercial nature or is for non-profit educational purposes. 2. The nature of the copyrighted work. 3. The amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole. 4. The effect of the use upon the potential market for, or value of, the copyrighted work. The distinction between what is fair use and what is infringement in a particular case will not always be clear or easily defined. You should consider avoiding the use of copyrighted material unless you are confident that the doctrine of fair use would apply to the situation. For Wikipedia purposes, review a more practical description to fit your needs: [Fair Wiki Use] --Wikidity (talk) 02:32, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

Broken link
Another article links to the subheading "Game screenshots" in this article, but the subheading doesn't exist. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.139.81.0 (talk) 01:33, 26 January 2013 (UTC)
 * It would be helpful if you could point out which article it was. — daranz [ t ] 02:05, 26 January 2013 (UTC)

Photographic Techniques
The 'photographic techniques' section is fascinating but lacks any sourcing and I could not turn up any proof of Polaroid releasing screenshot film in 1988 after about 30 minutes of digging - I'll remove that factoid but the rest might be worth revising. TEENS4BLOOMBERG (talk) 17:59, 16 February 2024 (UTC)

Add in gallery
Good result 2001:16A4:262:3702:C8DF:63C4:BE3E:BD14 (talk) 08:42, 17 June 2024 (UTC)