Take a Screenshot With a Macbook

From crafting a clever visual joke to reporting problems to tech support, taking a screenshot is a useful trick to know on your computer. Thankfully, taking a screenshot (or screen grab) on OS X is incredibly simple. These are the commands to take different kinds of screenshots on your Macbook or other Mac computer.

Steps

Take a Screenshot of the Whole Screen

  1. Hold down the keys: Command + Shift + 3 You should hear a brief camera sound. This is the most basic screenshot: it will take a picture of your whole screen at that moment.
  2. Find the screenshot as a png file on the desktop with the name Screenshot time/date.

Take a Screenshot of a Selection

  1. Hold down the keys: Command + Shift + 4 Your cursor will turn into a small reticule with pixel coordinate numbers to the lower left.
  2. Click and hold your mouse or trackpad and drag the cursor to select a rectangular area you wish to screenshot. You can press the Esc key to start over without taking the photo.
  3. Release the click to take the picture. Again, your file will be saved on your desktop.

Take a Screenshot of a Window

  1. Hold down Command + Shift + 4 + Space. This will turn your cursor into a small camera icon and whatever window you are hovering hover will be highlighted blue.
  2. Highlight the window you want to screenshot. To find the right window, you can cycle through your open applications with Command + Tab or use F3 to array all your open windows. Press Esc to cancel without taking a photo.
  3. Click the highlighted window. Find your file on the desktop.

Save a Screenshot to the Clipboard

  1. Hold down the Ctrl key and perform any of the above commands. This will save your screenshot to the clipboard instead of as a file on the desktop.
  2. Paste the screenshot into a word processing document, an email or an image editor by holding down keys Command + V or selecting Paste from the Edit menu.

Take a Screenshot in Preview

  1. Launch Preview. Find it in the the applications folder of the Finder, and double click on its icon.
  2. Open the File menu and move your cursor over Take Screen Shot.
  3. Select From Selection, From Window, or From Entire Screen
    • From Selection will turn your cursor into a reticle. Click and drag across the rectangular area you which to capture.
    • From Window will turn your cursor into a camera icon. Highlight the window you want to capture and click.
    • Entire Screen will start a countdown. Arrange your screen how you want it captured and wait for the timer to run down.
  4. Save your new image. The screenshot will immediately open up as an untitled Preview image window. Open the file menu and select Save. Type a name, select a location and file type, and click Save.



Tips

  • If you are taking a screen shot of your browser window, make sure you don't have any tabs open you don't want other people to see.
  • The screenshot is saved to the same clipboard that text is saved to when you copy and paste text.

Related Articles

Retrieved from "https://kipkis.com/index.php?title=Take_a_Screenshot_With_a_Macbook&oldid=363515"