How To Take Screenshots on a Mac Using the Keyboard

How To Take A Screenshot On A Mac Using Screen Capture Keystrokes.

In this video, I'll be showing how to screen capture on a Mac using Keyboard Keystroke Combinations.

When it comes Mac screen capture, taking a picture or screen shot on a Mac, OS X Mountain Lion offers some cool screen capture keystroke combinations.
Below is the raw script from "My OS X Adventures" Series - Episode 1, on the options available when using screen capture keystroke combinations on a Mac.

TRANSCRIPT:

In This Episode, We'll demonstrate how to take pictures of your screen using screen-capture keystrokes...the OS X Way.

TOPICS COVERED:
We'll be Covering the Three Options available
When using screen-capture key combinations

Option 1: Full screen-capture

Option 2: Capture, Windows, dialogue box, icons, virtually anything on the screen away from the
background.

Option 3: Screen-Capture a Section or Region of the screen.
Bonus: A quick Demo - Precise Screen-Capture.

"Let's Get Started"

OPTION ONE: FULL SCREEN-CAPTURE
To do a full screen-capture
using key combination
simply Press
Shift-Command-3

You will hear a familiar camera shutter sound
indicating that the capture was successful
followed by a Screenshot in PNG...Ping format
copied to the desktop

You can now do a quick look
or open in Preview to save the file in different
formats, such as JPeg, Tiff or PDF file format.

Incidentally, all screenshots copied to the
desktop is named as follows:
"Screen Shot follwed by the Date & Time the screenshot was created and the PNG file format
extention"

You can now Drag & Drop the screenshot in your documents as in our case Notes.

Alternatively
If you wanted to capture the screenshot to the clipboard instead,
Simply Press:
Control-Shift-Command-3

Once again, you will hear the camera shutter sound, indicating the screenshot was captures to
the Clipboard.
To paste the clipboard screenshot in your document or in our case Notes
Simply Click on Edit and click Paste
or you could use the keyboard shortcut
Command-V

OPTION 2: TO CAPTURE WINDOWS, ICONS, DIALOGUE BOX, MENUBAR AWAY FROM THE BACKGROUND

Simply Press:
Shift-Command-4
Then Tap the Spacebar Once

You will notice a light blue dimmed area with a tiny camera in it's canter
Now move the mouse to the item on the screen you wish to capture without the background.

OPTION 3: SCREEN-CAPTURE A SECTION OR REGION OF THE SCREEN

To Activate Section screen-capture, simply press the following key combination:
Shift-Command-4

You will notice that this is tha same key combination used in Option 2
But instead of the spacebar tap, click and hold-down the Mouse Button

Now Drag diagonally to create a rectangle

At this point we could release the mouse button and capture the selected region,
Instead we'll keep holding -down the mouse button in order to show how to manipulate the
rectangle in different ways:

For example, to move the rectangle anywhere on the screen simple press and hold-down the
Spacebar

Release only the spacebar when done.

Now while still holding-down the mouse button,
Let's say we wanted to constrain the movement of the rectangle and re-size in the vertical
direction only

Simply Press and hold-down the shift key and instantly move the mouse up or down, you will
notice that you are unable to move the mouse left or right in the horizontal direction.
Release only the Shift Key when done.

Similarly, to constrain the movement to only the horizontal direction, simply; press and holddown the Shift Key again while instantly moving the mouse to the right or left
direction...Horizontally.

Say we wanted to re-size the rectangle from the center outwards or inwards
simply Press and hold-down the Option Key or on some keyboards the alt key and move the mouse
inwards or outwards.
Release the Option Key when done.

As mentioned before, releasing the mouse button at anytime will take a Screenshot of the
selected region.

However; if you wanted to save the Screenshot to the clipboard after activating the Desktop
screen-capture key combination Shift-Command-4
simply Press and hold-down the Control Key and Release the Mouse Button.

If you wanted to cancel the screen-capture procedure after activation for the desktop or
Clipboard,
Press the following
the esc key or the key combination Command-Period keys.

Now for a Quick Demo:
The object here is to capture a Profile Picture measuring Exactly 358 X 358 Pixels
Cue the Demo...

THANKS FOR WATCHING

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THANKS AND PEACE.