Tech Tuesday: Screen Capturing

One trick that I use on an almost daily basis is screen capturing.

For the Mac users in the world there are a couple ways to capture -- aka take pictures of -- all or part of your screen.

If you're a menu-driven person, you may prefer to choose "Go > Utilities > Grab" to initiate the capture. Once Grab is launched, use the Capture drop-down to choose a particular selection, window, or your entire screen.

If you're a shortcut person like I am, you can use keystroke combinations to initiate the capture process:

• Take a picture of the whole screen........................Command - Shift - 3
• Take a picture of part of the screen.......................Command - Shift - 4, and drag the crosshair pointer to select area
• Take a picture of a particular window..................Command - Shift - 4, press space bar, move the camera to the chosen window, and click

Pictures generated in Grab are TIFF files by default, and shortcut pictures are PNG files. Both are compatible with most other applications and can be embedded, opened, and sent easily. You can change them to different file formats in Preview by doing a File > Save as, and changing the format.

I promise you that once you start using screen capturing, you'll find tons of uses for it.

Welcome to my new blog!

Here's my stab at creating a useful resource for sharing media and technology with my colleagues, students, and anyone else who enjoys learning new things. Here's the plan so far...but I reserve the right to change my mind. :)

Media Mondays - I'll share a resource (print, online, or other) available to my colleagues and students through the LHS Media Center.

Tech Tuesdays - Tips and tidbits about gadgets, gizmos, and other geeky tech stuff.

Web Wednesdays - I'll highlight a Web resource that can enhance or simplify your assignments, your lectures, or your life.

Theme Thursdays - I'll do my best to share an assortment of resources all focusing on a particular topic.

Fiction Fridays - Great reads! Enough said.

Lofty goals, I think, but worthy of my time and effort if others are able to pull a few things here and there that they find useful. And if you're one of those people, please feel free to share these blog posts with others you think may appreciate them by clicking on the little email link beneath each post.