Screenshots: How to make one
From WinCustomize Wiki
| How to make a Screenshot | ||||||||
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Contents |
[edit] Introduction
Similar to the days of ancient Rome when the main sport was watching lions eat Christians, WinCustomize has it's own bloody coliseum called "Screenshots". This is a brutal and diabolical gallery where users fight to the death to attain the coveted status of premier skinner, and the losers are thrown to the dogs like yesterdays garbage. Surviving the gladiatorial sporting-ground of screenshots is the realm of only a handful of ultra talented warrior-artists, and even posting a screenshot requires years of toil and study; the intelligence of Einstein, the scholarly aptitude of Aristotle, and the patience of Buddha.
[edit] Making the Screenshot
Or you could just follow these steps:
- Make your computer look like you want it to look to the best of your ability. I have not yet had the chance to guide you through icons, wallpapers or - well - anything else except WindowBlinds. (Keep in mind that making a screenshot is also helpful if you are having a technical problem and want to show someone what is going on.) For a proper screenshot you might want to have your start bar activated as that often shows off the skin you are using in better detail than just the task bar at the bottom (or the top, if you're trying to be ultra-cool).
- Hit the ctrl+prt sc keys on your computer.
- Open a graphic design program like Photoshop or CorelDraw or even MS Paint.
- Click paste.
Save it as a .jpg file. I am running a screen resolution of 1024 X 768, so that's the size I'm going to save my screenshot. If you are running a Really Big Size you might want to scale it down a bit, but when you size down you will lose some quality.
[edit] Uploading
There's your screen shot my friend! Now to Upload it to WinCustomize:
- On the left side of the web page there is a "submit a file" link. Click it.
- At this point you can follow the directions provided, but I'll walk you through them: Choose Screenshots from the dropdown menu. Click Next.
- Fill in the appropriate information. If you have your screenshot saved in - for example - your "my pictures" folder you can just browse to that folder and attach it.
- Be sure to give credit to anyone whose items you are using.
So, let's see those screenshots - if you dare!
Here's my screenshot. It contains the following:
- Synthek skin by DanilloOc
- Tribal-DF wallpaper by MillaMeter
- etched Clock widget by DHyral
- SuperNova XXL by jalentorn
- Cobalt Orion Icons by Mormegil (from the Orion Premium Suite)
[edit] Conclusion
Daily Hint for the Noob: If you want to look cool - and I assure you, you do - then you must have only "cool" programs open when you make your screenshot. If you are going to have your Start Bar activated when you make the screenshot, make sure it looks like you've been using cool programs. What are the cool programs? I couldn't possibly tell you; I am not yet cool.
Tomorrow's Article: IconPackager Basics
Upload a Scratch-n-Sniff screenshot and win a free link to WinCustomize.com!!!
(Offer not valid for vertebrates)
[edit] Tips
Uploading a screenshot to the screenshots gallery isn't the only use for them. Perhaps you're having a problem and you need to show someone in order to help fix it. Follow the same method mentioned above to save your screenshot, except now we're going to upload it to an image hosting site (like ImageShack or Photobucket). Personally I prefer imageshack because it's easy and simple.
For this example we will use imageshack. Go to the main page and you will see a Browse button so you can find the image on your harddrive. Select your image and click on "host it!"
After it's been uploaded, it will take you to the image page. If your image is large, it might be best to use a thumbnail that will link to the full version of the image (however, the WinCustomize forums have a script that will automatically resize the image, which can then be opened to fullview). To do this you just need to copy the code given to you at the top. When you copy and paste that code into forums, it will display just like the thumbnail on the page.
The code should look like this:
<a href="http://link-to-full-size-image.jpg"><img src="http://link-to-thumbnail-image.jpg"></a>
If you want to post the entire image directly into the post, you would copy the URL at the bottom that is labeled "Direct link to image." If you're not using the direct link, the image will not display. Click on the Insert Image icon (highlighted in red), and paste the direct link you copied into the Image URL box in the window that pops up.
It is recommended to use the raw html code (<a href=" ">) as compared to the bbcode style ([url=" "]) because sometimes the bbcode style doesn't always work properly.
If you want to get a screenshot of only a certain active window (like your browser, Windowblinds config, etc), press ctrl+alt+prtsc instead of ctrl+prtsc.
[edit] Notes
- For more of this series, check out Newbies Corner.
