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mashinhead

macrumors 68040
Original poster
Oct 7, 2003
3,017
1,049
I know how to do a screen capture selection (shift + apple + 4) but the default settings are a pdf. How do i change the setting to a jpg and increase the resolution of the image capture. can i do that.
 
or export the pdf in preview to a jpeg while at the the same time setting the quality when you export
 
grapes911 said:
You can open up grab and do a screen capture. You can save it as a tiff, then convert that to a jpeg.

how can change the settings to a tiff. and how can change the res.
 
mashinhead said:
how can change the settings to a tiff. and how can change the res.

When you go to save as, the default is a tiff. You can't really change the resolution, but a tiff isn't that bad when you enlarge it. I'm not sure of what you need this for, but I think this is as good as you are going to get with built-in functions.
 
Somebody must know how to make the OS spit out a tiff instead of a pdf.
I've asked before but have had no luck, there were some command line examples on macosxhints but none were a permanent change to the default screenshot.

I would like to know an answer.. I'd even like to know if there was a way of out putting directly to jpeg with a compression attribute to deal out the required image quality a bit like using the command line to gzip up stuff.

any ideas much appreciated.
 
kettle said:
Somebody must know how to make the OS spit out a tiff instead of a pdf.
I've asked before but have had no luck, there were some command line examples on macosxhints but none were a permanent change to the default screenshot.

I would like to know an answer.. I'd even like to know if there was a way of out putting directly to jpeg with a compression attribute to deal out the required image quality a bit like using the command line to gzip up stuff.

any ideas much appreciated.

Why not just copy it to the clipboard? just hold down the ctrl button while taking a screenshot.

If it helps you might want to know that .PNG files are the Tiger standard screenshot file instead of .PDF files.

By the way, some people are unaware of the many ways to take screenshots on Mac OS X so I have listed them below:

- command+shift+3 - Standard Screenshot (saved to the desktop as a .PDF file)
- command+shift+ctrl+3 - Standard Screenshot (copied to the clipboard; use the command+v keyboard command to paste where desired)
- command+shift+4 - Crosshair Screenshot (saved to the desktop as a .PDF file)
- command+shift+ctrl+4 - Crosshair Screenshot (copied to the clipboard; use the command+v keyboard command to paste where desired)
- command+shift+4 then let go and press spacebar - Picture of selected object such as window, background, dock, icon, etc. (saved to the desktop as a .PDF file)
- command+shift+ctrl+4 then let go and press spacebar - Picture of selected object such as window, background, dock, icon, etc. (copied to the clipboard; use the command+v keyboard command to paste where desired)
 
GodBless said:
Why not just copy it to the clipboard? just hold down the ctrl button while taking a screenshot.

If it helps you might want to know that .PNG files are the Tiger standard screenshot file instead of .PDF files.

By the way, some people are unaware of the many ways to take screenshots on Mac OS X so I have listed them below:

- command+shift+3 - Standard Screenshot (saved to the desktop as a .PDF file)
- command+shift+ctrl+3 - Standard Screenshot (copied to the clipboard; use the command+v keyboard command to paste where desired)
- command+shift+4 - Crosshair Screenshot (saved to the desktop as a .PDF file)
- command+shift+ctrl+4 - Crosshair Screenshot (copied to the clipboard; use the command+v keyboard command to paste where desired)
- command+shift+4 then let go and press spacebar - Picture of selected object such as window, background, dock, icon, etc. (saved to the desktop as a .PDF file)
- command+shift+ctrl+4 then let go and press spacebar - Picture of selected object such as window, background, dock, icon, etc. (copied to the clipboard; use the command+v keyboard command to paste where desired)

Cool, I didn't know about some of those shortcuts. :)
 
SnapNDrag

I do a lot of training manuals and posters for computer workshops, etc.

Snap-N-Drag is a life-saver! It's freeware (with optional shareware plugins for frames and stuff) that gives you the three main screenshot options (full screen, window, selection with crosshairs), a timer if you need it, and the ability to name the file, choose its type, and choose its quality - all before you save it somewhere (which you do by dragging the thumbnail to wherever you want it to save.)

Most importantly, you can shoot (er - snap) and drag the thumbnail directly into Pages, Word, or whatever you're designing in. Thus totally eliminating the need to have a tiff, jpeg, whatever file sitting on your desktop that needs to be filed or thrown away. Snap - drag - snap - drag - snap - drag - all without the clutter of pic files. Super app!!!!
 
I found an AppleScript that did most of what I wanted done, and then modified it to output the right filetype, and format I liked.

If you set this as a folder action on your desktop, it should convert your screenshots to .png (an image with lossless compression) and will name them first by date, and then time.

Here's the script; option (alt) click on it to download it, and then move it into the folder action scripts folder. (for some reason I could only get folder actions working if they were in that folder)
 
jsalzer said:
I do a lot of training manuals and posters for computer workshops, etc.

Snap-N-Drag is a life-saver! It's freeware (with optional shareware plugins for frames and stuff) that gives you the three main screenshot options (full screen, window, selection with crosshairs), a timer if you need it, and the ability to name the file, choose its type, and choose its quality - all before you save it somewhere (which you do by dragging the thumbnail to wherever you want it to save.)

Most importantly, you can shoot (er - snap) and drag the thumbnail directly into Pages, Word, or whatever you're designing in. Thus totally eliminating the need to have a tiff, jpeg, whatever file sitting on your desktop that needs to be filed or thrown away. Snap - drag - snap - drag - snap - drag - all without the clutter of pic files. Super app!!!!

It looks like everything that you are doing can be done with keyboard shortcuts.
 
Keyboard Shortcuts

GodBless said:
It looks like everything that you are doing can be done with keyboard shortcuts.

Well, we could get rid of the GUI all together and do everything via keyboard. Didn't we try that once? DOS or something? :)

Sorry, but those of us with regular old brains just can't memorize keyboard shortcuts that use more than two keys. Nor should we have to. That's not what the Mac experience is about. My synopsithingies have more important information to store. ;)
 
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