Take a Screenshot with Mac OS X

On September 29, 2015 Apple released its new version of the Mac OS X series operating system. The OS X operating systems is a Unix-based graphical interface operating system that was designed to be the brains of all Apple computers.

The new system that was introduced to the public at the end of September makes it easy to take and take screenshots. For those of you that are not familiar with computer lingo a screenshot is “the action of capturing your computer desktop or anything shown on your computer screen to a static image file. In other words, it is a way of taking a snapshot, or picture, of your computer screen. Some people also call it a screen grab.”

Using screenshots can be helpful when you want to demonstrate ideas, functions or physical movements. Capturing screenshots using a Mac computer can be relatively easy and there are many ways to capture screenshots using the OS X operating system.

Screen Shots are saved as files on the desktop. However they can also be put in a clipboard and pasted into documents.

Instructions on How to Take Screen Shots on a Mac Computer:

The easiest and the most common way that Mac users capture screenshots is by pressing the Shift+Command+3 button. By doing this the image on your screen is saved to your desktop display titled Screen Shot along with the date and time.


If you only want screen shot of a portion of the screen, press Shift+Command+4. When you do this, drag the crosshair over the screenshot and then drag it to whichever area of the screen that you want. You can use the mouse to adjust the dimensions of the selected area and when you release the cursor the computer will take the shot.


 

If you only want to take a snapshot of an individual object on the screen press Shift+Command+4, but instead of choosing an area press the space bar. When you do this a camera icon appears that can be dragged over the item that you want to take a snapshot of. When you click the mouse button the highlighted area will be captured and saved.

A common problem is that you might have is when an item on the screen, is not exactly in the area that you want it. If this happens, just press the spacebar place the crosshair over the item that you want a snapshot of and resize the object with your mouse.

In addition to these common ways of using the OS X screenshot features you can also use combinations of the above options. For example, you can select the screen selection shortcut and select an area of the screen and hold the shift screen then you can resize the snapshot in a single dimension either horizontally or vertically by either dragging the mouse horizontally or vertically.

You can also resize the proportions of the snapshot by holding down the option key and dragging the mouse either towards the center or away from the center of the snapshot.