Research Explainer

If you’ve done screen captures like I’ve done in the past, you probably just hit the “Print Screen” button (PrtScrn) to copy the whole screen to your clipboard, then inserted it into your presentation or document. Or, maybe you used the simple snipping tool in Windows Vista and Windows 7.

But now that I’ve discovered Snagit that’s all changed. It’s an incredibly useful piece of software for selectively lifting  all or part of a Web page or other screen segment and sending it to Excel, Word, PowerPoint, e-mail, or just about any other program. You  can capture images, text, screen video and even a Web page, complete with active links. In fact, I used Snagit to capture the image of the Snagit home page graphic on this post. You can even record animated sequences of interactions with a Web page, showing cursor movement and the effects of clicking on links.

When I created a recent PowerPoint presentation, I used Snagit to record such an interaction, as well as capturing and editing logos, selective chunks of Web page and other visuals to make my PowerPoint presentation look much more professional. You can also add arrows, speech bubbles, labels and other explanatory elements to the captured images. And if you want to emphasize a particular section of a Web page, you can even blur out the whole Web page except for that section.

Try the free 30-day trial. I can just about guarantee you’ll end up buying it. At $49.95, it’s a bargain. I should add that there are other screen capture programs out there, including  CaptureXT, CaptureWizPro,  FastStone, and !Quick Screen Capture. They may work well, too, but I chose Snagit because it received the best reviews.