Introduction
One of the oldest functional buttons on a keyboard is the print screen button. Located near the Pause – break and scroll lock button, the print screen button is one of the most used functional buttons on the keyboard. Although its position may vary from keyboard to keyboard, the print screen button’s main function remains the same. It takes a picture of you currently displaying screen that is saved in the computer random access memory. You can use several programs to just paste the respective print screen and save it as different types of files. But let’s see which are the steps required to create a print screen picture of your desktop.
Step 1
Step 1: the first thing you will need to do before creating a print screen of your desktop is to locate the button on the keyboard. It should be located on the central right part of it, usually on the first upper row of buttons, after the pause – break button (this means you can count until the second button to the right near the F 12 functional key). Its position may vary from one keyboard to another, especially with the new designs that are currently on the market.
Step 2
Step 2: now that you have found the print screen button, you will need to take care of your desktop. If you are doing a print screen, you are doing it for a certain reason. So clean up your desktop and leave only the window that you want to print.
Step 3
Step 3: after the second step is finished you can finally begin the print screen process. You will need to press only once the print screen button and the picture is taken and kept in your memory until you use it or overwrite it. If you don’t understand where it is located, just think of it being placed on the clipboard (if you are a Microsoft Office package user).
Step 4
Step 4: the fourth step consists in opening any program that allows you to paste in contents from your personal computer. Examples of such programs would be the Microsoft Word, the Microsoft Excel, Paint or any other software that allows you to edit pictures. The best recommendation would be to use Paint as your primary print screen software, because it is easy to use and it allows the user to save the respective picture in many different formats, depending on the user’s need.
Step 5
Step 5: after you have opened Paint (find it in start menu – programs – accessories - Paint) all you need to do is paste the print screen (you can also use the Ctrl + V keyboard shortcut) and the print screened picture of your desktop will be pasted into the new created file. Open the programs main menu and choose Save As, name the respective picture, choose its format and move it to a commonly used location so you will remember where you can find it and hit the Save button.
Tip
The most common type of files used is the .jpeg format, used for high quality pictures.
Source
graphicssoft.about.com
