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Screen Captures 102 resource (Was: Is Photoshop a good tool for screenshots?)
Subject:Screen Captures 102 resource (Was: Is Photoshop a good tool for screenshots?) From:"Sean Brierley" <sbri -at- haestad -dot- com> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Wed, 8 May 2002 09:10:03 -0400
As a follow-up, Eric and Deb were kind enough to host my thoughts on
screen captures. I think my article answers many of the screen capture
questions that get asked around here--from a practical, "test-it"
perspective--including the Photoshop/best-way question posted here.
> >-----Original Message-----
> >
> >Subject: Is Photoshop a good tool for screenshots?(long)
> >
> >I need to find the best way to take screenshots so they can
> >be used in
> >print and in online documentation and still retain their
> >quality AND I need
> >a program where I can also embed callouts.
<snip>
> >My manager,
> >who does the
> >online conversion, would LIKE to have the screenshots in
> >print just import
> >smoothly into Robohelp, but this doesn't work for 2 reasons:
> > 1) Images are poor quality once imported
> > 2) Callouts and lines created in FM come out misaligned
> >once imported.
> > I don't know of a good way to do what is being asked.
<snip>
> >
> >How did we do screenshots up to this point? Just copied and
> >pasted into
> >FrameMaker. But this resulted in such poor quality for
> >online that I had to
> >go in and recreate all of the screenshots just for online.
<snip>
> >
> >My solution proposes that we invest in a good imaging tool such as
> >Photoshop,
<snip>
> >the PSD file into JPEG for print and do the Save for Web to export
> >into GIF for online. My understanding is that you have to
> >manipulate the
> >screenshot for these different media anyways because they
> >have different
> >requirements (i.e. resolution, file size).
<snip>
> >Does anyone know of a better way to do this process? Is the
> >solution that
> >my manager wants one that can be achieved or do we have to,
> >as I propose,
> >create and maintain the screenshots separately?
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