Screen grab

I need to capture the screen, whilst SHIFT and CTRL are held down (to make the mouse pointer change shape) and include the pointer in the grab.

Snapper will capture the screen, including mouse, but not with SHIFT and CTRL held down, even if two other keys are the trigger. Snapper does not have a ‘capture after 10s’ option.

Paint does not include the pointer in its screen grab.

Any suggestions please?

Last time I had to do this, I had to resort to screenshotting RPCEmu.

I had a different resort. I opened a taskwindow display and changed its background to white. I then opened the application that created the alternative pointer and pressed CTRL and SHIFT. The pointer then changed and reverted once I released the keys. In the task window I typed *FX 106,2 and the mouse changed shape to what I wanted to capture and then I pressed CTRL and SHIFT (the trigger for Snapper) and captured the pointer (which was all I wanted).

Is it not in the application’s Sprites file ;-)

Is it not in the application’s Sprites file ;-)

No, first place I looked (although there are some black and white images in a Sprite file inside it somewhere but easier to capture from screen, in the right colours).

I have used a time delay on my mobile phone camera to take screenshots for slide out menu options that disappear when you try to snap them.
In your case you may need a friend to take the shot as you will be tied up holding down keys.

Snapper will capture the screen, including mouse, but not with SHIFT and CTRL held down, even if two other keys are the trigger. Snapper does not have a ‘capture after 10s’ option.

I will have a look at this. I suspect part of the problem is that Snapper sees shift or control down, and the check for what is down fails because it doesn’t correspond to the mask it is looking for.

One could add shift and control to the key trigger keys, or change temporarily to shift+control as the trigger.

I will also look to see how difficult it would be to add a time delay function to Snapper’s choices.

One could add shift and control to the key trigger keys, or change temporarily to shift+control as the trigger.

One could (and did) but Snapper cannot see the trigger as it is swallowed by the app/ I also tried other key combinations (e.g. ALT-ALT) but holding down SHIFT CTRL ALT and ALT, (SHIFT and CTRL to change the mouse pointer in the app, ALT and ALT to trigger Snapper, but that didn’t work either. I treid on VRPC and ARMX6.

One could (and did) but Snapper cannot see the trigger as it is swallowed by the app

That is a complication.

I have had a quick look at the source. I think I can add the facility to have a delay between pressing the trigger keys and making the snap. There is a bit of rearranging of the order of various actions to be done, since snapper is doing a lot during a snap that relies on the timing of wimp polls (putting windows to front/back, filling the snap area with a background, etc).

Would it be useful to allow a choice of delay times, or should it be 10s only?

@CH – Couldn’t you make a temporary version of the app that uses the pointer that you want to capture as the default pointer just for the sake of taking the snapshot. That way you wouldn’t be looking at conflicting hot keys to trigger different events.

I did work around it – get the app to change its ‘alternative pointer’ to the one I want (by pressing SHIFT and CTRL) and then move the mouse (now in its normal shape) from the app window to a task window without passing over any mouse changing window transitions. Then use *FX 106,2 to display the alternative mouse, then capture it. I did only want the mouse pointer, not any adjacent screen area.

I have a version of Snapper working with an option for a 10s delay. 10s actually seems a lifetime waiting for the snap, so I think I will add the further option of setting a few values for the delay, say 4 -10 s.

I will have a further play. I think one has to accept the fact that the user could do all sorts of odd things during the delay (Snapper is polling so the desktop is alive for things to be set up) which could get Snapper confused.

If anyone would like to try it out, let me know (off forum).