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Using Capture

Launching

Capture runs in the background. After double-clicking the executable, nothing opens: an icon appears in the notification area. Launching the executable again while Capture is running shows a “Capture is already running” tooltip.

The notification icon:

  • left-click: capture an area;
  • right-click: menu Capture an area, Capture a window, Capture a screen, Color picker, Settings…, Quit.

Shortcuts

Action Windows Linux
Capture Print Screen Print Screen, Ctrl+Alt+S
Next choice, during capture Print Screen Print Screen
Color picker Win+Shift+C Ctrl+Alt+C

On Windows, Win+Shift+S remains the system Snipping Tool, unless the “Replace the Windows Snipping Tool” option is checked in the settings. On Linux, the same option uses Super+Shift+S.

On Linux, some desktops keep Print Screen for their own tool. Ctrl+Alt+S remains available.

Capturing

  1. Print Screen freezes the whole desktop, on every screen.
  2. An “Area · Window · Screen” bar appears at the top of the screen where the mouse is. Each capture starts on “Area”.
  3. Choose the mode by clicking the bar, or by pressing Print Screen again.
    • Area: draw a rectangle.
    • Window: pointing at the inside of a window captures the inside only; pointing at its title bar or edges captures the whole window.
    • Screen: the whole screen under the mouse.
  4. What will be captured is outlined in red, with its size in pixels. Click to confirm. Esc, right-click or Alt+Tab cancel.

The editor then opens, centered on the screen where the mouse is.

Editor

Tools: Select, Freehand, Text, Arrow, Line, Rectangle, Ellipse. Rectangle and Ellipse draw an outline or a blur.

  • Colors and sizes: eight colors, thickness from 1 to 20 px, text size from 10 to 96 px, blur intensity from 1 to 10.
  • Selection: a click selects an annotation, dragging moves it, Delete erases it. A frame drawn on an empty area selects several annotations; Shift+click adds or removes one; Ctrl+A selects them all. A changed setting applies to the selected annotations.
  • Text: a click creates a text, Enter starts a new line, a click elsewhere or Esc confirms it. Double-click a text to edit it.
  • View: the mouse wheel zooms around the pointer, from 5% to 1,600%; holding the middle button moves the image; Ctrl+0 switches between 100% and the whole image.
  • Right-click: Copy, Save as… (PNG or JPEG), rotate right or left, flip horizontally or vertically, black and white.
  • Undo: Ctrl+Z, redo: Ctrl+Y, up to 300 steps.

“Copy”, or Ctrl+C, puts the annotated image on the clipboard and closes the editor. Esc closes the editor without confirmation.

Text placed on the image uses a font limited to Latin characters: emojis and non-Latin scripts are not shown.

Color picker

Win+Shift+C (Linux: Ctrl+Alt+C) opens a magnifier of 15 × 15 enlarged pixels, with the color code of the center pixel below it. A click copies that code in #RRGGBB format and shows a confirmation tooltip.

Settings

The Settings window opens from the icon menu or the ⚙ button in the editor. It has two checkboxes:

  • Replace the Windows Snipping Tool (Win+Shift+S): saved in capture.toml, next to the executable. No file is created until this setting is changed.
  • Start Capture with Windows (Linux: when the session opens): written directly to the system. If the executable is moved, the box appears unchecked; checking it again saves the new location.

Linux

  • Wayland is not supported: use an X11 session.
  • Without a compatible notification area, a message says so; quit Capture with pkill capture.
  • “Save as” goes through xdg-desktop-portal.
  • The copied image stays on the clipboard as long as Capture is running.