Windows

Give your Print Screen key a serious upgrade.

FREE (DONATION-WARE) | WWW.DONATIONCODER.COM

Screenshot Captor, from Donation-Coder, is just about the most powerful free screen capture tool you can download. It’s thoughtfully designed and packed with options that will make your life easier, whatever you need screen grabs for.

Although it’s available as both installable and portable versions for Windows XP and later, currently there’s nothing available for Mac or Linux, so this is a Windows exclusive.

It lets you capture your whole screen, a selected area, an individual window, or even the content from a scrolling window — a feature you won’t find in any other free screen capture software. Screenshot Captor can even capture stills from your webcam, or import images directly from your scanner.

If all that isn’t enough, you can also import images from your scanner directly into Screenshot Captor’s image editor, neatly bypassing several steps that would normally be necessary for tasks like importing and annotating contracts.

Once installed, Screenshot Captor appears as an icon in your system tray and a desktop widget. You can either use this to choose a capture option, or use a customisable keyboard shortcut.

Screenshot Captor’s toolkit includes options for blacking out sensitive information like passwords and usernames, and highlighting important areas. There’s a comprehensive set of watermarking tools, plus all the brush, text, selection and shape tools you’d expect from a basic photo editor.

Before you can install and use Screenshot Captor, you need to request a free six-month key from the developer or generate your own three-month key. This system is designed to encourage users to consider making a donation, but if you can hold out for 12 months you’ll be able to generate one for free.

This screen capture software is extremely impressive, though users may want to be mindful that making a donation gives “guaranteed lifetime to site content with no recurring charges ever, regardless of any future changes to site policy”, implying that Screenshot Captor may not be free for personal use indefinitely if voluntary contributions aren’t enough to sustain it.