Home Forums Mac Software Mac Applications Copying and pasting Screen shots

I've looked up how to copy and paste from a screen shot but can't make it work. Mostly it says to add the control button while taking the screen shot and then opening up Preview or maybe my word processor and pasting. That's doesn't do a thing. Has anyone actually had success doing this?

Thanks.

I have used TinkerTool (General Tab) to take screenshots in PDF format. I just tried this and it worked: Open the screenshot in Preview, copy it, and paste into Word. If you have screenshots in a different format, perhaps that's the source of the problem.

Every Mac has built in screenshot capabilities. The one that gives you the most options, and yet is still quite simple, is Command-Shift-5. This produces a small floating pallet (look to the bottom of your screen) that allows you capture some or all of your screen. If you hover the cursor over the items in the pallet a pop-up describes what each one does. After selecting, a simple Return or Enter captures the shot. The shot is saved to the location you choose in the floating pallet's Options (Desktop is probably the default). Double-click on the saved screenshot and it opens in Preview. Then you can do what is suggested above, or drag and drop it into a document.

Hi Ira:

I already dragged and dropped it into a word processing document. The trouble is that it still looks like the screen shot. I want to edit it and make it a document rather than a screen shot.

Hi Jon:

I don't have Tinker Tool under General. I brought it up with spotlight. It is in my Apps in Finder. This is what came up. Tinker Tool I don't know where to go from there. I want to edit the screen shot, not just put it into my document as is.

The General tab (as seen in your post) is two steps up from Applications. Click it and see if you can modify the screenshot format.

I changed the format from default to a couple of others, but I can still only cut and paste but no editing. Dang!

Hi, Rita. Take your screenshot with command-shift-3 (for a full shot) or command-shift-4 (for a partial shot), and then double-click on it, which will open it in Preview where you can do and save your edits with the "Save?" prompt when you quit.

If you make a mistake along he way, you can undo it with command-Z.

If that's not enough, tell me exactly what you want to do next with your saved, edited screenshot.

When you click on "Markup" towards the right of the top toolbar, you get all sorts of editing options.

Can you post a screenshot of an example of what you want your end product to look like so we can consider it from that perspective?

OK, when I get back. Got to run an errand.

It sounds as if you are trying to copy and edit text you have captured in a screenshot. If that is the case, the first thing you must do is to run OCR (Optical Character Recognition) on the file to create an editable text layer, which can then be copied and pasted it into your text editor. That will give you the editable text, but you will lose the formatting. Unfortunately, OCR requires a third-party application. There are several OCR apps available on the App Store. PDF OCR X Community Edition is free and has good reviews, but I have not used it personally.

FWIW, the one I have used for years is Nitro PDF Pro ($139.99) but that is a serious Adobe Acrobat competitor and gross overkill for what you need.

That didn't occur to me.

Shottr, 30 day free trial, then nagware...$8 to purchase, which I originally bought for full page screenshots, has also got OCR functionality which I've found to work well.

I clicked markup and then I clicked on the font icon but it wouldn't let me edit my screen shot I just want to have the text to paste into my word processor and not a screen shot per se..

joemike was more insightful than the rest of us who would have gotten right to the point had that been your initial post.

Try Shottr, which I suggested.

Hit command-option-control-O and select the text you want, and it will wind up in your clipboard.

It's never failed me, but results may require a bit of editing depending upon how the text fits into your selected area.

I just did the command-option-control-O and nothing happened. Of course I just clicked on the screen shot. Not sure again how to get it in Preview which didn't pop up when I clicked on it. And is that a capital O?

Yes, capital O.

The command should have brought up a crosshair which you use to select your text, and after selecting, your text is automatically on your clipboard.

I've got the routine down pat.

With both full page copy and OCR functionality, Shottr is a pretty useful app, and Max must be getting some action, because he's raised the price from $4 to $8.

There is a free one too and that's the one I used. He also has a friends plan for $25.00 I guess. That was on a video I saw on how to use it.

With both full page copy and OCR functionality, Shottr is a pretty useful app, and Max must be getting some action, because he's raised the price from $4 to $8. [/quote]

The "free" one is nagware which will start bugging you to buy after 30 days.

"You can download and use Shottr for free. After 30 days it will start asking you to consider upgrading."

Back in the days when I was broke, I ran across a few apps which forgot that I had already run them when I completely uninstalled and re-d/l them.