What is best way to take screen shots off internet so as to have best resolution when using in Sony Movie Studio 13?

[Jorge Schutt]

Press print screen, open MS Paint, and click paste.

[John Rofrano]

Hi Jeff, You have a lot of questions and it sounds like you are just learning so let me try and answer them one at a time to hopefully bring some clarity and fill in the gaps in your knowledge.

[Jeff David] “I took some screen shots off of the internet for use in a project. I know this is prob the total wrong way to do it but I did ctrl, alt, prt screen and then pasted the screen shot into word”

There are two primary ways to save images from the Internet:

(1) Right-click on an image and select “Save Image As…” (or whatever terms or browser uses) to save that image to your hard drive. I like to save them into my Downloads folder and then I move them later to where I actually want them. This keeps the initial location constant and eliminates me asking myself the unanswerable question, “Now where did I save that image?” 😉

(2) You can take a screen capture as you did and save it somehow. I would use the image editor to save it instead of word. The Windows Paint program would be fine for this.

The difference between these two methods is that saving the image by right-clicking will give you the image at it’s original resolution while taking a screen shot will always only be the resolution that is currently displayed on the screen. So, for example, if there is an image on a web site that is 900×900 and the web page is instructed to display it at a 300×300 size, right-clicking and choosing save will save the original 900×900 image but taking a screen capture will only capture the 300×300 image that is currently being displayed. Make sense?

[Jeff David] “I know that pixelation is the key. Some are 979 x 528 x 32”

Pixel count is certainly important. What’s more important to understand is the pixel dimensions of your final delivery format. If you are planning to render your video in HD, you should know that Full HD is 1920 pixels wide by 1080 pixel high. That means that Movie Studio will have to scale the 979 x 528 image up to make it fill the 1920 x 1080 screen and that can make it look bad.

[Jeff David] “Some I used the auto correct feature on in Picture Manager and it appears to have increased the resolution to 1600 x 818 x 24 and while the picture quality has been improved, it still is a little less than I would like.”

You are on the right track! Movie Studio is not going to do as good a job at upscaling the images as a dedicated image editor will, but you only increased the image to 1600 x 818 which is still smaller than he 1920 x 1080 that you need to fill your video. This is why I said that knowing that your final output will be HD is important because you want to resize these videos to be at least 1920 x 1080. Even then, they might not look that good but they will look better than if you let Movie Studio resize them.

[Jeff David] “At one point, I was doing, “Save as” instead of taking screen shots. The screen shots I took were of linkedin and when I used, “save as” what it did was copy the individual pictures of the people on the screen but none of the text. “

That’s correct. It sounds like you are actually trying to capture the layout of web pages so screen capture is what you want. Unfortunately a web page is probably going to be smaller than 1920 x 1080 so you are going to have to resize them and probably sharpen them in an image editor to make the text readable again. Resizing an image with text is one of the hardest things to make look good so don’t think that it should be simple, and that you must be doing something wrong… it’s actually harder than it looks and you might need to use something called an “Unsharp Mask” in an image editor to bring back the sharpness of the text.

[Jeff David] “I also saw where Photoshop has a feature whereby you can increase the pixels from 72 to 300?”

That is one of the confusing parts about working with images. Don’t be fooled… that parameter is for print and has nothing to do with video! The parameter is called DPI which stands for Dots Per Inch and refers to how many dots your printer uses to create a square inch of print. Most printers are 300 DPI. By changing the DPI in Photoshop to 300, you can then change the width and height to a familiar 5 inch by 7 inches and Photoshop will change the pixel count to get a guaranteed 5×7 print. This has absolutely nothing to do with video since Full HD is always 1920 x 1080 regardless of whether you view it on a 20 inch, 40 inch, or 60 inch screen! Computer screens are referred to as having 72 DPI so just leave that parameter on 72 if you are working with images for video.

[Jeff David] “I guess the quality is simply limited by the quality of the screen shot.”

Exactly! When you make an image larger, you have to create pixels where there were none. This is always a guess and almost always makes the image look fuzzy. Having said that, there are programs dedicated to enlarging images that do a great job like ON1 Perfect Resize but they’re not free. Photoshop also does a pretty good job using the Bicubic method.

[Jeff David] “Can someone please tell me the proper procedure as I don’t think pasting images into word doc is the right way?”

If you want entire web pages with images and text then screen captures are the best way to go. If you have access to Photoshop then use that. If not, you might want to download a free image editor like GIMP and paste them into that to save them as JPEG files. You can also use Microsoft Paint that comes with Windows just to save them as JPEG. GIMP will take a while to learn but it will be worth it because you will get better quality from resizing your photos properly for 1920 x 1080 HD.

Hope that helps although I’m sure it will just feed the next stream of questions which is a good thing. (that means your moving forward in your learning) 😉

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Jeff David]

Wow! Awesome John. Thanks for the beginners lesson! Ha. I’ve been 4 years off an on w SONY MS (now that I think of it more like 2 years as the first 2 years all I did was film part time) but not a lot of experience doing what is in this post so I guess I can still be a beginner – as far as this topic.

I had thought copying and pasting into Word was silly but thanks to you, I know I was not far off but I will take your advice and use the Gimp etc.

I see I am limited to what the best clarity is that I can expect so that makes me feel better too – just knowing that it’s not me but just the limitation.

The info about the size of the image or internet page and when rendered with 1920 by 1080 format was great – as all the rest. However I now realize my image quality will look even worse when rendered, however, this is just a small project I have to do for a job I am up for. So it does not have to be HD and I can render it in standard format.

The job has nothing to do w vid production but I was asked to do a Powerpoint as part of the interview. I figured I would go one better and make a video and wow the hiring manager. However, I see the image of the screen shots give up quality in the video format whereas they are clear in the PowerPoint.

I had doubts in my mind and was thinking I was totally wrong the way I was proceeding but thanks to you the uncertainty has been removed and I can move forward w confidence.

I’ll take your advice and paste into Gimp instead of Word. I really thought pasting into Word was totally wrong but I guess it’s not totally wrong just GIMP is better.

I am guessing GIMP is better then MS Picture Manager due to the ability to resize to the 1920 x 1080? My gut feeling is Picture Manger is just basic?

I can’t tell you how much I appreciate this excellent lesson John!

I’m printing your, “tutorial” off and will follow your instructions!

An aside is – I just built a green screen. I built a wooden framework about 6 feet by 6 feet and got a fluorescent green sheet and hung it over the frame. Getting ready to try it out.

Lenovo quad core i7 16gb of ram, Windows 8.1 MS 13 64 bit

[Jeff David]

Something else I meant to mention, I have had no problem (as far as I know) videotaping pictures from books – mostly drawings, and paintings and photographs) off of the internet.

I.e. I look up a book in HathiTrust or Archive.org where all of the books are in the public domain, find drawings in the books, display them on my computer screen, videotape them with my camcorder.

Resolution seems good so no real problem.

IN this instance – I did in fact ALSO do the same thing.

I.e. did a search on Linkedin that displayed about 20 photographs and text, filmed it right off of my computer screen with my camcorder, but unlike the drawings and pictures I had videotaped previously,text was also involved i.e. on the screen and when viewed in MS the text was blurry. I guess videotaping text is a harder thing to do and get to come out clear.

Lenovo quad core i7 16gb of ram, Windows 8.1 MS 13 64 bit

[Jeff David]

Yes that definitely helped.

I am having better luck today.

I don’t think I was pasting directly into Picture Manager yesterday.

I can’t remember exactly what I did but I think I might have pasted the screen shots into WORD and from there, somehow got the image of the screen shot from word into Picture manager.

Anyways, I had tried just pasting the screen shots directly into PICTURE MANAGER yesterday, I thought, but I must have been doing something wrong cause the images did not appear.

Hard to tell exactly what I was doing.

However, just now I did ctrol, alt, print screen and was able to paste directly into PICTURE MANAGER.

Oddly enough, unlike yesteday, the resolution was immediately w out adjustments 1599×818. Doing auto correct made the picture of the screen shot look better but unlike yesterday, did not increase the screen resolution.

I surmise that using word lowered the resolution (yesterday) and that is why when I did autocorrect to the word image – it increased the resolution to the higher resolution – yesterday but not today as today I was pasting straight to PICTURE MANAGER.

Anyways, the image when in Movie Studio looks pretty good, much better than yesterday I am pleased with it. Although, I guess I need to see what happens when I render it as you taught me unless it matches the project settings, it won’t look as good as it does on the timeline or in preview.

But I am thinking I will just render it in Standard.

Thanks for all the help!

I am really glad I learned all of this as it was perplexing and now I am comprehending!

Lenovo quad core i7 16gb of ram, Windows 8.1 MS 13 64 bit

[Jeff David]

here’s something I found on improving picture quality

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pc0PpS9nWV0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CzFDKV9FDJg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K4LRaFxZZvI
this one only works w pics from cameras

Lenovo quad core i7 16gb of ram, Windows 8.1 MS 13 64 bit

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[John Rofrano]

[Jeff David] “I guess videotaping text is a harder thing to do and get to come out clear.”

Yea, text is very difficult to video properly because the video will get compressed while it is encoded and it’s a lossy compression so you will loose some quality guaranteed. Most video codecs don’t handle thin lines very well which is what text basically is. That’s why a screen capture would be better quality.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[John Rofrano]

[Jeff David] “I am really glad I learned all of this as it was perplexing and now I am comprehending!”

I’m glad that my explanation helped. Pasting direction into Windows Picture Manager will definitely give you a better results than using Word (as you have seen). Remember, MS Word is a “word processor” and so it will resize the picture to fit on a printed page. This is not what you want to do for video.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[John Rofrano]

It’s important to point out that all three videos were working with print and not video which is why they all changed the DPI to 300 to match their printers. You DO NOT want to do this because you are working with video.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Jeff David]

Ahhh yes, good point. I see what you mean.

I know the one video did state that it would only work with pictures taken with a camera vs copied “pictures” (vs. screen shots – I know now there is a difference) and so I see what you are saying video is different.

Other than the one vid that states the procedure (in that one vid) will only work with pictures taken w someone’s very own camera – vs pictures copied off the internet . . .

1. will the other two procedures work on screen shots?

I.e. Can screen shots be improved with the other two procedures outlined in the vid clips I posted – if I get the screen shots into a Picture editor?

I hope I have stated the question so as it can be understood. It’s a little tricky.

2. I noticed today that when setting the project parameters you can set them according to what media someone is using.

Of course you already know this but:

PROJECT

PROPERTIES

MATCH MEDIA VIDEO SETTINGS

And of course – it sets it to match the resolution of the media.

SO I guess I can either render in standard or just let MS set the resolution – depending on what media I clicked on once MATCH MEDIA SETTINGS opens up.

For instance, today, I selected one of the screen shots I had added to MS and MS set the project parameters to uh I think that screen shot res was 1600 by 818 – somewhere close to that.

I assume this will prevent the resolution problem you described that occurs of someone renders in HD and their media is less than HD I assume?

Of course the project also contains video footage I shot in HD along w the screen shots I captured.

But the screen shots are 1600 x 818.

Lenovo quad core i7 16gb of ram, Windows 8.1 MS 13 64 bit Thumbnail is view out of the Olde North Church window where the signal lanterns were hung, as in, “1 if by land 2 if by sea” looking across the Charles River to the Charlestown Naval Yard where rebels awaited the signal April 18th, 1775.