You can quickly and easily add a screenshot to your Office file to enhance the readability or capture information without leaving the program that you are working in. This feature is available in Microsoft Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint, and Word. You can use it to take a picture of all or part of the windows open on your computer. These screenshots are easy to read in printed documents and on PowerPoint slides that you project.
Screenshots are useful for capturing snapshots of information that might change or expire, such as a breaking news story or a time-sensitive list of available flights and rates on a travel Web site. Screenshots are also helpful for copying from Web pages and other sources whose formatting might not successfully transfer into the file by any other method. Screenshots are static images. When you take a screenshot of something (for example, a Web page), and the information changes at the source, the screenshot is not updated.
When you click the Screenshot button, you can insert the whole program window or use the Screen Clippingtool to select part of a window. Only windows that have not been minimized to the taskbar can be captured.
When you choose Screen Clipping, your entire window will temporarily become opaque or “frosted over”. After you select the part of the window that you want, your selection will show through this opaqueness.
Open program windows are displayed as thumbnails in the Available Windows gallery and when you pause your pointer over a thumbnail, a tooltip pops up with the program name and document title. For example, if you are in Word, you might see Microsoft Excel - Book 1 as a minimized window that you could add to your Office file.
Which Office program are you using?
Excel
NOTE Only one screenshot at a time can be added. To add multiple screenshots, repeat steps 2 and 3 below.
- Click the worksheet that you want to add the screenshot to.
- On the Insert tab, in the Illustrations group, click Screenshot.
- Do one of the following:
- To add the whole window, click the thumbnail in the Available Windows gallery.
- To add part of the window, click Screen Clipping, and when the pointer becomes a cross, press and hold the left mouse button to select the area of your screen that you want to capture.
If you have multiple windows open, click the window you want to clip from before clicking Screen Clipping. When you click Screen Clipping, the program you are working in is minimized and only the window behind it is available for clipping.
TIP After you add the screenshot, you can use the tools on the Picture Tools tab to edit and enhance the screenshot.
Outlook
NOTE Only one screenshot at a time can be added. To add multiple screenshots, repeat steps 2 and 3 below.
- Click the e-mail message that you want to add the screenshot to.
- On the Insert tab, in the Illustrations group, click Screenshot.
- Do one of the following:
- To add the whole window, click the thumbnail in the Available Windows gallery.
- To add part of the window, click Screen Clipping, and when the pointer becomes a cross, press and hold the left mouse button to select the area of your screen that you want to capture.
If you have multiple windows open, click the window you want to clip from before clicking Screen Clipping. When you click Screen Clipping, the program you are working in is minimized and only the window behind it is available for clipping.
TIP Read this
Outlook blog post to see how you can add a screen clipping to an email message.
PowerPoint
NOTE Only one screenshot at a time can be added. To add multiple screenshots, repeat steps 2 and 3 below.
- Click the slide that you want to add the screenshot to.
- On the Insert tab, in the Images group, click Screenshot.
- Do one of the following:
- To add the whole window, click the thumbnail in the Available Windows gallery.
- To add part of the window, click Screen Clipping, and when the pointer becomes a cross, press and hold the left mouse button to select the area of your screen that you want to capture.
If you have multiple windows open, click the window you want to clip from before clicking Screen Clipping. When you click Screen Clipping, the program you are working in is minimized and only the window behind it is available for clipping.
TIP After you add the screenshot, you can use the tools on the Picture Tools tab to edit and enhance the screenshot.
Word
NOTE Only one screenshot at a time can be added. To add multiple screenshots, repeat steps 2 and 3 below.
- Click the document that you want to add the screenshot to.
- On the Insert tab, in the Illustrations group, click Screenshot.
- Do one of the following:
- To add the whole window, click the thumbnail in the Available Windows gallery.
- To add part of the window, click Screen Clipping, and when the pointer becomes a cross, press and hold the left mouse button to select the area of your screen that you want to capture.
If you have multiple windows open, click the window you want to clip from before clicking Screen Clipping. When you click Screen Clipping, the program you are working in is minimized and only the window behind it is available for clipping.
TIP After you add the screenshot, you can use the tools on the Picture Tools tab to edit and enhance the screenshot.
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