PicPick is a powerful, free way to take and edit screenshots

Filed under: Design, Utilities, Windows, Freeware

PicPick is a powerful, free way to take and edit screenshots

by Lee Mathews Oct 19th 2008

I've been using Faststone Capture portable for ages to handle my screenshot tasks, but PicPick is a very capable alternative.

PicPick provides the usual capture functionality and Windows hot key replacements (print screen and the control + and alt + variations), but it doesn't stop there. The integrated editor is packed with features, and can easily handle any quick edits I need for creating documentation or blog posts.

The editor's tabbed interface makes working with multiple images easy, especially when working with the repeat function to re-capture the same region for, say, a step-by-step installer tutorial.

Since most of my screen captures have to fit into a 500 pixel <div> tag, I was eager to test PicPick's ability to scale images. Resizing is very good, producing reductions that are on par with those created by CS4.

So what else does PicPick include? How about a color picker, screen ruler, crosshair (for finding pixel-accurate screen locations), protractor (wth?), and whiteboard. The whiteboard feature works well with pen input, and allows you to markup your screen with multiple colors and pen widths prior to capturing.

On the downside, the editor lacks layer support and elements can't be moved once you place them. It can be especially frustrating with text, but PicPick isn't really designed for that kind of editing.

It's free, and packs a ton of useful features in a half-megabyte portable package.

[ via Freeware Files ]

Tags: capture, portable, screen-capture, screencap, screenshot

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

LinearMode said 2:48PM on 10-19-2008

tried it out and i gotta say i love it

grlofthecity said 2:50PM on 10-19-2008

Does anyone know if Windows Vista is supported?

Stephen said 8:35PM on 10-19-2008

For some strange reason I can't see any menus in this program:

http://img206.imageshack.us/img206/2853/46453075yw1.png

MK said 2:33PM on 10-20-2008

Remove pickpick.ini and restart the program.

Stephen said 7:03PM on 10-20-2008

Tried that.

Even tried changing my Windows theme to classic.
No luck

Xaro said 10:09PM on 10-19-2008

I prefer Jing for my screenshot taking, mainly because I take SS to show something to someone and use Jing and it automaticly upload it to an image server and gives me the link

Mark said 2:07AM on 10-20-2008

Ever tried Cropper? I loves me some Cropper for simple screen shots.

aristarkhos said 2:47AM on 10-20-2008

Sounds good. Will definitely try it out.
I checked Jing out...cool! Thanks Xaro.

Jash Sayani said 5:07AM on 10-20-2008

I like Corel Capture. Just because it gives the output in amazing resolutions for web publishing, etc.
You can also import it to Corel Draw directly for the editing....

Stuart Halliday said 6:13AM on 10-20-2008

The free and popular graphics viewer/editor IrfanView has been master of the screenshot for years. Any reason why I should change? ;-)

Rocketboy said 8:29AM on 10-20-2008

I go for Screenshot Captor from DonationCoder.com. It's a little janky from time to time, but it does a great job at handling elements added to the file. You can even go back to saved files, and edit what you've added to the screenshot. Nice.

Rocketboy said 8:46AM on 10-20-2008

I'm a fan of Screenshot Captor from DonationCoder.com. It's a little janky at times, but you can even go back to a file that you've saved, and re-edit your annotations. Nice.

Rocketboy said 8:47AM on 10-20-2008

One day Webblogs will fix their comment system.. I'm not holding my breath though.

Aniruddh said 10:30PM on 10-20-2008

I think Google should add screen shot ability in Picasa....What U say Lee?

Lee Mathews said 10:38PM on 10-20-2008

It would be nice to see a major app like Picasa add screencapturing. Tight integration with an excellent picture manager? I like the sound of that.

Plus, if there's a system tray component running anyway, why not add screenshots?

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