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Take a picture of a screen saver in action System
Most people know that if you press Command-Shift-3, you get a picture of your screen. Well what if you wanted a shot of that cool screensaver? You can do it the same way, but with a few more steps:
  1. Hold down Command and Shift.
  2. Without letting go of Command-Shift, open System Preferences, click the Desktop & Screen Saver panel, and then the Screen Saver tab.
  3. Still without release Command-Shift, find the screen saver you want, then click Test.
  4. Wait about five seconds for the screensaver to fully load (or wait until it reaches the image you wish to capture), and then just press the number 3.
You will find a screenshot of the chosen screen saver on your desktop. Hope this has been helpful!
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Take a picture of a screen saver in action | 9 comments | Create New Account
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Take a picture of a screen saver in action
Authored by: kirkmc on Mon, Aug 21 2006 at 7:37AM PDT
SaverLab:

http://www.dozingcatsoftware.com/

"Runs Mac OS X screensaver modules in regular windows."

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Read my blog: Kirkville -- http://www.mcelhearn.com
Musings, Opinion and Miscellanea, on Macs, iPods and more

[ Reply to This | # ]

Take a picture of a screen saver in action
Authored by: canas on Mon, Aug 21 2006 at 8:59AM PDT
The hint seems overly complex...holding command and shift just before clicking "Test" seems to work for me on Tiger.

Command-shift-click on System Preferences also opens its location in the Finder rather than opening up System Preferences itself.

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Take a picture of a screen saver in action
Authored by: kostia on Mon, Aug 21 2006 at 9:27AM PDT
Now THAT is a hint. Command-shift-click on an item in the Dock to get the functionality of right-click and "Show In Finder." I love it.

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Take a picture of a screen saver in action
Authored by: skochak on Mon, Aug 21 2006 at 10:43AM PDT
works with a simple Cmd-Click.. :)

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Take a picture of a screen saver in action
Authored by: robg on Mon, Aug 21 2006 at 11:48AM PDT
And *that* has already been a hint :).

-rob.

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Take a picture of a screen saver in action
Authored by: morespace54 on Mon, Aug 21 2006 at 9:22AM PDT
[QUOTE]
The hint seems overly complex...holding command and shift just before clicking "Test" seems to work for me on Tiger.
[/QUOTE]

Just holding COMMAND + SHIFT just before clicking "Test" also seems to be working in Panther (10.3)

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Take a picture of a screen saver in action
Authored by: ctierney on Mon, Aug 21 2006 at 11:21AM PDT
Another option is to use the screencapture utility preceded with a sleep command. I find this especially usefull when taking screen shots of system menus:

sleep 5 ; screencapture -m ~/desktop/image.pdf

--
Cole



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Take a picture of a screen saver in action
Authored by: DanFrakes on Tue, Aug 22 2006 at 12:54PM PDT
Don't forget OS X's own Grab utility, which lets you take a timed screenshot; just start the timer, click the Test button for the screensaver, and you'll get your screenshot ;-)

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Dan Frakes / Senior Editor, Macworld / Senior Reviews Editor, Playlist

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Take a picture of a screen saver in action
Authored by: swanksalot on Wed, Nov 26 2008 at 10:21AM PST
Is there a way to change the amount of time Grab counts down from? I'm trying to take a screenshot of the iTunes screensaver (like this ), and 10 seconds isn't long enough for the screensaver to start.

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