A Quick and Easy Guide to Posting Screenshots
I made this a few weeks ago as a PM for a new member, but figured I would update it for the general public. It may be of some help to new AAR writers or anyone who wants to post a screenshot for whatever reason.
PLEASE NOTE: Experienced .Orgers need not read any further, as this is directed towards new members who aren't familiar with screenshots.
A Quick and Easy Guide to Posting Screenshots
1. Rome: Total War has an automatic screenshot feature which can be used by pressing the Print Screen button. However, if you play with Anti-Aliasing on, this method will not work correctly.
It is for this reason that I recommend downloading and installing FRAPS. You can download it straight away HERE.
It's far and away the best screenshot program I've ever used, and it's free (although there is a full version available, which allows you to save your images to jpeg straight away, but this isn't really a necessity to have)
F10 is the standard button for taking screenshots. F9 will allow you to take 30 second movies, and longer ones with the full version. These buttons can be changed in the settings menu.
If you're in a position to, I encourage buying the full version, and supporting this fantastic software.
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2. If you don't have access to an image editing program like Photoshop, you may want to look into getting GIMP. It's a free image-editing program very similiar to Photoshop.
Before you can use the GIMP, you have to download the GTK runtime environment. You can download it straight away HERE.
The GIMP can be downloaded HERE.
The FAQ for the GIMP can be found HERE.
This is useful for altering your pics. For instance, cropping battle shots produces images that are much more aesthetically pleasing. After you've made any alterations deemed necessary, save the picture as a JPEG. This is the primary reason for getting GIMP; for converting your pics to the JPEG format. This is important because all hosting sites require the images to be in JPEG, if I'm not mistaken.*
Once again, if you're in a position to, donations help programs like this thrive.
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3. Find a good image hosting site. I recommend Photobucket. Once again, it's free, so no worries. I'll be using Photobucket for this little tutorial, but most other image sites are comparable. Be wary of those sites with bandwidth limits if you plan on having an aar with a lot of pics. This is why I like Photobucket, because it has no bandwidth limit that I'm aware of.
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4. After you've taken the screenshot with FRAPS, look in the FRAPS screenshot folder (this is easily accessed using the little FRAPS icon in the lower right hand corner where you see your clock and programs running. Just right click on the FRAPS icon and select view screenshots) and select the image that you want. Open the Gimp, go to open file, choose the proper directory (ex. C:\Program Files\Fraps\Screenshot Folder), open the file in Gimp, and make any necessary alterations. Save the file as JPEG (.jpg).
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5. Ok, now that you've edited your image(assuming you want to) and converted it into JPEG, go to Photobucket and choose "my album" (after you've created an account of course), and you'll see the browse buttons to upload your images....choose to browse, and go to the fraps/screenshots folder, and choose your image.
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6. Press Upload and upload your image. You can upload 3 at a time.
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7. You'll now see that your image is in your album. After this it's really a simple matter of copy/paste. You'll see several different codes under your picture (with an explanation of what they're for), just copy the IMG Code (it's usually the last one down) and then simply paste the code in your post, do a preview to make sure it looks good, and there ya go.
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Hope this is easily followed, and somewhat useful.
Let me know if you have any questions.
Bootsiuv
*I think you may be able to use Microsoft Paint to convert images to JPEG (not 100% sure though), but the GIMP is very user friendly, and the cropping tool is also very important for AARs in my opinion.
