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Screenshots on OS X do not have any default customisation settings, at least, not in the form of a preferences pane. In order to change anything, and I mean anything at all, about them you need to venture into one of the most feared areas of OS X, the Terminal.

I always say this when writing about the Terminal, and I am going to say it again. The Terminal does not have to be feared. As long as you follow the instructions that I give here you cannot do any damage to your system.

Back To Basics

Before we delve into the act of changing the settings for screenshots, I’m going to walk you through taking them in the first place, if you already know how to do this jump on to the next section.

Firstly, their are three different types of screenshot on OS X, full-screen, area and window. In order to take a full-screen screenshot you simply press ⌘+⇧+3. By default this will save the screenshots to your desktop.

Next, is the ‘area’ screenshot. In order to use this type press ⌘+⇧+4, and then click and drag over the area you want to screenshot.

Finally in order to do a window screenshot press ⌘+⇧+4, and then once the cross-hair has appeared press space. This will make a small camera appear and from here all you have to do is select the window you wish to screenshot.

Customisation Options

On OS X you can customise screenshots in many different aspects, but here I will only cover two most common ones. The full list of possibilities can be found in the Apple documentation.

Changing the File Format

In order to change the file format you must firstly open up a Terminal window (Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app), and type the following.

defaults write com.apple.screencapture type TYPE

For the command to work, you need to replace “TYPE” with a valid file format, the available options are:

• png (default)
• pdf
• jpg
• jp[2 (jpeg 2000)
• gif
• tiff
• bmp
• pict
• tga

Once you have selected your format simply issues the command, placing the file format in it’s space. For example for a JPG, I would issue:

defaults write com.apple.screencapture type jpg

In order for any changes to take effect you must logout and back in.

Changing the file location

Changing the default file location is a pretty common want for OS X. In order to do this simply type the following into your Terminal window.

defaults write com.apple.screencapture location PATH

Naturally, “PATH” should be replaced with the desired location for where you wish your screenshots to be saved. For example, if I want to have my screenshots saved in my Pictures directory, I would issues the following command:

defaults write com.apple.screencapture location /Users/danielsgroves/Pictures

Don’t forget to log-out and log back in for these changes to take effect.

Conclusions

This concludes the guide on both taking screenshots and on how to customise the way they work without bogging down your system with unnecessary software. As you can see it is really quick and easy to do, and no more do you need to worry about remembering to move your screenshots all the time in order to keep your desktop clean and minimal.

Have you tried either of these? What other screen-shot related tips do you have?