How To: The Art of Making Classic Screenshots - Page 1/1
Created on 2005-02-04
Title: How To: The Art of Making Classic Screenshots By: Chris 'bapman' Baptista Date: 1999-03-08 1482 Flashback:Orig. Multipage Version Hard Copy:Printer Friendly
Ok, so you have some hot new sim/game sitting on your hard
drive. It has graphics that are out of this world and you'd like to
take screenshots worthy of putting on your desktop to make all your
Playstation pals drool. Want some tips on spicing them up? Sit back and
rub the sleep out of your eyes because I'm about to make your ugly
desktop nightmares go away.
Before I can get into the ins and outs of composing your shot,
you have to have the right equipment to get the job done. My favorite
program for playing around with pictures of any kind on the PC is ThumbsPlus.
Maybe there are better programs out there, but for the average newbie
you need something simple to use that allows you to see all the shots
you've taken in a thumbnail form. This allows you to quickly find and
access the screenshot you're looking for.
Different games save and store screenshots in different
formats; .jpg's, .bmp's,and .raw's are a few of the common formats.
I've been using the raw2bmp
program to convert my .raw's in Falcon 4.0 into .bmp's. Then once I
have the shot in a .bmp format I go into ThumbsPlus and it's as simple
as finding and highlighting the desired photo for my desktop and
hitting F7. BOOM! I have a new desktop picture.
Ok, now you know how to get a pic to your desktop. But taking a
screenshot worthy of a desktop is not so cut and dry. There are a few
major guidelines to follow, and they are ALL important. If you are not
aware of any of these guidelines, taking a good screenshot will be very
hit and miss.
Here is the checklist I use. Each item is important so there is
no specific order of priority: subject matter, action, angle,
foreground/background, and lighting. Let's take them one at a time to
highlight what part they play in making your screenshots sing.
Subject Matter:
1. This is the main part of your screenshot, the focus of
attention. Try to make it something interesting. Screenshots of the
sheep in Warbirds are bound to be immensely boring unless you're a
lonely sheepherder.
2. Keep it believeable. If you decide to shut off all the
realism in your flight sim and find you can take off and land your
trusty F-22 on its tail like it was a space shuttle on the launchpad,
cool. But to do it in a screenshot would just look cheesy, or like you
just missed getting the crash snapshot by another half a second.
Action:
1. Little things count. Those sheep in Warbirds might actually
look a little more exciting if you have an external shot of your
bullets strafing the little buggers.
2. Get busy. No matter how pretty the graphics are in todays sims, a
static photo of a plane just sitting there just doesn't have the punch
of one strutting its respective stuff.
Angle:
1. Stay close. Having your subject matter close enough to see
the details of the markings and weapons loadout is always best. If you
have to squint to see the object of your attention the other guy is not
going to "get it."
2. Stay away from flat level. Giving the virtual camera a
different altitude than your subject adds drama and depth to a photo.
Take a good look at comic books. You will never see a straight on photo
of a villain, but rather the camera will be looking up at him, giving
the picture an ominous turn. Rotate the view and take into account the
overall picture before hitting the snap key.
Foreground/Background:
1. Add texture. Adding something to the foreground and/or
background adds to the texture and depth of a shot. Use this idea in
conjunction with angles to catch things you might otherwise miss in the
background. Angles above the subject looking down are a great way to
pick up burning ground targets in the background.
2. Use everything available. A good way to use the foreground
and background along with the subject matter in a flight sim is by
using a "from the cockpit" view of a burning plane you're chasing to
the ground. The cockpit is the foreground, the burning plane is the
subject matter, the terrain is the background. Taken at the right
distance this is always a great shot; it includes angles and everything
I've mentioned up to this point.
Lighting:
1. Light is good. The many lighting effects
that today's games are using will help you out. Lens flare from the
sun, light reflecting off a surface, light from a burning target or a
missile in flight: remember to always think of where the light sources
are and try to work them into your shot.
2. Dark is good. For every bit of light you'll always have a
shadow. Shadows can dramatically enhance any shot with depth and
perspective, and they create mood. To put it simply, you want the light
to highlight your subject and draw attention to it. On the other hand,
when going for a silhouette try to keep it dark, with the lighting
being provided by things like the afterburner, cockpit displays, and
missiles. The shadows created from aircraft surfaces at night when the
aircraft is in full afterburner can get quite interesting.
Here are a few shots demonstrating some of the concepts I've listed.
In this shot the foreground is dark, drawing your eyes upward. This
method brings your attention immediately to the subject matter.
Although it is a static shot with no action, it includes enough detail
to be interesting.
This shot does a better job of showing action. It is well
lit and it uses the foreground and background effectively and is a
better picture than the earlier one.
Here is a shot from Need For Speed 3 that shows how to
incorporate angles, foreground, background, subject matter and lighting
together to make a great shot.
Distance is what keeps this Warbirds shot from being a great shot. It
has good lighting, action and background, but it just isn't close
enough to see the pilot making that "ohhhh NOOOOOOOOooooo!!!" face.
The
light surface of the plane in contrast to the dark color of the grass
draws your eyes directly to the plane. The craters in the ground and
the fires burning in the background add to the fun.
The
cloud in the background and the sun glinting off the cockpit, even the
climb angle of the aircraft, give movement and depth to this screen
shot. Courtesy of Maddox Games.
This
picture was off the mark. It shows how small changes could have made a
big improvement. If this snap was a little higher and a little further
away, and if the aircraft rolled just enough to the right to catch the
horizon in the distance , it would have been an entirely different
shot. Does perspective really matter that much? Check out these next
two:
I've just scratched the surface on most of these subjects but you
have enough here to improve all your snapshots. Decide what you want
the shot to be before you take it, then pause the screen if possible to
rotate the angle around. Play with the zoom controls a bit and make
those console players drool, drool, drool!
