Purpose

• The snipping tool affords an easy way to capture the image of an Internet screen. While it is possible to right-click on most website images and save them to your computer, the text surrounding an image is not saved that way. The snipping tool is particularly helpful if you want to capture the contents of a message board or series of social networking posts, which cannot otherwise be saved to a PC.
  
  

Rectangle Tool

• The rectangle snip tool, as its name suggests, lets you drag a rectangle around a piece of content. The shape you create can be horizontal or vertical; it is also possible to drag the shape in such a way that it becomes an equal-sided square. When you release your mouse after creating the rectangle, the content on the inside of the shape is automatically captured and you are given the option to save it.
  
  

Free-Form Tool

• If you want to capture a piece of content that will not fit comfortably inside a rectangle, the free-form snip tool is more appropriate. This tool allows you to manually draw around the part of the screen that you want to save. To draw around the content, drag your mouse around it -- the feature looks much like the drawing tool in Microsoft Paint.
  
  

Saving Snips

• When you first capture your Internet content, the snipping tool shows you a preview of what you've captured. To save the piece to your computer, just click the purple icon of a computer disk. In the pop-up window that opens, navigate to the folder where you want the file to be kept and choose the image's file format using the "Save as Type" drop-down menu. Snipping tool captures must be saved as an image file.