A FREE screen capture utility and other ramblings...
from 
GalCiv2 Forums
GalCiv2 Forums
Hopefully this is in the best place.....
Hey all (fellow fans and devs alike),
First post in the community, small intro followed by a link to a small and FREEWARE utility (NOT of my creation) for all those that want to take multiple sequential in-game screenshots easily using the printscreen button....(something that I noticed a number of people mention in the POST YOUR SHIPS thread, and didn't see answered clearly). I'd like to start showing off (and YES sharing as well) some of my ship creations with the community, but the ALT-TAB method is just too time consuming.
I've been lurking and reading (time permitting) for the past week or so. I had considered the game after reading reviews, but I hesitated after feeling somewhat burned by "SW:Empire at War" (yeah, it was pretty for a week, but I shoulda known better as far as true depth was concerned).
Then, a co-worker/friend recommended the game and showed me what the ship builder was capable of, I was instantly hooked and I've spent (as much time as I have with full time employment, a modest commute, etc.) learning the game/play mechanics (which seem pretty darned robust and logical so far) as much as I've had time to, with that wonderful little ship builder consuming 80% of the time that I have had the game up so far;.....Ugghhhh!....thanks for such a wonderful little toy guys, seriously, I haven't had this much fun with a game customization utility....well...to be honest...that I can remember...EVER...and that's out of +/-25 years (PONG anyone? or better yet, anybody remember that BEAST game on the Commodore PET? haven't played that in awhile) of gaming experience on multiple generations of both computers and consoles....
The Beta Version (I'm running beta3) of the ship builder is just spectacular, I could (and I may at some point this week put in the appropriate post) throw some requests/opinions/whatever you will out there. It seems like you guys have an excellent handle on this thing, and that you have already (from talking to my friend) made HUGE improvements in the ship builder, but there are a few small tweaks/additions, like being able to select multiple objects (using a shift-select command), a copy/paste feature, and maybe the rotary dials being a little larger (or possibly make the tick marks brighter/different color). I use "Free Rotate", and it works great, but it's sometimes difficult to tell how close I am to a tick mark.
Then there are some of the ideas that Kryo's Mod supposedly starts to address (sorry, haven't actually been able to use it, since I don't want to potentially muck up anything from the Betas, and I'm just getting started at looking at the file structures, and I'm not sure exactly what it does to the basic install ATM), like "blank" hull points floating in space that denote the "size classification" of a ship and then allow you to place any object, on that single point, as the "hull" of the ship, and then make the current hulls just available as Jewelry.....but I digress...that's not what this post was about, and I generally believe (as Brad said earlier this week) that the best thing for the general community is to push the official update before continuing the Beta roll-outs, which have (betas 2 and 3) worked fine for me BTW, AND that may be better off done as a Mod anyway.....
Hopefully, if things go as planned, I'll be posting images of multiple ship designs (some possilby late in progress shots to get some feedback) as the weekend/week progresses, but a pretty ship design still takes time, and sometimes real life responsibilities get in the way as well, things come up, etc....so, we'll play it by ear....As time goes by, and time permitting, I would possibly like to get involved in meshing some new ship parts, and possibly some Mod work as well....With the core game being so great, the more that I think about it this engine has a lot of great potential for many other things (and I like the fact that I'm supporting a "local" software dev and their product as well).....
In the meantime though, here's a link to that free screenshot utility, it's fairly easy to set up, extract the .zip to a directory of your choosing, make a shortcut of the .exe to your desktop (or start menu, or whatever floats your boat) and click to run. There are a handful of options to choose from, like the directory in which to save files and the file type, but no configurable printscreen button (which isn't a big deal for GC2 or most other games for that matter, since that's often the default button, or can easily be setup to be). Configure it and Hide it in your system tray and you're all set to take screen captures till your hearts content, or your hard drive is full, when you're done right click on it in the SysTray and Quit.....
Link
UPDATE: Here is one (hand cropped) image from said utility, more can be found in the "show off your cool ship designs"
Later all, I'm off to play...errmmm....uhhhh, I'll be honest, work on my ships....
Oh, and sorry about being so long winded here...too much reading without having the proper time to reply, then my mind just dumps when I start typing.....
Hey all (fellow fans and devs alike),
First post in the community, small intro followed by a link to a small and FREEWARE utility (NOT of my creation) for all those that want to take multiple sequential in-game screenshots easily using the printscreen button....(something that I noticed a number of people mention in the POST YOUR SHIPS thread, and didn't see answered clearly). I'd like to start showing off (and YES sharing as well) some of my ship creations with the community, but the ALT-TAB method is just too time consuming.
I've been lurking and reading (time permitting) for the past week or so. I had considered the game after reading reviews, but I hesitated after feeling somewhat burned by "SW:Empire at War" (yeah, it was pretty for a week, but I shoulda known better as far as true depth was concerned).
Then, a co-worker/friend recommended the game and showed me what the ship builder was capable of, I was instantly hooked and I've spent (as much time as I have with full time employment, a modest commute, etc.) learning the game/play mechanics (which seem pretty darned robust and logical so far) as much as I've had time to, with that wonderful little ship builder consuming 80% of the time that I have had the game up so far;.....Ugghhhh!....thanks for such a wonderful little toy guys, seriously, I haven't had this much fun with a game customization utility....well...to be honest...that I can remember...EVER...and that's out of +/-25 years (PONG anyone? or better yet, anybody remember that BEAST game on the Commodore PET? haven't played that in awhile) of gaming experience on multiple generations of both computers and consoles....
The Beta Version (I'm running beta3) of the ship builder is just spectacular, I could (and I may at some point this week put in the appropriate post) throw some requests/opinions/whatever you will out there. It seems like you guys have an excellent handle on this thing, and that you have already (from talking to my friend) made HUGE improvements in the ship builder, but there are a few small tweaks/additions, like being able to select multiple objects (using a shift-select command), a copy/paste feature, and maybe the rotary dials being a little larger (or possibly make the tick marks brighter/different color). I use "Free Rotate", and it works great, but it's sometimes difficult to tell how close I am to a tick mark.
Then there are some of the ideas that Kryo's Mod supposedly starts to address (sorry, haven't actually been able to use it, since I don't want to potentially muck up anything from the Betas, and I'm just getting started at looking at the file structures, and I'm not sure exactly what it does to the basic install ATM), like "blank" hull points floating in space that denote the "size classification" of a ship and then allow you to place any object, on that single point, as the "hull" of the ship, and then make the current hulls just available as Jewelry.....but I digress...that's not what this post was about, and I generally believe (as Brad said earlier this week) that the best thing for the general community is to push the official update before continuing the Beta roll-outs, which have (betas 2 and 3) worked fine for me BTW, AND that may be better off done as a Mod anyway.....
Hopefully, if things go as planned, I'll be posting images of multiple ship designs (some possilby late in progress shots to get some feedback) as the weekend/week progresses, but a pretty ship design still takes time, and sometimes real life responsibilities get in the way as well, things come up, etc....so, we'll play it by ear....As time goes by, and time permitting, I would possibly like to get involved in meshing some new ship parts, and possibly some Mod work as well....With the core game being so great, the more that I think about it this engine has a lot of great potential for many other things (and I like the fact that I'm supporting a "local" software dev and their product as well).....
In the meantime though, here's a link to that free screenshot utility, it's fairly easy to set up, extract the .zip to a directory of your choosing, make a shortcut of the .exe to your desktop (or start menu, or whatever floats your boat) and click to run. There are a handful of options to choose from, like the directory in which to save files and the file type, but no configurable printscreen button (which isn't a big deal for GC2 or most other games for that matter, since that's often the default button, or can easily be setup to be). Configure it and Hide it in your system tray and you're all set to take screen captures till your hearts content, or your hard drive is full, when you're done right click on it in the SysTray and Quit.....
Link
UPDATE: Here is one (hand cropped) image from said utility, more can be found in the "show off your cool ship designs"
Later all, I'm off to play...errmmm....uhhhh, I'll be honest, work on my ships.... Oh, and sorry about being so long winded here...too much reading without having the proper time to reply, then my mind just dumps when I start typing.....