How to Get the Most Out of the New IOS 11 Screenshot Editor
In iOS 11, Apple introduced a new screenshot tool for iPhone and iPad that allows you to quickly edit a screenshot after you take it.
The screenshot is taken in the same way as always. If for some reason you’ve never tried this, you can take a screenshot by pressing the Home button and the Sleep / Wake button at the same time.
Now when you take a screenshot, you will see a small thumbnail of the recent screenshot in the lower left corner of the screen. It will stay for a few seconds after you grab it (you can deflect it by swiping to the left) and then continue moving. To access the screenshot editor, click on that thumbnail.
Write on it
Capturing screenshots is probably what you are most likely to do with the editor. Inside you have a pen, as well as a pencil and marker. Select the digital pen you want to use by clicking on it. On the right you will see color options (white, black, blue, green, yellow, red), click on a color of your choice and then start writing on the image. In the image below, I used a pen to draw a circle, a pencil to underline the text, and a marker to draw the sun.
If you mess something up, tap the eraser icon to erase that nuisance. You can also go back in time and remove the last change by clicking the back arrow in the upper right corner of the page on iPhone or in the lower left corner on iPad.
If your digital handwriting isn’t that great, you can also add text to images by clicking the plus sign in the bottom right corner of the page and then selecting Text.
Trim
Cropping in Screenshot Editor works the same way as in other photo editors. To resize the screenshot, adjust the blue border around the image. You can also use your finger to zoom in on a specific part of the screenshot to get closer to what you want to highlight.
Save your signature
A screen capture tool can potentially come in handy for signing documents on the fly. In it, you can save your signature, so you just have to drag and drop it onto whatever shapes (or love notes) you need to sign. To go to where you saved your signature, tap that plus in the lower-right corner of the page, and then select the Signature section.
Move drawings around
You draw a large circle around something, and then you realize that you actually walked around the wrong place. You can move your digital circle (or anything else you wrote) by touching the digital lesson tool on the page, then touching what you want to move, and then dragging it across the screen to its new home.
Use predefined shapes
99% of the time I take screenshots because I want to point a friend to something specific, usually with an arrow. The screenshot tool has several shapes preset in the menu (square, circle, arrow, and speech bubble). You can navigate to them by clicking on the plus sign in the lower right corner and then clicking on the one you want. The shapes can be resized to whatever size you want, and you can drag them to the best place in the screenshot.