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Thursday, March 6, 2008

Adobe Acrobat - Snapshot Tool

Posted on 3:49 AM by Robin Young

This tech tip is not earth shattering and for many people it will be an "Of course, doesn't everyone know that." type of post, but believe me, not everyone does!  And anything that makes life easier is worth sharing!

Did you know that you can copy a graphic from a pdf files and paste it into any other type of document that you wanted?  This was something that I recently figured out.  I had been spending all my time taking paper copies of pdf files and scanning them into my computer so I could grab the graphics from various presentations.  This can get old very quickly and I knew there had to be a better way, and there is.

 I was working with some teachers who were capturing the images in adobe and pasting them into their PowerPoint presentation.  They were using the "shapshot" tool.  Very easy to use, basically you select the tool, click and drag to highlight the area and it copies the info for you.  All that is left is to paste it in the new document.

I have created a short how-to video -  Snapshot Tool in Adobe  - to walk you through the steps of doing this.  I was very excited to know I no longer had to recreate all those diagrams, charts, maps and graphs or spend many hours at the scanner.   This is my new favorite shortcut. My only question is, "Why didn't I know about this sooner?"  :)

6 Response to "Adobe Acrobat - Snapshot Tool"

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Greg Says....

Great Post! I did know this, but had forgotten it. It is a nice feature! Thanks for the reminder.
I’m also glad that you found Jing. I have it set aside for one of my TechTips. Not just yet though. I wanted to make sure it lasts first, it’s still kinda new.

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Denise Rose Says....

Great info, BUT I just downloaded Adobe 9.0 and there is no snapshot tool. Any suggestions? Thanks so much. Denise

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Robin Young Says....

Denise,

I just downloaded Adobe 9 to check this out. The tool is there under the Tools menu and "Select and Zoom." Sometimes they move items around in updates. I hope this helps. :)

Robin

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Jachi Says....

Great tip. I had grown more grey hairs trying to figure out how to copy diagrams from pdf docs for teaching illustrations. Thanks

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RobinY Says....

Jachi,

Me too! That is why when I learned how I wanted to share that info with everyone else!

Robin

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Linda Says....

Help! I'm using snapshot and Powerpoint. I save my file and then close. When I open the file again, some of my snapshots have been replaced with a giant 'X'. The interesting part is that not all have this problem, just some. Any hints are greatly appreciated.

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