Fraps or Irfanview for screenshots?

[Paul Riley]

Good day all,

I was wondering which software you prefer for capturing screenshots,either Fraps (which I have just downloaded and have yet to try) or Irfanview? ,which is ok for converting .TGAs to .JPEG but I am not too impressed with the image quality of the screenshots,as there are usually strange colours,false lighting and sometimes artifacts present in the images.Last night for instance I managed to capture a close up of a 2 torpedo spread impact against a medium merchant,and as I had the game paused ready for the shot the scene looked bloody amazing,with a huge funnel of water bursting high above the ship,yet when I later looked at the image through Irfanview the water funnel looked like a group of squares joined together.Maybe I need to 'tweak' the image to get better quality out of it? If I DO could you give me some tips on what I could do to improve the quality?
I have heard some very good comments about Fraps and the ability to also record the action from your games is enough to make me want this software,I am even prepared to buy the 'full' product if the free version is any good.

Let me know what you think.

Cheers

[Hottentot]

I use Fraps to take screenshots. Irfanview to edit them (or any other).

[Paul Riley]

Originally Posted by Hottentot

I use Fraps to take screenshots. Irfanview to edit them (or any other).

Can Fraps convert files?

[Feuer Frei!]

Originally Posted by Paul Riley

Can Fraps convert files?

Video files, use StaxRip to encode and merge fraps videos.
in answer to your question: no.

[Hottentot]

I don't think so. The unregistered version takes only .bmb pictures and I use Irfanview to convert them to .Jpg

[Paul Riley]

So,I can take the shot with Fraps,hopefully giving better image quality in the first place then convert to JPEG using Irfanview?.
As I said earlier,Irfanview doesnt seem to produce an image not nearly as good enough as the original,and I have seen some screenshots here at Subsim that look far better than the ones I have been able to do so far.
Regarding my graphics card (ATI X800 Pro),it may be old but its still a decent card and able to hold its ground with some of the older games,pre 2008 - 2009 for example.Please,no graphics card flaming here,I hate that!.

Thanks for the replies so far.

[Hottentot]

Originally Posted by Paul Riley

So,I can take the shot with Fraps,hopefully giving better image quality in the first place then convert to JPEG using Irfanview

Yep. Or you could register Fraps and take JPEGs directly. It costs something, though methinks.

[Paul Riley]

Originally Posted by Hottentot

Yep. Or you could register Fraps and take JPEGs directly. It costs something, though methinks.

Yes,I was expecting it would cost something.But from the reports i've read so far about the software it may prove worth it,so long as its not TOO expensive.

Thanks then!

[Paul Riley]

Hottentot,

Just finally,I have now installed Fraps and can see that the default capture button is F10 and will be saved in .BMP format.So it appears that the application needs to remain running in the background when playing games,does it impact on performance at all?. I can see it uses 18,566k of memory.

Thanks again!

[Hottentot]

Try it?

It doesn't affect the performance on my rig anyway.

[danasan]

Did you try this?

Howie's Quick Screen Capture Tool:

[Paul Riley]

Originally Posted by Hottentot

Try it?

It doesn't affect the performance on my rig anyway.

I was just asking

[Paul Riley]

Originally Posted by danasan

Did you try this?

Howie's Quick Screen Capture Tool:

No I didnt,but I will now,thanks.

[Paul Riley]

Originally Posted by Paul Riley

No I didnt,but I will now,thanks.

I like the look of this one,especially the different grades of quality you can choose from.Does it need to be running in the background/minimised etc?

Thanks for this

[danasan]

Yes, it has to run, but it does not take too much resources...