Dear Computer Lady,
I’ve been subscribed to your newsletter for a number of years and appreciate all the advice I’ve learned from you.
I have a question for you today–
Friends send me Power Point slide shows with beautiful pictures. Occasionally I see one I would love for a desktop.
Is there a way to save a photo out of those programs?
I’ve tried but to no avail so far.
Can you help? Thanks, Pat
Dear Pat,
Saving an image from a presentation with PowerPoint depends on a couple of things.
First, do you have PowerPoint installed on your computer? If you don’t, don’t worry, it is still possible to get your pictures, you just have to go through a few more steps.
Second, are the PowerPoint presentation images a background image in the presentation, or just inserted in the slide. My guess, if each slide is a different picture, that the images are inserted in each slide.
Let’s start with the first point. PowerPoint is installed on your computer, and when you double click on your PowerPoint presentation, it opens up in the program, ready for you to either edit, or present the slideshow.
If you click on the photo, it will become selected, with a box drawn around it. Just right-click on that photo and from the context menu, click on “Save as picture…” and you will be able to give the picture a name, and save a location for it.
If you don’t have power point installed on your computer, or if you can’t select the picture, you can still save it, there are just more steps involved. So, here is how to save your image from PowerPoint… point by point.
1. While you are viewing your slideshow (I would make sure it is full screen) when you come to the picture you want to save, press the “Print Screen” button on your keyboard.
2. Click on “Start” then point to “All Programs”, then “Accessories” and finally click on “Paint”.
3. In Paint, click on the “Edit” menu, then click “Paste” or in newer versions of Paint, just click the big “Paste” icon in the top-left corner.
4. Your photo will now be in the Paint program where you can save it to your hard drive and use it.
You don’t have to use Paint to save your picture, you can paste it into almost any image program. In fact, if you have my favorite, free image program, Irfanview, you can follow the steps above using Irfanview, and then click on “Options” in the menu bar and set the image as your desktop wallpaper right from Irfanview.
Elizabeth
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