This is for SLED's question in another forum, but it is about screenshots and films, so I'll post it here (then link him to it). It may or may not help anybody else as well.
First off I start the film viewer and play the film. You either have to see a possible screenshot coming up before it happens, or you have to replay the film multiple times.
You cannot rewind the film, otherwise smoke, flames, etc totally screw the film up and the screenshot looks like crap.
Further, I do not PAUSE when taking a screenshot. If you reduce playback speed (with the slider) all the way to zero you get some problems with shells falling forward while the aircraft sits still, or the hit sprites time out and disappear, and/or other things that make it look uncool.
So, if I see I'm about to merge and I know at the top of the merge I'll get a wickedly close snapshot, I will slow the speed down to about 0.04 or 0.07 if I can get it that slow. I'll start positioning my views, including ZOOM and FOV sliders, to get the best image. Once I know the FOV and ZOOM, and I'm in external view, and have about what I want, I need to give myself plenty of advance time.
I click "Fullscreen mode". Now you have to give yourself plenty of time for all the white textures to display again. Move mouse all the way off screen to the right. Wait. You can adjust position of the view and zoom using your keyboard, but not your FOV. So you follow the action. As your aircraft moves, you reposition it. Always be on the lookout for an angle you hadn't thought of.
This can be a long wait, if you gave yourself too much time. Nothing to be done for it, because you really' can't rewind once you start shooting. At 0.07 it's fast enough to not make you give up, but slow enough to get screenshots with tracers, hit sprites, or really cool action shots, and let you position the view to get the shot you want.
When you GET the shot hit PRNT SCRN. Don't hit it again unless a split second later you get a BETTER shot. Anytime you press it again, what you had before is lost.
Once you have a print screen you like, click anywhere with mouse, pause the film or close it. Open Photoshop, new file, paste, flatten image, rectangular marquee, and crop.
Save, voila.
Rectangular marquee because your are ALWAYS centered in the film viewer. It doesn't always lend to the best image or screenshot, if half the image is just grassland below you, and all the action is in the upper right corner. Might as well just crop around the action.
Note you don't have to be in external view, or even in your aircraft. You can double click another player in the player list, and position the view around their aircraft showing yours in the forground/background for effect, or you can position the view in internal mode in your aircraft if you so wish. Play around, have fun! It's one of the best ways to learn.
That, SLED, is how I take screenshots from films, in a nutshell.
