Effective Living > Technology > Apple
Summary. When writing articles about software programs for the Apple OSX computer operating system, it’s nice to use the program icon image associated with the software. This document explains how to obtain a nice crisp and clear large image of the program icon, such as the iCal icon shown at right.
Instructions. Follow these instructions to obtain a high quality program application software icon image of larger dimensions.
- Using the Finder, go to the Applications folder on your Apple computer and choose to view items in the icon view by clicking on the icon view button as shown here.
- There is a zoom slider adjuster in the lower right corner of the finder window that lets you change the size of the displayed program icons. The slider looks like this.
As you move it to the right, the icons will increase in size. Most will appear to be very crisp and clear. Those not designed properly will get fuzzy at larger sizes. - You can create a very nice copy of any icon by using the Screen Shot keyboard shortcut of shift+command+4 which will display a crosshair. When you see the crosshair, use it to click and drag a box around the permitter of the icon you’d like to copy. Whatever you draw a box around will get copied and placed as a Screen Shot file on your desktop in PNG format. You can open this using Preview and save it as JPG if you like.
The resulting image can be used in print or on the web, assuming the copyright owner of the image is okay with it. If you’re using the image in a journalistic capacity or to promote their product, you probably won’t have trouble with anyone. All of the images in this document were created using this method, including the smaller clippings of controls.