App Review: Screenshot Ultimate for Android
Today we're taking a closer look at what may be the best screenshot app for Android: Screenshot Ultimate from Ice Cold Apps. This powerful yet snappy tool lets you quickly capture, edit, share, and view screenshots using a huge variety of customizable triggers, including the phone's default hardware button combos.
If you're running Android 4.0 and up, chances are your phone is equipped with a built-in hardware button combo that will trigger a screenshot. Most of the time this combination consists of holding the 'Volume Down' and 'Power' buttons at the same time for 2-5 seconds, but some devices allow screen shaking or rotating to be used as triggers.
Regardless of the default trigger, when you initiate a typical screenshot in Android, an alert will popup in the notification bar, letting you easily view the recently taken capture. However, when Screenshot Ultimate is running and the screenshot trigger is initiated, this four-button interface automatically pops up:
Clicking the Edit button brings up a menu listing the 10 options (8 of which are shown below, the other 2 become visible upon scrolling down):
Most of the editing features above are self-explanatory, but we really liked the Effects module:
The ability to choose your own image editor from the Android system is also a huge plus (found by scrolling down to the other 2 options in the Edit menu).
Tapping the 'Share' button brings up three sharing options:
Tapping 'Share' again lets you easily name and then share the file through any of the share options in your native Android share/send menu:
Selecting Imgur will instantaneously upload the image to Imgur and provide a convenient short link to the newly hosted file:
The third sharing option is POST, which lets you upload the screenshot to a web server at the URL of your choice:
The 'View' button lets you choose an app to use for viewing the recent screenshot:
Finally, the 'Other' button provides a few basic options like closing, deleting, viewing file information, or accessing the screenshot library:
More Notable Features
Although the above screenshots should provide insight into the basic features of Screenshot Ultimate, they don't even begin to scratch the surface of what the advanced settings are capable of. With that said, here are just a few of the less obvious perks we found useful:
- Huge Variety of Screenshot Triggers - Right now the app currently supports at least 16 different screenshot triggers, from blowing into your phone's microphone to shaking the screen or tapping an overly icon. If the trigger method exists, it can probably be found in this app.
- Automated Editing Preferences - The Screenshot Adjustments module lets you adjust settings that will automatically be applied to every screenshot you capture. Adjustments include automated rotating, mirroring, effects, adding text, or setting a default overlay image or default crop area.
- Custom Shutter Sounds - You can specify an audio file to act as the shutter sound when you take a screenshot.
What About the Pro Version?
While the free version of Screenshot Ultimate packs enough functionality to satisfy 90% of Android users, the remaining 10% of power users might want to consider the advanced extras that come with the Pro version, the most notable of which is the elimination of ads and popups. This is a major plus if you decide to opt for the paid version is that you'll no longer have to deal with annoying ads that not only interrupt your workflow, but also slow down your device b consuming internal memory. Overall, we think the Pro version is well worth the $0.99 it costs, especially if you plan on taking a large volume of screenshots on your Android device.
