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How to draw on your screen in OS X

Mac

This brief guide will serve as an introduction to Magic Pen for OS X. From their ReadMe.txt – “Magic Pen is an application that allows you to draw on top of your screen (with your mouse, not a “real” pen silly!), much like overhead pens allow you to write on top of an overhead.” If you use your Mac for presentations, this is a must-have utility.

After you’ve downloaded and installed Magic Pen, launch it as you would any program. Once it opens, your cursor tuns into a pen. You can immediately start drawing if you hold down the left (for multiple-button Mac folks) button and move your mouse around.

magicpen
click to enlarge

To change the ink color, click inside the small pad in the upper left corner of your screen.

magicpen

And select a color from the palette.

magicpen

The Magic Pen pad can be moved to any of the four corners of your screen by selecting the appropriate radio button.

magicpen

To stop Magic Pen from drawing on your screen and regain normal control of your cursor, select File -> Ignore Mouse – or use the keyboard shortcut Apple Key + I.

magicpen

If you open new apps or move existing ones around, the things you drew on your screen will remain in place. They can be cleared by selecting File -> Clear Pad or the keyboard shortcut Apple Key + C.

magicpen
click to enlarge

Posted in Mac.

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5 Responses

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  1. Webomatica says

    Cool… if you take a screen shot with Grab do the lines drawn show up there, too?

  2. Ross McKillop says

    Webo -

    If you capture a region, yes. If you capture the entire screen, yes. If you capture a window (that has some Magic Pen markings on it) no.

    I used InstantShot! for (most of) the screenshots in this overview (and most of the stuff here) and it captured the Magic Pen markings every time. Actually I also used Apple Key + Shift + 4 to take regional screenshots, and it caught the markings too.

  3. pancakes_r_nc says

    this way sux

  4. Daniel says

    This is BA
    I dig it

Continuing the Discussion

  1. Adding A Few More Blogs To The Blogroll » Webomatica - tech, movies, music blog linked to this post on July 16, 2007

    [...] Simplehelp: Features lots of awesome techie tips in a clear manner. I was pretty intrigued with Magic Pen and this list of “Single Purpose OS X Programs”. Lots more tips and this blog will only get better as time goes on. I can just let Ross play with all the shareware so I don’t have to. [...]



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