Firstly you need a method of capturing the images you have on screen. Luckily steam has this functionality in built and you simply by default just have to press f12 and the rest is rather self explanatory. Unfortunately they will be compressed by default. Using steam to save uncompressed screenshoots go to the top right hand corner of your screen when in steam and press steam, then click settings then In-Game and make sure Save an uncompressed copy is ticked. You may also have to select an output folder for this.

You could also use an external program such as fraps if you would prefer for the additional functionality some apps like that have (eg: fraps can take a new screenshoot every second from pressing a button untill you press it again, which can be helpful for getting unpected shoots that you may like).

To remove the hud open the console by pressing ~ and type in tm. Not be aware this will also hide the console from appearing on screen, so when you press ~ again the effect will take place. You just won't be able to see it (that is kind of the point :) ). This allows for shoots like the below

Next to get a free camera to get better angles once again press ~ and this time enter TFC 1. This will not only allow you to move the camera around but it will also freeze time which can help in taking some rather nice screenshoots.

Currently using this command in first person will make your character invisible. If you wish to have your character in the image do the same as above but ensure you are in third person first.

This in particular allows for some great landscape and environmental shoots.

How to take shoots similar to the above picture:
If you're wanting to take a picture of landscape eithout your character in it, stay in first person and press ~ to open up the command line. Then type in TM to hide the hud and menus, then type in TFC 1. Next close the command line (by pressing ~) and as the game is paused from using TFC 1 you can move the camera around and take screenshoots of that moment in time from different angles etc. To enable your hud/menus after doing this, press ~ then type in TM again (not you will not be able to see the console when doing this).


Some shoots involving my character, dog meat and some mischief using the above:


How to take shoots similar to the above two pictures:
In third person shoot the NPC, as you shoot the npc press ~ to open up the command line. Then type in TM to hide the hud and menus, then type in TFC 1. Next close the command line (by pressing ~) and as the game is paused from using TFC 1 you can move the camera around and take screenshoots of that moment in time from different angles etc. To enable your hud/menus after doping this, press ~ then type in TM again (not you will not be able to see the console when doing this).

One obvious way to drastically change what your game looks like is to change the time of day. This way you can capture the cold look of night, the warm sunset or the dryness of the middle of a desert landscape.

To change the time of day open the console (for most press ~) and type in the below:
set gamehour to XX

where XX is your desired hour of day. Valid options range from 00 to 23 (note it uses 24 hour time). For the effect to take change you must exit the console.

Some example of different times of day from the same position.



As you can see this can have a substantial change on what kind of image you are capturing.

Want to see more around you without moving backwards, thus increase your fov. The solution is simple. Simply press ~ then type fov by whatever your desired fov is. Note: this change will not stick once you press ~ for your general fov, but it will change your viewmodel. To get around this, simply type in refreshini in the console. Conversly loading up a a save game from before doing this will also revert the change.

FOV 90:

FOV 110:

As you can see, changing the fov will change how much you can see around you, and does so without changing where you are. Hence decreasing the fov can be seen as zooming the image and increaseing the image can be seen as zooming out. But the location of the 'camera' remains the same.

For more info on FOV please have a look at my tweak guide as I don't wish to get into to much detail here.
http://steamoss.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=551069501

One thing to keep in mind is that when taking screenshoots, your frame rate is more or less irrelevant. Downscaling is where you render the game at a higher resolution then your monitor and then the image is then scaled so it can fit on your screen.

There are a multitude number of ways of doing this. Nvidia users with 600 series cards and above can simply use DSR which nvidia provides for. Downscaling is also possible on amd cards.

More details to come.