If there is one key on the keyboard that I can't live without, it's the PrintScreen key. It's my personal favorite, and probably the most powerful key for web and graphic designers. It allows images created from other programs which don't have image saving capabilities (such as Microsoft Office programs) to be outputted onto the Clipboard. Importing images is a snap. Just open your favorite image editor and click "Paste". (I personally use MS Paint or Paint.NET)

More than likely, you don't want to save the entire screenshot, so using the select tool (or whatever tool it is to select portions of an image) is the next step. Crop only the parts you want, then click "Copy". Scrap what you don't want. Click "New" without saving the rest of the image. In the new image, click "Paste". Voila! Only the cropped portion is pasted! Then save the image in the format you desire. This can be used for web graphics, wallpapers, icons, or other images.

PrintScreen can also be used on videos and flash movies as well. Just press PrintScreen (Or Alt+PrintScreen) when the time is right, then output & crop it to your specifications using your favorite image editor.

Most of the icons I create originate from Microsoft Word, using basic shapes, with various levels of transparency. I then output the completed icons using printscreen, so I can save them as a separate image, apart from the Word document.

Don't underestimate the power of PrintScreen!!!