I can do it in Firefox....

August 20, 2007 4:31 PM

Is there a Thunderbird extension or another programme that will allow me to save an entire email as an image?

I have an extension for Firefox that allows me to save an entire page as a .jpg/.png. I want to be able to do the same thing with an email. I have tried several programs, but they only save the visible portion of the email, whereas I want the entire email, including the bit that's not visible. I'd also prefer not to have to work with .pdf files.

I've tried saving the email as a .html file, and then opening it in Firefox, but it doesn't always work.

Is there a program or extension that will let me save the email as an image file? I'm prepared to pay up to ~$20 for this functionality, but I'd prefer something free.

posted by Rabulah to computers & internet (11 comments total)

Just a thought, have you tried installing whatever firefox extension you are using to provide this functionality into Thunderbird?
posted by Good Brain at 4:34 PM on August 20, 2007

Yep. No joy. Just complains that it's not compatible.

It uses something called canvas, which is part of Firefox.
posted by Rabulah at 4:43 PM on August 20, 2007

Can you print it and get all the fields you need? If so PDFcreator will create several image formats besides PDF.
posted by Mitheral at 4:55 PM on August 20, 2007

I assume you use Windows, but on OS X, you could:

Go to File > Print. Click the button marked "PDF" in the lower left part of the dialog box. Click "Save as PDF". Open the newly created PDF in Preview and then save the file again as a JPG.

This works in any (I think) OS X application with a print dialog.
posted by jstef at 4:56 PM on August 20, 2007

I don't know of a Thunderbird extension like that, and without going out to look for the absence of if I'd suggest it's probably not available -- because the sort of folks who write extensions for Thunderbird are going to be scornful of the idea of saving a text-plus-attachment e-mail as a picture ("why don't you print it on your favorite paper and take a picture of it then if you want to hang it on your wall?"). An image file is . . . well, an image file -- no longer reformattable or searchable. That's not a strategy that developers of e-mail applications are likely to respect.

Would you accept an extension or a strategy that resulted in a thoroughly saved e-mail as HTML or PDF, or do you insist on an image file? If so, would you explain why? It may help you get an answer to your liking.
posted by gum at 4:58 PM on August 20, 2007

i know you said you'd rather not deal with pdf, but if you're on linux (or maybe with cygwin) you could print to pdf, then run pdf2ppm and then ppmtojpeg. it's not pretty, but it will almost give you what you want. i say almost because unfortunately pdf2ppm generates one ppm per page, which probably isn't exactly what you're looking for. you could write a little script so it would be only one command if you wanted too.
posted by christy at 4:59 PM on August 20, 2007

Try Paperless Printer. It will let you print in PDF, HTML, RTF, Excel, JPEG and BMP formats and is free for non-commercial use.
posted by slavlin at 5:26 PM on August 20, 2007 [1 favorite]

SnagIt is a program that takes screenshots and makes it really easy to automatically stitch together multiple shots of a scrolling document with its "Scrolling Window (web page)" mode, which works perfectly well in Thunderbird. If I recall correctly, they offer a free trial. Give it a shot.
posted by likedoomsday at 7:39 PM on August 20, 2007

Seconding SnagIt. Several people where I work use it and it does contain this functionality and works very well.
posted by PowerCat at 7:53 PM on August 20, 2007

Thank you everyone for your replies and suggestions. :)

Snagit does the job perfectly.
posted by Rabulah at 1:23 AM on August 21, 2007

Since the question's been answered, can I ask ... and this is just purely for curiousity's sake ... why you would need an e-mail as an image file?
posted by WCityMike at 10:09 AM on August 22, 2007