How to make beautiful screenshots with backgrounds and mockups

A raw screenshot is a hard-edged rectangle that blends into whatever it's posted on. Put the same capture on a background, give it a window frame and a soft shadow, and it reads as a finished visual — the look you see on product launch pages and in feature announcements.

In Flicka, those settings are the same for screenshots and screen recordings, so a video and its thumbnail can match exactly. Everything below works in both the annotator and the video editor, under the Look panel.

1. Start from a preset

Presets are complete looks — backdrop, frame, shadow and tilt together. Pick one first, then adjust. It's faster than building from scratch and the combinations are already balanced.

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1. 1Look, Motion, SoundLook holds everything visual. Motion and Sound only apply to videos.
2. 2Search every settingType shadow, tilt or aspect to jump straight to a control.
3. 3PresetsClean macOS, Tilted Dark, Soft Dots and Bold Sunset.
4. 4Backdrop typeGradient, solid colour, pattern, your own image, or none.

2. Choose a backdrop

• Gradients are the safe default. There are 42, and each has an angle control and custom colours.
• Solid colours match a brand exactly — use your site's background so the image feels native.
• Patterns (dots, grid, waves and more) add texture behind minimal UIs.
• Image backdrops use any picture, such as a blurred photo or your brand illustration.

3. Frame it

A window frame tells the viewer what they're looking at. The Mockup section offers macOS light and dark title bars and a Windows frame, with an editable address or title and optional window controls.

4. Padding, corners, shadow and tilt

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1. 1PaddingHow much backdrop shows around the capture. 8–12% works for social posts.
2. 2RadiusCorner rounding. Match your app's own window radius for a native look.
3. 33D tiltDrag the joystick to angle the capture in perspective, with a matching shadow.

Shadows have their own controls: Drop or Glow, presets from Soft to Long, and fine-tuning for colour, opacity, blur, offset and spread. A long, low-opacity shadow is what makes a tilted screenshot look like it's floating.

5. Size it for where it's going

The Canvas section sets the output shape. Choose a size preset and the layout reflows around it, so you don't crop by eye.

Want to point at something first? Annotate the screenshot with arrows and callouts before styling it — annotations are drawn inside the frame and tilt with it.