Whether you’re asking for help with a PC problem, or trying to explain a point to someone else, it’s often important to clearly document a series of steps.

StepsToReproduce is a free application for Windows Vista+ which makes it easy to record, annotate and share a sequence of screenshots.

The program can work much like Windows’ Problem Steps Recorder, automatically capturing the active window every time you click. For example, this might be your application window with the File menu displayed and “Save As” highlighted, then the usual “Save As” dialog, then an error message.

StepsToReproduce can also take full screen captures just by clicking the mouse, which gives it plenty of other uses (grabbing images from a video you’re watching, maybe websites you’re visiting). There’s also an option to capture rectangular regions.

Annotate your captures with text, lines, shapes, effects and more

Clicking “Stop Recording” displays all your captures in a presentation-type application. Images can be reordered by dragging and dropping, and optionally given a title and description.

An excellent editor allows you to crop individual captures, annotate them in various ways (shapes, lines, text captions, more) and apply various effects (highlight, blur, shadow).

You’re also able to create duplicates of a capture, or insert and annotate a blank page, maybe handy if you’ve some complex point to explain.

Individual images may be sent via email or uploaded to Imageshack in a click or two, and your complete sequence can be shared as a group of images, or a single PDF.

Overall StepsToReproduce is well-designed and professional way to document exactly what’s happening on your Windows desktop. Give it a try.