Spotmark
Back to Spotmark

User Guide

Everything you need to spotlight, annotate, and present with Spotmark v0.4.5 on Windows.

1Download & install from spotmark/windows
→
2Press F5 to activate overlay
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3Pick a tool from the floating toolbar

Getting Started

Spotmark sits quietly in your system tray until you need it. No window takes over your screen — the overlay lives on top of everything.

1

Activate the overlay

Press F5 at any time — even while inside another app — to toggle Spotmark on or off. The amber toolbar appears at the top of your screen.

2

Pick a tool

Click any tool on the floating toolbar or use Alt+1–7 to switch instantly without touching the mouse.

3

Pause or quit

Press F5 again to pause the overlay (everything you drew stays hidden until you un-pause). To quit Spotmark entirely, right-click the tray icon or press Ctrl+⇧+Q.

While in Cursor mode, the overlay is fully click-through — your mouse interacts normally with apps behind it. Switch to a drawing tool only when you need to annotate.

Tools

Seven tools, each mapped to Alt+1–7. Switch at any time, even mid-drawing.

Floating Toolbar

The floating toolbar — drag the grip to reposition

CursorAlt+1

Default pointer mode. Overlay is click-through — your mouse passes through to anything beneath.

SpotlightAlt+2

Soft circular highlight that follows your cursor. Dims the surroundings to focus attention on one area.

PenAlt+3

Freehand drawing. Adjust brush size and color. Supports pressure sensitivity on compatible stylus.

ArrowAlt+4

Draw directional arrows to point at specific elements. Great for calling out UI details in a demo.

RectangleAlt+5

Draw rectangles and boxes to frame or isolate sections of your screen.

CircleAlt+6

Draw ellipses and circles. Useful for highlighting UI elements, icons, or controls.

HighlighterAlt+7

Semi-transparent marker. Passes color over content without hiding it — ideal for text and code.

Spotlight Mode

Spotlight dims everything outside a soft circular area around your cursor — drawing the audience's eye exactly where you want it.

Alt+2
Radius
60 – 400 px
Controls the size of the bright circle. Larger radius for wide diagrams, smaller for precise code lines.
Darkness
20 – 90 %
How dark the surrounding area gets. Higher = stronger contrast, but can feel aggressive for long sessions.
Edge Blur
0 – 80 px
Softness of the spotlight edge. 0 = hard cut, 30+ = gentle vignette feel.
Smooth Tracking
toggle
Adds spring-based lag so the spotlight glides rather than snapping to cursor position.
Hide While Typing
toggle
Auto-hides spotlight when keyboard input is detected — prevents the circle from jumping around during navigation.

For most teaching scenarios: Radius 120, Darkness 67%, Edge Blur 30 is the default balance. Increase blur for a cinema-style effect.

Drawing & Annotation

Pick up any drawing tool and draw directly on the overlay. Strokes persist until you clear them or pause the overlay.

Color palette
Brush size
5 px
Smoothing
NoneLowMediumHigh
Undo / Redo

Ctrl+Z undoes the last stroke. Ctrl+⇧+Z redoes it. Only available when Undo/Redo is enabled in Settings.

Clear Canvas

Press Ctrl+⇧+K to wipe all drawings at once. Or right-click the overlay for the context menu.

Pressure Sensitivity

Enable in Settings → Drawing. Supported on Wacom and compatible stylus devices. Stroke width varies with pen pressure.

Keyboard Shortcuts

All shortcuts are customizable in Settings → Hotkeys. Below are the defaults for v0.4.5.

Overlay
Toggle overlay on / offF5
Open SettingsF6
Tools
Cursor modeAlt+1
Spotlight modeAlt+2
PenAlt+3
ArrowAlt+4
RectangleAlt+5
CircleAlt+6
HighlighterAlt+7
Exit to CursorEsc
Drawing
Undo last strokeCtrl+Z
RedoCtrl+⇧+Z
Clear canvasCtrl+⇧+K
Capture
Capture regionCtrl+⇧+A
Capture full screenCtrl+⇧+S
App
Quit SpotmarkCtrl+⇧+Q

Open Settings → Hotkeys (press F6 ) to remap any shortcut. Spotmark detects conflicts and warns before saving.

Click Effects

Visual ripples appear on-screen when you click — making mouse activity visible to your audience in real time.

Left click
Right click
Middle click
Colors
per button
Assign different colors to left, right, and middle button clicks. Default: amber / blue / green.
Ripple Size
20 – 120 px
Diameter of the expanding ripple ring at peak. Larger sizes are more visible on high-res recordings.
Duration
200 – 1500 ms
How long the ripple animation lasts. Shorter = snappier; longer = more cinematic.

Keystroke Display

Show what keys you're pressing in a live HUD at the bottom of the screen — ideal for tutorials, coding streams, and demos.

Ctrl⇧K
Alt2
Modifier Keys
toggle
Show Ctrl, Alt, Shift, Win combinations. Enabled by default.
Function Keys
toggle
Show F1–F12 keypresses. Useful for app-specific shortcuts.
Alpha-Numeric
off by default
When disabled, regular letters and numbers are hidden — protecting privacy when you type passwords or personal info.
Mute in Password Fields
toggle
Automatically suppresses the HUD when focus is on a password input field.
Position
left / center / right
Where the keystroke HUD appears at the bottom of the screen.

Capture & Recording

Snapshot your screen with all annotations baked in, or record the full overlay session as a video.

Region Capture

Ctrl+⇧+A

Click and drag to select any area of the screen. Saved with your current annotations.

Full Screen Capture

Ctrl+⇧+S

Captures the entire primary display. Includes all drawings and the overlay state.

Screen Recording

Start/stop via tray menu or Settings. Records at three quality levels: Small file / Balanced / High quality.

Format
PNG / JPEG / WebP
Choose image format in Settings → Capture. PNG is lossless; JPEG and WebP reduce file size.
Include Annotations
toggle
When enabled, captures both the underlying screen and all drawings in one flattened image.
Copy to Clipboard
toggle
Automatically copies the screenshot to clipboard after capture — paste directly into Slack, Notion, etc.

MagnifierWindows

A floating circular lens that follows your cursor and magnifies the area beneath it — useful for small UI elements, dense code, or pixel-level detail.

2x

Scroll wheel over the lens to zoom from 1.25× to 4×. Zoom level is remembered between sessions.

Zoom Range

1.25× to 4× in 0.25 steps. Scroll up on the lens to zoom in, scroll down to zoom out. The zoom level badge in the corner updates live.

Edge Clipping

The lens follows your cursor precisely and clips naturally at screen edges — it doesn't bounce back or push away from the edge.

Auto-hide

The magnifier hides automatically when your cursor overlaps the toolbar, settings panel, or other Spotmark UI elements.

Multi-Display

Spotmark covers all connected displays by default. Each display gets its own overlay canvas.

Single Display Mode
toggle
Confine the overlay to a single selected monitor — useful when you have a private reference screen you don't want to share.
Spotlight Active Only
toggle
When enabled, spotlight effect only dims the screen where your cursor is. Other displays stay at full brightness.
Mirror Annotations
toggle
Replicate all drawings across every connected display simultaneously — useful for multi-screen presentation setups.
Toolbar Display
drag to move
Drag the toolbar to the edge of any display to move it to that screen. Only one toolbar is active at a time.

Settings

Press F6 or click the gear icon on the toolbar to open Settings. Changes are applied immediately and saved automatically.

SpotlightDrawingClick EffectsKeystrokesHotkeysCaptureDisplaysGeneral
UI Scale
90 – 150 %
Scale the Spotmark UI independently of your system DPI. Default 120% suits most 1080p and 1440p setups.
Language
10 languages
English, Vietnamese, Japanese, Chinese (Simplified), Korean, French, Spanish, German, Portuguese (BR), Russian.
Theme
Dark / Light / System
Dark by default. System follows your OS preference automatically.
Launch at Login
toggle
Start Spotmark in the background when you log in — no manual launch needed before presentations.
Controls Always Visible
toggle
When off, toolbar and HUD auto-hide and reveal only when you move to the top edge of the screen.

Ready to present?

Download the free Starter build and start spotlighting your screen in minutes.

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