[jeffy162]

Have your graphics program open, take a screen shot (hit the "print screen" button), switch to your graphics program, paste ("ctrl + V") the screen shot into a newly created blank file. If you use Photoshop you don't even have to size it. It's automagically sized to your screen resolution. I think Gimp does that, too.

As to why they are square has nothing to do with the BLP format. It has to do with the age of the game, I believe the game was developed at the time when we didn't have all these neat wide (and extra wide) view monitors, so the graphics are pretty much square. I have a wide view monitor (a 17 1/2" laptop at 1600 x 900 resolution) and the loading screens don't go out to the edges. They are squares in the middle of my screen, but they filled the screen of my last computer (also a laptop, but a 17" with a 1200 x 800 resolution).