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[ transparent gifs || transparent pngs ]

01. Start with a new image - any size will do. I normally start with something like 500x500 pixels just because I can crop it down to size later on if I need to.

02. Next, use the Flood Fill tool and select any colour, I usually use #00FF00 simply because it's a color you don't find in many pictures. Fill in the entire background this colour as it will become the transparent part of the image.

03. Now from the top menu, select Layers > New Raster Layer. When you get the pop-up window, don't change any of the settings and click on OK.

04. Now that you have a separate layer to work with, select the text tool. When this tool is selected, look up to the tool menu and there should be a drop down box that says Anti-alias. There are three options: Off, Sharp and Smooth. In order to make a transparent gif, you MUST select the Off option.

05. Type whatever you want onto your images and feel free to change your text colours and your font.

06. Once you finish your text, if you need to crop, use the Crop tool to select the area you want to keep and crop out the unnessecary stuff.

07. Now you're almost done. From the top menu select Image > Palette > Set Palette Transparency. When the pop-up window comes up, select the third option; 'Set the transparency value to palette entry:' and click on the up arrow until you get the colour of the background of the image - this will become transparent. You can click on 'Proof' if you want to make sure it looks right.

08. The last thing to do is save your image as a .gif file. This is very important. Saving it under anything else will cancel the transparency setting.

[img=http://tnegraphics.trustnoevil.com/tutorials/images/tnegraphics.gif]

01. Start with a new image - any size will do. There will be an option to set the background as transparent instead of a solid colour (the default is white). Make sure you set it so that the background is transparent.

02. Now you can go right into putting text on the image. You are allowed to have Anti-alias set to Smooth or Sharp if you want to, as they tend to make the text look smoother. You'll see the difference between having Anti-alias turned off, and having it turned to Smooth or Sharp.

03. Add whatever text you want to, and crop it down to size if you need to.

04. Once you are done and ready to save, select Save As and choose to save it as a .png image, but don't hit save yet! To make sure the transparency is set properly, select Options from the save window, and then from the next pop-up window, select Run Optimizer. Once that window pops up, click on the tab that says Transparency and select the third option that says Alpha channel transparency. Click Okay, and now you can save it.

[img=http://tnegraphics.trustnoevil.com/tutorials/images/tnegraphics.png]

Last Updated April 11th @ 1.42 am