Copy Graphics

Photographs

Clippings in Magazines

Digital Camera

Roll your own in Fireworks or Works

One of the main sources for graphics is the web itself. As you browse the web, you will come across interesting graphics. Remember to click and hold on an image (or right-click) to save it to your disk. There are also many sites devoted to providing graphics (such as AAA Clip Art). Don't forget - whatever means you use to get graphics there are copyright issues involved. While the producer of an image might allow you to use an image in a paper you turn in or in a class newsletter, it's quite a different isue when you put it up on the web and it's available to millions of Internet users!

Photographs and magazine clippings can be scanned. You should save GIFs of various sizes, especially thumbnail copies. Some links have an indication of how many bytes an image is going to download. Anything over 100K should have such an indication as a warning of how long it could take. The background may look like it is a uniform color, but most scannings will have lots of different colors that are very similar and will look the same. Using Transparency may turn only one shade of the background blue transparent leaving a speckled background. You can use Fireworks to erase the background to a uniform color, but with irregular borders, it can take a long time to get a perfect image.

The use of a digital camera eliminates printing a photo and then scanning it. Any shot that is unsuitable can just be erased. You may want to photograph an article on a background of a uniform color. That way it should be easier to make the background color transparent and make the article stand out on a web page.

If you learn how to use Fireworks (or Word Art), you can create fancy text graphics with bends and twists. If you create the background yourself, it will be a single color, thus making it easy to get a transparent background. I have used the draw tools in Microsoft Works to create colored text GIFs (such as the one on the top of these lecture pages. Try not to make your graphics too large (too wide for normal window sizes) or too many colors (large in the number of bytes to download).

'The WebMaster Speaks....' 3-4

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