Creating / modifying GOOD PNG's isn't all that hard, it just takes a bit of patience, software, time, experience and sometimes a bit of artistic skill.

See the 'Links' sections for PNG sites and specs!

Some of my 'best practices':

• Use Paint Shop Pro (URL to this is on link page).

• Never make the graphic larger than 316 x 316 without need.

• Read (from the links page) the 'Paint Shop Pro and PNG' page.

• If you are doing a graphic from scratch (in Paint Shop Pro) you should start with the:
  • (Set background to white, foreground to black)
  • Resolution: set to 100 in Pixels /inch
  • Set the Height/Width to Inches,
  • the Height and width ought not be larger than 3.16 inches
  • Set the Image type to 2 colors (1 bit)
  • Paint!

• If you are converting, once again read the docuement mentioned above.

• Trick: If converting doesn't work well create a new layer over the old and 'trace' the defining lines. Throw away the original picture layer (background) and save your PNG.

• when drawing make your tool very 'hard' to avoid antialiasing; when you convert to two colors (as you will probably have to as many functions only work with millions of colors (rotate etc) the anti-aliased stuff comes out icky

• and of course when pasting in text make sure that the antialias is off as well
  (remember these tips are for Paint Shop Pro, but are probably ablicable in other apps)

Any questions or comments may be directed to Sam McDonald