....REMEMBER! That was it! Remember that to have a transparent image, it must be in ".gif" format. NOF has a cool  feature that let's you make any .gif be transparent. But, it's ability is limited as it can cause the "jaggies" if your image was anti-aliased.

There's two ways to create a transparent image in PSP. One is the good old standby method of setting the transparency manually. The other is to use the great new "Transparent Gif Wizard". Let's go through both, first the manual way:

In your PSP create a new image about 100 x 100 pixels and make a big red square in it. Add some texture to it if you'd like.

If you prefer, download and upzip this PSP image and use it to practice on (6k). [ download ]

 With the image ready in your PSP, go to the menu and choose, "Colors", then "Set Transparency". You will get a pop up which says PSP must reduce the image to a single, paletted background color. Choose "YES" to do this. Another pop up window will show called "Decrease Color Depth". Often it's best here just to leave the default settings (JASC really knows their stuff!), and click ok. These options should be set to:

• Palette: Optimized Median Cut
• Reduction Method: Nearest Color
• Options: None

Ok, one more pop up window. This is where you tell PSP what color you want to be transparent. For our purposes it's that annoying white piece of "paper" in the background!

The Cursor Is Quicker Than The Eye!

If you can't see your image because of this pop up window, drag your pop up off of your image. You'll need to be able to get to the background color you want to turn transparent ON that image. Here's what you should have now:

Ok. Once again, due to the brilliant folks as JASC, you really don't have to change anything in this window. But how do we tell it we want the "white" color gone from our picture? (Here's the tricky part).....move your cursor from the pop up and over to your image somewhere on the where on the white space.

AHH-HAA! Did you see it? You've got to have a sharp eye! Your cursor changed to the "Dropper" tool automatically!! (And that goober-fellow thought HE was a magician!). Now, with the Dropper, just click in the white space. You'll notice the Transparency pop up automatically changed it's settings to show that "white" is the color to be transparent.

But....But....My "Magic Trick" Didn't Work!

"Ok" you say. "The color changed but I don't see any difference in my image!" Well, PSP has a solution to that too. Back to menu, choose "Colors" then choose "View Transparency". Still didn't see a change? No problemo. In the menu, choose, "File", then "Preferences, then "General Program Preferences". This is a pop up of all sorts of PSP goodies. Click the "Transparency" tab. Choose a "Grid Size"  and "Grid Color" from the drop down lists (The KROW chose "Tiny" and "Dark Grey"). Voila! Image with transparency! All to do now is save it to your harddrive (be SURE it's in .gif format) and drop it in your NOF. Instant transparent image with NO annoying white background!

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