Webpages

[Faileas]

Thanks Scottish!   As for the rest of the post most of it is station and fried potatoes as the saying goes in germany lol; i.e. I am not sure what ye mean. Can ye show me some examples or explain what ye mean? Not sure whether i can change the tones of backgrounds on that programme. Do ye ken the site builder (which is the software) of freeserve?

[scottish2]

Well good example is this background image I did for an anti-war website I am working on. Bare in mind with this type of background being so big this is actually a single image that is both fixed in the center of the users screen and will not repeat or scroll.

See your image is a repeating image meaning it uses it once and then repeats it to fill the screen up with your image. It also scrolls meaning as you scroll down the page it scrolls with you.

Where as the images below I would have it fixed so in a sense think of it as a 2 layer website meaning that the background is on one layer and remains static or still while layer two is your websites content and this scrolls and moves over the stationary background. As you can see there is a more solid image this was the image I made up and then you have the sort of faint image which is what I used for my background so that way it shows through but does not overwhelm the text which is what you want your users to actually see. Now bare this in mind I tried fiddling some with your image and do to it's design it is hard to get it looking faint like image 2 below and also look proper. Because behind your swirls is sort of a crumpled paper type effect and when you start fading the image alittle it makes this crumpled paper effect sort of disappear.  

My personal feelings is I would not use such a worky background because it detracts from your content no matter how much you like the image you have to decide if you want your user to view your content or your background image as if you want the image then the text might be hard to read depending on how bold the image is.

Below are the two images and I also have 2 website examples one with the bold image and one with the faint image note the faint image is on my actual website. Bare in mind also this is still a work in progress has not been released yet as I just recently started it but is a good example of what I am  talking about. See below for images and also links with examples of both in use.

Unfaded background image click here for example in use

Faded background image in use (Bare in mind this could be faded even alittle more but if I did then would lose the Earths clarity so can't fade further because of this)

Original image (Some works been done but no fading has been done to this image)



Reworked and faded image

[Faileas]

Point taken David but actually i cant do much in terms of own design : a) i dont have the skill b) i dont have the software c) i have to use whats there and d)its my first try. Dont forget that lol. I just have to use the stuff thats there. If ye know of an idiotproof programme where ye can use your own backgrounds and so on please let me know. Even so i have chosen a differently toned background with the same spirals. But i think it's less distracting now and admittedly there was too much blue on the Scotland page. Do ye have a gif.file for me with the Saltire and the Lion Rampart? one thing i can and would like to do is to put that as logo on that page. Cheers for all help!            

[scottish2]

Before I forget I will try and see what I have for you in the relm of Scottish/Celtic images. I have a few including what you asked for.

Now as for programs I use the following but bare in mind I use an older version of this program. I personally lke it's interface better is easier in my view then the new version but it is totally free is freeware meaning you don't need to pay ever for it and the guy even says this on the site that he doesn't expect anything in exchange except basically to be happy in life weird but true. Anyways here is the link for the new version

http://www.arachnoid.com/arachnophilia/

And the older version which I suggest at least until you are more familar with coding

http://www.arachnoid.com/arachnophilia/index_old.html

But bare this in mind your site should also have some kind of text editor to edit parts of the coding so you can pretty much edit any background image you want into it. I know most do have a test editor of some sort but this program works great you can compose your pages from scratch including adding all the background images you want and stuff. For your main page make sure to save it as index.html or index.htm that way when folks visit your URL it will find your main page then you can name subpages anything you wish ended with .html or .htm. If you need help coding ask away I'll answer if I can or if you want any good books let me know I have a few I can recommend which maybe your local library has.

I will mail you the images shortly.

[tartangal]

Dave or Paul,
  I want to email photos that I have in my computer(digital )but I can't find an email address to send them.Can you help?

[scottish2]

Try this. Might be god to put scottish pictures or whatever the pictures ar of in the subject so Paul checks this as he doesn't always get a chance to get on top of his mail mountain due to classes and such. But this is the address for the website

[email protected]

[tartangal]

Dave
     Tried to post pictures on the site but I dont know if the file size is too big but it wouldnt post. Emailed them to Paul anyway.
                                   Jules

[scottish2]

Where do you have the images uploaded to? Some free websites like geocities will not allow links from outside to images and such. For instance if I put my peace image on geocities all I would get here is a small X so I have it uploaded to my homestead account which works fine for off site linking. I tink they do this to help cut down on bandwidth and such for images in a sense being stolen off of the websites of their users and hence wasdting that users bandwidth.

So where do you have the images uploaded to as far as I know there's no limit on file size but I could be wrong.

[tartangal]

Dont have them uploaded to anywhere.Thought I could just transfer direct from my computer(Did I happen to mention that I am an idiot and a technophobe?) So how do I go about it?      
                           Jules

[scottish2]

Well easiest way is to mail them to Paul unless there are a lot and high quality in this case can increase the file size enough to not be good for E-Mailing if you are on a 56k modem or a mail system that has a file size limit.

If you want to upload them to a website homestead is pretty good for a limit. They only allow 2 pages for a site and have a maximum of 8 MB's storage space but you can link to these images  Here is their link if you want to use them for this I can respond if you need help on getting them uploaded. Their account is free for what I described above you can subscribe if you needed more space but for this free will probably sufice.

http://www.homestead.com

[tartangal]

Thanks Dave
      Will just send to Paul.Jules

[scottish2]

No problem

[MDF3530]

Kinda off-topic but not really...

Today, I dragged my butt outta bed early to attend a one hour seminar on the basics of using Macintosh OS X at the nearest Apple Store with my father. We got there with better than a 1/2 hour to spare, so my dad suggested we go to the McDonalds that was nearby. I could've gone for some breakfast, so I agreed. My dad had a cinnamon roll and a cup of coffee and I had the hotcakes and sausage meal.

Anyway, back to the seminar. We both found it very interesting. There was a pretty mixed group. Some were learning the computer for the first time, others were converts from PCs, and a couple, like me and my dad, were people who'd been previous Mac systems and just wanted a few pointers on OS X. The clerk, himself a convert, who gave the seminar didn't try to pitch a sale to us. He was very informative, didn't use a lot of techno jargon and gave us several tips, hints and pointers. I would highly recommend that if any of the stores where you bought your software offer seminars for free like that, go for it. One of my mottos: if it is gratis, grab it.

[scottish2]

Thanks a lot Mike!  

hotcakes and sausage meal!

Now you got me hungry and being 4 PM I can't get any as Mac D's stops Breakfast during late morning. Man am I now hungry for a hotcakes and sausage meal.