Help on saving an image

Use as wallpaper | Test pages | Graphics program | Use as web pages' background | Web TV

To copy an image, in a pc you can usually right click on an image and choose "save image as..". Then you can specify a new name or even format. For example, you can save an image as a *.bmp file =windows bitmap (where *=file name) in your windows directory; then you will be able to use the image as a desktop wallpaper.

In a Mac you left click and hold to save an image and choose from the menu that appears.

Most browsers now support an easier way to set an image as a wallpaper: right click on an image and choose "set image as wallpaper". In the latter case, the image will be saved with a name like: (browser name) wallpaper, which means that you can only save one image. The next image you save will replace the first one, because it has the same name. Still, this is a useful way to check how an image looks tiled (you can also see the image tiled in the test page).

If you left click on the image (only for tiles and borders), you will see it tiled in the test page with text of various colors, so that you can see for yourself whether the image is suitable for a web page background. In this page, you can again right click and choose: "save background as...". To return to the page you were originally viewing, you can press the back button of your browser or the little hand showing left. For full screen wallpapers, if you left click on the thumbnail, you will see the 800 X 600 wallpaper, which you can save by right clicking on it. If your screen resolution is larger or smaller than this, you can left click on the appropriate text link below the thumbnail.

It usually takes up much less space on a pc's hard disk to save an image as a *.jpg, if you don't want to set it as a wallpaper at once, or maybe you are thinking of other uses for it, like using it for a web page background. The latter use requires checking to see if your text is visible. Most of the dark images should be used with white or yellow text.

If you need a program to view images of various formats and also convert between them (plus various effects), I can personally recommend Irfanview, which is a very good freeware program from Austria for all versions of 32 bit Windows. It is also very fast and small.

To use these images as web page backgrounds (use of full screen wallpapers is not recommended for the web: the files are too large and your visitors won't all have the same screen resolution as you - they may see an image and a half..), you need a plain text editor, like Windows Notepad and an FTP program. (The FTP program is used to upload your files to the server that hosts your web pages.) You save the image file as it is (*.jpg or *.gif) in the same directory as your html files. You can also save it in a different directory, but it gets more complicated, especially with style sheets. There are two ways to link the image file to your web page:

By using html : Open the html file, in which you want to use the image as a background with your plain text editor and search for the BODY tag (the first one that opens the body, not the second one that closes it). Change the

<body>

with

<body background="image_file_name.jpg">

Just change the "image_file_name.jpg" with the actual file name of the image. You must do this for every page that you want to set a background image. This lets you specify a different background for each page, but it is also too much trouble, when you want to set the same background for all your pages and then decide to change it.

By using style sheets : This is not as difficult as it seems. You must make a new plain text file with your text editor, write a single letter or digit (so that it can be saved) and save it as *.css (*is whatever name you decide to give it - I prefer short names; less typing!). I have read about various tricks on forcing your text editor to accept a different ending than .txt or whatever its default is, like writing the name and ending in quotes (it hasn't worked for me). In Windows Notepad you save the file as "all files", or let it save it in any way it likes and then rename it. This file is your style sheet and it still contains nothing. So you write the following:

BODY { background:#ddffff url(image_file_name.jpg); }

For #ddffff you can write any color hex number you like, which you think would look good if somebody couldn't view your background image (see the hexadecimal values of colors ), or just write in english the name of a color that is acceptable by browsers (see strange colors - it mentions font colors, but the same is true for background colors), like white, black, yellow etc. And don't forget to change the "image_file_name.jpg" with the actual file name of the image. Save the css file again, in the same directory as your pages.

Then you must link the style sheet to all your pages. This involves opening each and every page (thankfully, this has to be done only once) with your text editor and copying and pasting the following just before the closing HEAD tag (</head>):

<link href="*.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css">

Change the star (*) with the name you gave to your style sheet file. Now, any time you wish to change the background of your pages, you open your css file and only change the image file name once.

To use the images for web tv, since I don't have much experience with the process, it is better to check: Web TV Gif Sites Webring (check: " How to transload") and Web TV Information, who seem to have all the answers.

Now there is a way for web tv users to upload images to their sites; check the article WebTV gets FTP. So there is no reason to link directly to the images in someone else's server, something that has made web TV users quite unpopular in the Web (read this story WebTV'ers: Let's load instead of link if you don't know about it).

I have been informed that web tv users need to know the image file name and path, so I have added the names (my selection of file names is not so good) under each image. The path, if not otherwise stated, is: http:/helensimages.com/bground/ (some images have /wild/ or /big/ or /images/ instead of /bground/ - this is clearly stated) .
Bear in mind, however, that not all images are suitable for web tv, because of the screen differences. Especially unsuitable are very light images, also those with very fine shadow variations.
Lastly, a question I seem to be asked at least every other day by web TV users, is how to use images in their email. The answer:
You must use HTML in your email as outlined above, after of course, transloading the image to your own server (you can sign for a free home site at many free hosts) and not linking to the file in my site.

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