Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler Finally an Avatar

Alright, I finally took the time to attempt an Avatar. It didn't turn out how I hoped any suggestions for how to improve it, if possible? Is it due to the pixel limitation?

Here's the original image

Had to quickly edit some spelling and grammar

I don't believe it!

Actually, I think it's pretty good as is. It's hard to do something gorgeous at 72x72 pixels. Nevertheless, you've come pretty close.

Thank you.

My wife was wondering what I was doing for so long and came over to see. She was not impressed that she was waiting to watch CSI while I erased pixels around scrats hands in MS paint.

Maybe a bit of dropshadow, but I don't think you can do that in MSPaint.

I think it looks great, but it just doesn't seem to be on the same level as my representation of the battle between the conscious and sub-concious within the confines of the human psyche...

Who am I kidding, your avatar shows a lot of imagination. Great job.

If you'd like it to look better as an avatar, resize it to 72x72 then post it.

It's cute though, I like it.

I really like the avatar! Great concept! What's his name - Scrat, I think - is coveting the Axiom like we do. You know he was one of those guys fogging up the front windows waiting for the DHL man ...

I love it! And, I think you did a great job. Of course I'm pretty crazy about Scrat, so that could be why. The opening to the the first Ice Age was/is a delight. I've been a Scrat fan ever since.

Cool! The problem you are having is because you are starting with a very crisp, very detailed original. When you shrink that down, the program you are using doesn't blur the image, but rather tried to maintain the high level of detail at such a small size, and you end up with jaggies and what will appear as pixelation. Just the nature of the process.

Oh wait, you are letting the Axiom forums shrink your image. That is the problem. You should shrink it prior to putting it in your profile. Plus, the forums resize the width incorrectly (to force it to 72 x 72 pixels) and thus it gives Scrat a few extra pounds by making him wider. Here is one that is already shrunk... Just right click, so a Save Picture As (assuming you are using a PC) and save the file. Then upload it to your profile (only if you like it of course).



And here is a side by side comparison....



Again, if you don't like the revised one, it won't hurt my feelings. I just think that I know what you are talking about as I have run into it in the past, and this is what I've come up with. Again, I like the original. Scrat is just funny!

I think it looks GREAT!
What is it that you dont like about it?

HAY:

That avatar is truly adorable. How clever!!!

Cool like The Fonz!

Love it!

It's really nice- awesome!

Yes, just crop square and resample to 72x72 and it will look better and load faster.

Again, great job.

Really liked the movie, love the Avatar

Very cool!

Oh...that is sooo cute! Can you make one of him holding up an M60?

Errrrrrgghh!

Oh now that second one is truly a classic.
My daughter loves that movie but i doubt she would recognize the speaker in place of the nut.
"Yes sweetie. The squirrel is pushing a speaker into the ground. Why? I don't know why sweetheart. I guess he was out of nuts."

Thanks to everyone for all of the positive comments and advice. I'll try the resized one shortly as it does clean it up a lot.

What programs do you guys use to do all of your manipulation of pictures and resizing?

Thanks again

nickbuol, thanks again for the resize. I've put it to use and it's much better!

I use Adobe Photoshop, but I don't have to buy it myself.

Glad you liked it.

I used Photoshop. There should be a lot of lower cost programs to do simple resizing of pictures.

Try Paint.net or The GIMP. They're both relatively decent free alternatives to Photoshop. They don't have all the features, but they have most anything that most people use in Photoshop.

Cool, I'll check out the suggested sites and I also have a couple photoshops. I haven't played with photodelux home edition 4.0 at all as it was pretty foreign to me when I first opened it and I quickly got frustrated. I also have photoshop album 2.0 which I just did minimal red eye touch ups and cropping. Perhaps this weekend I'll dig in deeper.

Heh... the GIMP will also be foreign and confusing. As will Photoshop. I find just about any image manipulation program these days is pretty darn complicated--I usually get frustrated, too.