Need Help With Pngs

are you talking about the terrible compression issues the thumbnail has? the site does that. why they compress the preview so much it does that is a real mystery. it has nothing to do with being a png file, because this image is a compressed jpg right now. partly its the solid color, partly its interference with that purple border you gave it.


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

I am, Mike. It's supposed to be a dark blue border, but no matter :)
Is there any way to avoid this look? Who would believe it would print all right seeing that preview? Will it print okay?
I don't actually expect to sell it, but I'd like to try something similar on other images and who knows. I did not save for web so I think I had a really big file coming in. Since I'm not really interested in selling this as a print, would it help to save that way and have a smaller file? Would it help to not put an outline on?

oh yeah it is blue, the bottom right gave it a purple hue...

i've been complaining about the compression for a while now. it takes a solid background and does that to it. if you can make a busier background. or use a gradient of some kind, it shouldn't do that. its simply trying to simplify a solid color into large lousy blocks. it shouldn't because some people have simple designs and it makes the preview look bad. i'd add this to bugs though, maybe they can look into it. especially with all the new floating images, there will be a lot more solid fills. the size of your file won't make a difference, its the solid color.

like if i did a blue sky i would get a bad edge. if it had clouds, or even noise, it won't compress it like that. the close up, you'll see it looks better, but that won't help attract buyers.


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

Yea, I totally agree. The thumbnail indeed, looks disgusting... Once you press zoom, it is much better, but many people will think that this is how it looks like orignally... I have also noticed that they are adding some extra sharpening too. I don't know... The preview pictures should look as good as they can, this is what attracts potential buyers after all... but in most cases pictures look like they have been taken from fb or something, all poorly compressed.


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www.tgchan.pl
www.tgchan.com

But my background is transparent, not solid - until I upload here at FAA. Are all the png's looking like this? Can others post some links?

The background, looks solid red for me. No, I have seen some designs with transparent backgrounds. I will edit and link them once I find them/


This looks, like it has a transparent background (or maybe just white?):







Plenty of transparent work in here:
http://pixels.com/art/all/all/tshirts/all/nicklas+gustafsson

Maybe you can pm the guy, and he will help you out.


You should also check out this topic, if you have not done it before:

http://fineartamerica.com/showmessages.php?messageid=2634576


--
www.tgchan.pl
www.tgchan.com

its because you used a color. if it was white, i don't think you'd really see it. no wait i was wrong, you still see the crust. this is an issue that should be addressed. there will be a lot more of these backgrounds. and the preview should look good. the annoying part is, i've seen close ups that also had the jpg fuzz. and that's the copy everyone expects to be clean. so sean if your out there, can you save at a level 9 or so for the jpgs? even an 8 should be fine. thanks


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

panorama's tend to compress like this as well.

---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

Nikolyn - when you upload a png with a transparent background, the site wants to determine a color to use if someone were to order a print. That background color is not for the clothing or other items. If you look at your image on a shirt, there is no background.

Thanks, all.

@ Tgchan - Sharon's Saxophone is on a white background, not transparent. I haven't had time to check out the link you gave me, but I will. Thank you for agreeing that mine looks awful - seriously!

@ Mike - I could try either choosing a white background or going with the default (site suggested) color. Maybe that will help at least a little bit. I'll try changing just the image - someone actually already shared this.

@ Greg - That's what I thought, too, and why I took the prices off all the prints. But it looks bad on the other products, too - take a look at the shower curtain, for example. I think the only reason the t-shirt looks ok is that it's soooo small and you can't enlarge to see the problems. Here's the pixels.com page.
http://pixels.com/featured/gateway-arch-saint-louis-transparent-nikolyn-mcdonald.html

if you make it black, i'm thinking that will be your best bet hiding the crumbs. white would be cleaner though.


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

Maybe it's something temporary with the display. I made the following png for a shirt the day they were announced. Looked fine then. Now when I check, there's gunk in the top left, but it appears to display correctly on the shirt..



Also, you can fade your edges if desired to make the transition to an added color look cleaner. Example I just made:

I just made all the product icons different colors: white, dark blue, red, black. If you look at all of them, you can still see the compression in the duvet cover (red) but not in the others.
I did not change out the image yet - it's still red and looks awful. When I do, I think I'll try white. I think I read that if I change the image, I will have to re-do all the product option settings? That's fine with me, just want to know. And I really don't want to delete this file if I don't have to - it already has 63 hits (that's a lot for me) and someone tweeted it, too.

Just use 'Edit Image' and then change it out. You shouldn't lose hits or have to redo any prices.

Edit: Just don't change the title.

Okay, so I uploaded a new image. I did have to change all the product settings.

The default color was dark blue so I stayed with that. I stayed away from the red except for the duvet cover which I left so people checking into this discussion later can see what we are talking about. Not sure why, but the red seems to be the only color of the ones that I've chosen that really looks awful. Too bad, too, as red, white and blue are the Cardinals' colors and I kind of wanted to be able to show that color scheme. Not at the expense of an awful looking thumb, though.

Thanks for all the eyes, suggestions, tips, etc. I'll leave this open a day or so.

Just change for the product!

Edit image
Scroll down
Customise product
Add special image
Submit changes as normal

Nikki, you don't have to upload a new image you can customize/upload for each product.Can't you have a JPG for one product and a PNG for another for the same image?

Thanks Abbie and Jessica. I think I didn't make myself clear, but maybe I just don't understand.

@ Abbie
This was a new file which I worked up two ways: one traditional rectangle jpg and one oval w/ lettering on a transparent background png - two completely different looks IMO

No problem with the rectangle.

When I originally uploaded the png, I got the option to change the background from the default (which was dark blue) to another color for the main "display" (which would also be the look for prints if I priced those), so I did. I chose a rich, cardinal red. Then I went on about my business setting the displays for the products, putting some on white, others on blue or red. I decided to leave prints as an option, too, since who knows - someone might like the oval look on a canvas or something. Submit. The main display looked AWFUL! and had terrible artifacts around the outside of the oval in the red; all the products for which I had chosen red looked bad, too, but it wasn't as noticeable since those are smaller and cannot be previewed large.

After reading all the input and looking again and again at my main display image and all my products, changing background colors on different products as described by Abbie above, I decided that the only color that looked really bad was the red. Yes, I could get rid of it easily on any product, but not (I thought) on the main display without changing out the image. So I did that which necessitated re-customizing all the products (not a biggie - just kind of reminding people to do that).

@ Jessica
I absolutely did not know I could have different files for different products within the same main image if that's what you are saying. And I don't see how/where to do that. Yes, I could save the oval with a transparent background as a png and upload that for the products; and I could add a color to the background in PS and save the file as a jpg and upload that for the prints. Is that what you are suggesting?

Nikki, maybe this will help:

https://forums.adobe.com/thread/1035459

Nikki, you just asked Jessica how to do what I just told you how to do

Nikki, edit image, go to the t-shirt product and click on: customize product. You will then see a tab:IMAGE. click on that to upload another file.

Got it! Sorry, Abbie, I was completely missing the "IMAGE" tab. Thank you both. This is not what I want to do in this particular case, but it IS very handy to know.

And now do you think that if Sharon had done this with her images, she would not have lost the placement of the original jpg in Google? See this thread:
http://fineartamerica.com/showmessages.php?messageid=2657305

And thanks for the link on fading edges, Jessica. I tried to do that the other night and was not happy with the result, so this will help. Again, it's not what I want for this image - I prefer the sharp outline for the oval - but I do have other images I'd like to try that on.

And how's this? Just did it. Not many of my images that this will work for, but it did, here. And though you can't see it, I chose black for the t-shirt.
http://fineartamerica.com/featured/migrant-worker-nikolyn-mcdonald.html?newartwork=true

Very simple tutorial:

Beautiful!

Thank you for the tutorial Jessica!

You're welcome, Terry! It's the most simple and straightforward one I've found.