User talk:Joelthefrog1

Hi there!

Welcome!
Hi Joelthefrog, thanks for joining us here on the wiki! :) This is a talk page I am writing in, if you ever have a question or need help figuring out how to do something on the wiki, please feel free to leave me a message anytime by clicking the Talk button on my signature and leaving me a message. You can also go to my talk page by clicking my user name then clicking on the Talk Page tab at the top. I understand what it was like trying to edit when I was new, and I wish I had somebody I could ask questions to or welcome me on here at the beginning.

Please don't forget to put your signature at the end of each of your talk pages. All you have to do is press the Signature button next to the templates above and it will look like four ~ marks.

Starting Out
I hope your day is doing well, and I just wanted to give you some info on starting out with some basic things if you don't mind. Whenever I make a new page or find one without the template (or big box with the columns of info) on the right, normally I end up adding one. This actually isn't as user friendly as you may think, because the ones it shows at first pretty much don't work hehe. So trial and error I found the ones that do work, first click Template under Insert, and select Other template / magic word (may have to click a couple times :p). I then type in just Template:in, and it's usually enough to get the Infobox NPC / Item / Monster to pop up (may have to scroll down to see the monster one). Now a green thingy appears and you just put your cursor over it to edit/delete it!

One last important thing is a free, downloadable software I use called Gimp 2 to add transparency or alpha channels to screenshots (Google search this). The steps I do this is: Take the screenshot, paste into Gimp 2 by doing CTRL V, zoom into 400% to crop around the image (clicking the square tool on the left, clicking and dragging around image then hit Delete), zoom into 800% to prepare alpha channel: Go to Layer--Transparency--Add Alpha Channel. Then I pretty much use the magic wand everywhere around the image you want to keep by simply hitting the Delete key each time. Items are, by far, the easiest kind of image to work with. This will add a transparent background so all that's left is just the real picture...but be very careful! This part takes practice, and can be tricky and technical at times.

Tips On Transparency
Sometimes the person's brown boots (for an example) is the same color as the floor he stands on, so the magic wand will want to transparent his boots also, or will make the boots partially transparent even if it's formed around it. If this happens, simply go to Edit-Undo, or try to undo on the right hand side of the screen using the Undo History. This is where I create an unusual color, like a wacky light blue, and pencil around the boots (or wherever you want to block the magic wand from hitting). Then the magic wand hits the light blue instead, and it serves as sort of a force field. The light blue is dealt with at the very end by making it transparent.

Lastly, when all the transparency is added, I go to Image-Autocrop image. A good way to tell if it's done correctly is when it autocrops perfectly around the image, but still double check with the magic wand everywhere because sometimes it doesn't fully clear all the pixels although it may look cleared (zoom in to 1600% if you need to). Save As your image, type in .png at the end of its name and you're done! :)

If you have questions or get stuck, please drop me a message any time. Good luck and have fun! :P 17:12, May 10, 2011 (UTC)