I am not very computer savvy, and I've seen a lot of really neat avatars around--from moving avatars, to some that have a two-picture sort of slide-show... Anyway, I'd love to know how that is done. Anyone care to explain the techniques in a way someone who is computer handicapped can understand? :wavey:

The fancy avatars are animated gif images. There are literally thousands of them online (just google "Free animated avatars).

I create mine in Photoshop, but I'm sure there are some free programs out there that let you animate gifs.

also, animated avatars can't be larger than 90x120, otherwise the forum software will automatically resize it which stops the animation.



(I didn't animate my current avatar though, I found it online)

The magic of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphics_Interchange_Format.

I suspect Adobe Photoshop and Gimp (free) are the most commonly used tools for fancy avatars. I also suspect some avatars come directly from websites. Me, I just cropped a picture from the web, and drew the symbol of Vinegar Ra using MS paint

I've only used Adobe ImageReady 7 (not free though). Gimp as Hellmouth has mentioned is a free editor that can do this for you, or just create your own from various web based creators like http://picasion.com/.

Sites with free gif avatars;

http://gdpit.com/avatars_pictures/animated-1.htm

http://3gold.com/pictures/avatar1.htm

I just saved mine to my computer from Malacath's page on UESP... I'm not tech savvy at all either.

I just got mine off the internet.

Whoo now my sonic runs :thumbsup:

beg

okay, thank you all for your input. I will have to check these different sites and programs out...

if you can find a JASC Animation Workshop, that would be a great way to start doing your own customizing. As as it was said already, GIMP, Photoshop, and all those other image editors can be used to

personally, i think http://www.allavatars.com/index.php makes a decent start up for an avatar that is not like most(most are not fancy as you say, but i think they are a sufficient, at least for the time being, brake from regular avatars.

I want to change mine, Slenderman's jerky facepalm is boring me.

me too