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What is an avatar? How do you get one? An avatar is a cute little picture that shows next to your name, every time you post a message. You need to make this yourself and then "upload" it by going to User CP ... Edit Avatar. This message below explains how to make an avatar from any digital photo. Need more help? Contact me or post a message in the "Welcome" forum.

Starnectar Forums requires that all avatars represent you with some attempt at realism, but without being very useful for strangers to identify you.

I am tired of corny cartoons. Some forum managers agree with this and the usual answer is to have no avatars. Well I don't quite agree with that. At first, I thought I would make a stock of artistic avatars from photographs of tribal masks, animals, fruit, etc. However I've decided that I would like avatars for once to represent the people who are speaking. Like looking at them. The problem is, most people don't want their image to be public and I agree with this. Aesthetically also, 'mug shots' are not the best. I would like something impressionistic but less identifiable than most impressionist paintings.

My ideal avatar would be something like a well-done child's crayon drawing. The idea is to be colorful and represent real features, but not very usable to identify a person to strangers. Something that captures the spirit of seeing the person, without quite seeing them. However it would be difficult for everyone to find the right artist or child to do this. Maybe software can produce a substitute.

I took a photo of myself and tried the free program Paint.NET (http://getpaint.net). (I learned about Paint.NET (http://getpaint.net) from a website telling how to use it to create transparent backgrounds. I donated $5 because it's worth at least $10 if not $50.)

http://starnectar.com/pix/me-emboss.jpg http://starnectar.com/pix/me-clear.jpg http://starnectar.com/pix/me-inked.jpg

First I applied Effects . . . Stylize . . . Emboss . . . 90. This was good enough.
Also nice was Effects . . . Artistic . . . Pencil Sketch with a tip of 10 and a range of 0. If you wish, you can color it in manually while the photo is still at full size.

(I decided to use this "pencil sketch" and also to match my Avatar's background with the forum background. I took a 'screen print' of the forum, then used the 'eyedrop' feature to suction the forum's background color. The 'eraser', 'magic wand' and 'paintbrush' then can remove and replace the existing background. Unfortunately, transparent .GIF backgrounds do not seem to work with our forum software.)


I then tried . . . Effects . . . Artistic . . . Ink Sketch . . . outline: 0, coloring: 100. This was not as fine in quality as the pencil sketch, but had more color.
I also tried . . . Effects . . . Stylize . . . Relief . . . 90. Then to the same picture I also added . . . Effects . . . Distort . . . Frosted Glass . . . with minimum and maximum both set to 1.10. This results in something like a combination of "Embossed" and "Ink Sketch".
Not yet tried: enlarge the photo as much as possible . . . place clear plastic over your computer screen for protection . . . place a piece of paper over your computer screen . . . trace with colored crayons, pastels or felt markers . . . photograph the result.

Avatar rules and suggestions.

Anything resembling Disney, Scooby or Anime cartoons will be rejected.
A close-up may be suitable for some people. For others, consider a half-length portrait in a characteristic pose: holding a baby, petting a cat, weeding the garden, etc. This says more about you while giving less to identify you. (Let's avoid 'sitting at the computer' themes, a bit too obvious.)
To avoid distortion, make your avatar picture square: same length as width.
About 100 pixels wide is best.
Let's keep the file size below 10k.
(Using Paint.net, "Save As" and put "Quality" at 90%. This made my 100x100 images about 6k.)
Need help? Send the original photo to me in a PM (private message (http://starnectar.com/private.php?do=newpm&u=1)) or email.

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