Subhash's Guide: Anti-alias

While surfing the net you would have come across pixelated pictures. The ragged edges of the graphic looking awful. Don't make the same mistake in your page also!

The reason for such pixelated graphic is that the computer displays graphic in pixels. So pixelation occurs when you reduce the number of color displayed in a graphic. This occurs mostly when you save your pictures in indexed graphic formats like GIF.

One way of avoiding such jagged edges is by anti-aliasing. Anti-alias smooths the edges of the graphic by blurring the colors in the edge. Almost all graphic programs bundle anti-alias tools.

Anti-alias does not work with indexed color graphic formats like GIF. In indexed format the number of colors that can be used is defined. Thus first convert your pictures to RGB mode. This lets you create and fill colors in between colors of an image and it's background (in short, anti-alias). Then you may save your work in GIF. But the best bet would be to go for PNG. This way you would not loose any color.

Example

Aliased

Anti-aliased