How can I create bitmaps with a transparent background? You know those fancy graphics you need when making a nice-looking game. I have searched the entire web, (well, not the entire web, but you get the idea) and I can not find any good explanations on how to do this. I would think was is quite simple, but then again I am a Canadian. Prefered sofware: MS Paint Adobe Photoshop 5.2 Corel Draw Please, I beg you! Do you want to be my friend?

you don''t create transparent bitmaps (not .bmp anyway). What you do is to make the background in a special color and when you draw your Image , you do not draw that color == transparent

It depends on what format your game engine supports. .tga is a good file format though because it supports an alpha channel unlike .bmp. For .bmp you need two images like the previous post mentioned.

In Photoshop click on the channels tab and then the create a new channel button down below. This creates an alpha channel. Open the channel''s properties box to set the transparent color and set the opacity to 0 or whatever you want. When you flatten and save the image to a .tga file the transparent color should be saved with the image.

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Todd
http://www.3dcgi.com/

It depends if you do a 2d or 3d game. If you make a 2d game with DirectX 7, you must use a color-key blit. This is a color you choose that, instead of being copied on the screen, indicates not to copy this pixel. If you want a more sophisticated way, that is an alpha channel, you must use some kind of 3d interface because directdraw doesn''t support it.