A.G. Bloggin'

New Desktop Wallpaper: Fan's Eye View Behind Home Plate

2009-06-12T15:50:00.000-07:00

Now that baseball is well into the 2009 season and has started interleague play, I decided to offer a baseball-themed desktop wallpaper to celebrate. I've played around with the original photograph, which I took some time ago, in Virtual Painter and sized it in four different resolutions (sizes) to fit most monitors, desktop and laptop computers alike.

The effect you see on the wallpaper is silkscreening on washi. It's easily done with Virtual Painter and any image or photograph. I think the effects are pretty cool and fun to work with.

View the thumnbnail and the full-size desktop wallpapers beginning with the fifth wallpapers page. Each size will open a new window from which you can download the wallpaper that fits your monitor's resolution. Remember, these images are not meant for web pages, including social networking profile pages, etc., and are blanket-covered by the Terms of Use.

New Desktop Wallpaper: Monarch Butterflies (and a Ladybug)

2009-03-31T19:11:00.000-07:00

Last offering for March is a desktop wallpaper featuring a couple of monarch butterflies and a teeny red ladybug atop some plants (I think they're sage plants but I could be wrong -- I'm no gardener nor a botanist). The photograph comes from the morguefile.com and was taken by member beglib.

We're into over a week of spring now and I felt like doing something with some harbingers of spring, like butterflies. I haven't come across a photograph of a robin yet or other birds that have struck my fancy. I like the butterflies. There's usually a ton of them swarming to Pacific Grove, California, on their migrations to and from Mexico. Read more about them at wikipedia.org.

As usual, the wallpapers come in four sizes to fit most monitor resolutions. Choose the link to the size you want to download and a new window opens up. Follow the directions for downloading the wallpaper either to your desktop (set as wallpaper) or to your downloads folder in your hard drive (save as...). The wallpapers are not meant to be used on webpages. The Terms of Use applies to the wallpapers you get from Arride Graphics. Please be sure to read it.

New! Side Border Page Background Graphic: Earthy

2009-03-27T19:26:00.000-07:00

I can't let March pass by without offering at least one graphic. Today's graphic is a little reminiscent of the Southwest U.S. and of Arts and Crafts/ Art Deco styles, all in earthy colors. This was inspired by my visit to Phoenix and architect Frank Lloyd Wright's summer home at Taliesin West before taking in a couple of games at Spring Training camp (baseball).

The side border background is 2000 pixels wide and 100 pixels high, enough to cover most monitor resolutions before repeating the side border. Clicking the thumbnail image on the page opens a new window, after you enter the username and password provided. Follow the download instructions on the page. You can use this on any web page without charge but must linkback and credit Arride Graphics as part of the agreement to use it. Read the Terms of Use, please!

Download "Earthy" here.

New Desktop: Wallpaper: Waterfall

2009-02-26T13:09:00.000-08:00

Every winter I go through the same thing -- I get tired of gray skies and rain, even when it (rain) is a good thing. Like last month's desktop wallpaper offering, this one is green and wet and fresh but hopeful of the coming spring.

I have on my desktop a wallpaper from the National Geographic website. National Geographic publications are known for their fantastic photographs and photographers. This one I have is of a cascading stream with moss-covered, overhanging trees and branches, some with icicles even. If not a winter scene, it is probably early spring. The photograph is by Nick Feller, an amateur photographer who contributed the image on their Your Shot (now called My Shot) page in December 2007.

While I love that image, I wanted one sans the icicles. So I scoured a couple of my favorite stock photo sites for something similar. I finally settled on the image you see on the wallpaper. It comes from ImageAfter.com. I'm not sure of the attribution because the download page really doesn't state who took the photograph. Anyway, rather than keeping the wallpaper to myself, I decided to offer it to you as well.

I paired the photo with an apt quote by Anne Morrow Lindbergh from Quoteland.com. The font I used is Lucida Calligraphy.

To view and download the desktop wallpaper, go to the fifth wallpapers page. There are four sizes to choose from. Download the size that most closely corresponds to your monitor's resolution. And remember, these are not meant for use on webpages.

New Desktop Wallpaper: Flowers and Rain

2009-01-30T19:09:00.000-08:00

Here in California we're finding out that we may be facing a drought this summer due to the scarce snowfall in the Sierra Nevada mountains this winter. We rely on the runoff from the snowpack to fill our reservoirs, if not the rains. So with that on my mind, and me being tired of the cold, I look to spring flowers to cheer us up with this latest desktop wallpaper.

The flower and rain photograph comes from my favorite source, morguefile.com, and it was created by delboysafa whose real name is Derek Nutley. The quote I chose for the desktop wallpaper is by Rachel Carson which I got from The Quote Garde n.

The wallpapers come in four sizes (resolutions) and can be downloaded on the fifth desktop wallpapers page. Choose the size that closely corresponds to your monitor's resolution and save the wallpaper from the popup download window. Save it to your desktop directly or save it to your downloads folder in your hard drive. Brief directions are on the popup download window.

Snowfall Side and Top Border Web Page Backgrounds

2008-12-09T20:11:00.000-08:00

I've finally created a side border snowy background graphic for your web pages and a top border with the same graphic. The difference here is I'm experimenting with Cascading Style Sheets this time for the page layouts. Check them out!

This is pretty exciting for me because I've been thinking about getting away from tables-based web pages. While I'll still offer backgrounds and sets using tables for layouts, I will be basing sample pages more and more toward CSS layouts. So right now I'm working on changing my own web site to a CSS layout, for the most part. That means I won't have time to offer any more new graphics for this year.

Wow! Can you believe 2008 is almost ending?

Well, here are the links to the pages for "Snowfall":

Hope you enjoy using either one or both of these backgrounds. Finally, here's wishing you a Happy Hanukkah, Merry Christmas and Happy Kwanzaa!

Coordinated Web Page Graphic Set and Desktop Wallpaper

2008-10-24T16:06:00.000-07:00

This latest graphic set and desktop wallpaper are created from a photo I took a few summers ago of some koi fish swimming in a resort hotel's garden pond. The photo was treated to some artistic, silkscreen rendering with Paint Shop Pro. It gives the resulting image an abstract look without rendering the fish unrecognizable.

Initially, I made this photo into a web page graphics set with a top header for my own use. Then when I decided to distribute this at Arride Graphics, I wondered if the entire altered photo would look nice as a desktop wallpaper. I think it does. So there you go!

To view and download the web page graphic set, please go to the Top Headers page.

To view and download the desktop wallpaper in one of four sizes, go to page five of the Wallpapers section.

These two graphic offerings complete my releases for the month of October.

Start at the main page to see what other graphics are offered at Arride Graphics.

Arachnophobic: A Top Border Background

2008-10-08T20:59:00.000-07:00

Here's a new top border background suitable for the upcoming Halloween Friday, a personal page or maybe a science page about spiders. The spiders sit at about the 100 pixel line from the top but still provide plenty of space for your header information, such as your website's name or maybe even a small banner ad. The graphic's total size is 100X3000 pixels so there's a lot of space for your content before the spider border repeats itself.

Interested? Well then, go to the fourth page of the Top Border backgrounds to find the thumbnail for the download. You'll need the username and password info found on that page to get to the download page. The download link opens a new window.

Shades of Gray Background Tiles

2008-10-07T14:35:00.000-07:00

Today I'm releasing some background tiles in shades of gray to complete (maybe) the first page of the solid color tiles. The four existing tiles were a bit lonely without more grays. So I added four more.

Hopefully, someone will find some use for these tiles.

To view and download the new tiles, go to page 1 of the solid color tiles section.

Also, in light of my missing releases in September, I'll offer a new/ old set and a new desktop wallpaper this month. Boy, is it hard to get back into the swing of things after returning home from vacation!

Check out some existing webpage backgrounds, too, in the Halloween spirit on the following pages:

Side Border Page 5 - jack o' lanterns, 2 styles
Top Border Page 2 - skeletons
Top Border Page 3 - jack o' lantern
Top Border Page 4 - cats on a fence

New Desktop Wallpaper!

2008-08-20T18:37:00.000-07:00

As promised earlier this week, a new graphic in the form of desktop wallpapers are here to decorate your computer monitor. I whipped this one up from a photograph I took of nasturtium flowers in my garden. Sometimes I fiddle with photographs using Virtual Painter in Paint Shop Pro, but this time I left it untouched. So what you see is what I took.

A little bit of info about nasturtiums: these are orange flowers, but they come in other colors, too. I also had some in a light yellow or cream color. Nasturtium is also known as tropaeolum. The young leaves, flowers and unripe seed pods are edible, having a peppery flavor like watercress, and can be used in salads for color.* They're really easy to grow and re-seed themselves. Unfortunately, for me anyway, snails and slugs love to eat them, too, so I had to remove them to avoid having to deal with those slimy critters; nevermind eating any of the flowers after they've nibbled on them. Yuck!

The desktop wallpapers come in four sizes to fit monitors in most of the common resolutions my visitors use. So go to the fifth wallpapers page to download one of them. Remember, they must be saved to your desktop or your computer's hard drive, or set as wallpaper directly. They're not meant to be used as web page backgrounds.

* Information on nasturtiums: Sunset Western Garden Book, 1995

Cool New Patterned Background Tiles!

2008-07-31T17:48:00.001-07:00

I don't know why these weren't offered back in 2005 when I made them, but here they are now. (Kind of like finding clothes in the back of your closet you forgot you had.) These are freeform, patterned background tiles to use on your web pages or your desktop for a very wild look. Count 'em: 12.

Like the ones on the page and the pages before it, these were created using Sausage Software's Reptile. Some colors were tweaked from the original patterns; others were cropped. All of the names are mine and I've written the tile name below each download sample. As for three of the tiles, I don't remember why I named them as I named them. So those will remain enigmatic.

Go on and check out the background tiles now, located on the "B" and "C" pages of the Freeform Designs page.

New Balloonz Web Page Graphic Set!

2008-07-07T15:49:00.000-07:00

I missed my self-imposed June deadline for releasing something new, and I feel a wee bit bad about that. But not so much because I've been enjoying baseball in the meantime.

On to the new graphics: This latest set is called "Balloonz." It's a double-border looking set composed of three graphics to use in a table to create the look. It's a fun set suitable for a child's web page or web site, a birthday web page for any age, or any fun page or site you can think of. The set comes with the three table graphics and three more background tiles to use as you wish in your page design. Accessories include two bullets, two page header graphics and a page divider.

In a break from the past, you can now download individual pieces of the set from a separate page or you can download the zip file as before. All graphics for this set, whether obtained from the download page or the zip file, must be saved to your computer's hard drive or your transloader space, if you're a WebTV user. There is no direct-linking or hot-linking allowed.

So now, go to the preview page for this set on the Double Border Sets page. Enjoy using this set!

Updates

2008-05-27T17:54:00.000-07:00

In the coming month or so, my web host will be migrating accounts to new servers located at a different data center, mine included. There may be disruptions of accessibility to this site.[Arride Graphics] I'm hoping it will be minimal.

My hand is feeling better but it is not completely healed. I will try to get out some graphics anyway between now and the end of June. This downtime has been nice in a way, because there's always something going on in life.

Hey Janet, What's Up?

2008-04-07T15:24:00.000-07:00

You may have noticed that I haven't been offering any new graphics for over a month now. That is because I've got a repetitive stress injury to my wrist and hand. Making graphics requires extensive use of the mouse and I can't do that much right now, especially while wearing the brace. Very awkward.

So while I heal, there won't be anything new to offer. I can say that my hand seems to be getting better every day. Hopefully, I'll be ready to make more graphics within the next month or so. In the meantime, please check out the existing graphics. Maybe you need a new desktop wallpaper?

Thanks for your visit!

Background Tiles As Desktop Wallpapers, A Mini-Tutorial

2008-02-25T19:11:00.000-08:00

If I judge correctly from how long some visitors stay on my site when they're searching for certain desktop wallpapers, I don't think they understand what desktop wallpapers are. In some instances, they are fixed-width images, e.g. 800x600 pixel photos or color graphics. In other instances, they are graphical tiles, mostly with seamless edges, in a variety of pixel sizes, e.g. 10x10 or 100x100 or 10x100, as examples. While I offer the fixed-width images as desktop wallpapers, you can use any of the web page background tiles on your desktop also. It's how you set the graphic on your desktop that allows the image to cover it.

The fixed width image, should you go ahead and install it immediately, is set as a Stretched image (Windows). Because you set it that way, you have to be sure you download the correct size for the resolution you've set your monitor. For example, if you're using the resolution of 1024x768, you download the desktop wallpaper sized at 1024x768. You can also use the option of Center, if you've downloaded the correct size. (Theoretically, you can use a size larger than your monitor's resolution, but you end up losing some of the image -- right and bottom sides -- in doing so.)

The other option is to Tile the image. Obviously, with a fixed-width image, it makes no sense to tile it since it covers the entire desktop anyway. This is the option you choose when you use a background tile. Instructing the computer to tile the image on your desktop will cover it all. Check it out. If you tell the computer to center the background tile, all you'll see is this lonely tile in the middle of your desktop. If you stretch it, watch out! It will be so huge and out of focus, maybe even funny-looking. (The screenshot doesn't do the real look justice. Believe me it looks bad.) Tiling the tile makes sense and is the best way to go. Additionally, the best thing about background tiles is you don't have to worry about knowing your monitor's resolution.

Centered, a 100x100 pixel tile

Stretched and fuzzy

Tiled

Words of caution: If the small, single tile looks good, it does not necessarily translate into a good-looking desktop wallpaper. It may end up looking too busy. Try them out. You can always change it easily, unlike wallpaper you put on house walls.

How do you set your image on your desktop? With Windows, you right-click on the image until a menu pops up and select "Set As Desktop..." Then in the next popup window, select the Position and change the color, if necessary. Finally, press the "Set Desktop Background" button. You're done!

For Mac users, click on the link to view the desktop image. Click and hold the mouse cursor over the image and drag it to your desktop. The image will be copied and saved. (The browser window may have to be resized in order to see and reach the desktop so the image can be dragged and dropped.) Next, open the appearance control panel ( Main Apple Menu drop down menu -> Control Panels -> Appearance) When the appearance control panel window opens, click on the "desktop" tab. Drag the saved image from the desktop into the appearance desktop window. Choose how you want the image to be displayed (i.e. position automatically, center on screen, tile...) then click on "Set Desktop".

Here are the Desktop Wallpapers and Background Tiles pages at Arride Graphics:

Wallpapers 1 - space images
Wallpapers 2 - more space images
Wallpapers 3 - variety of images
Wallpapers 4 - more variety of images
Background Tiles - color and patterned

Have fun!

New Top Border Web Page Background: Green Jewels

2008-02-21T13:40:00.000-08:00

Top border backgrounds are pretty popular nowadays, if I can judge from the number of visitors here searching for them. I'll continue to make and offer them in a variety of patterns and colors as the demand dictates. Today, I'm offering two, similar top border backgrounds - Green Jewels - made with an emerald bead tube and Virtual Painter in Paint Shop Pro 7.

The beads line the bottom of the green, textured top border. One background graphic has a large bead and a tiny bead, giving the graphic a bit of presence. The other background graphic has a small bead and a tiny bead, a much more subdued yet still elegant look. The choice is yours. Both graphics are shown on sample pages from which you can download the graphic, and the instructions are right on the page.

You can find the thumbnail images on page four of the top edge or border backgrounds page. Each thumbnail image will open a new window with the sample pages. Have fun choosing!

New Desktop Wallpaper: Hammock at the Beach

2008-02-13T12:53:00.000-08:00

Last year, you saw this image on the July calendar desktop wallpaper. It's a photo of a white hammock strung from palm trees on the beach in Sri Lanka. The photo was taken by Ana C. Golpe and offered at Morguefile.com.

Feeling a little bit anxious for warm weather and for spring and summer to arrive, I decided to resurrect this image for another desktop wallpaper more permanent than a calendar one. Also because the beachy/summery image I had on my computer's desktop -- although nice and warm feeling -- was the one provided by Microsoft and I wanted something different, so I chose to bring this back. I love Ana's photo and the feeling it gave me when I first saw it. I remember sighing deeply and wishing I could be laying there in the hammock right then.

Now, the photo was a bit skewed with the horizon slanted upwards from left to right. So I leveled that out. In doing so, I needed to crop the image so that the background color I used would not be part of the photo. That meant the image sizes would be off the standard heights, e.g. instead of 800x600, it is 800x592 and instead of 1024x768, it is 1024x758 and so on. I also made the image less fuzzy by sharpening it a bit. All this was done with Paint Shop Pro 7.

Does this sound like something you want on your desktop? Go to the fourth wallpapers page (click link) to download in one or more of four widths, and enjoy!

New Desktop Wallpaper: Blue Ice

2008-02-05T20:52:00.000-08:00

Finally got a burst of energy to churn up another desktop wallpaper for you. This will be the last of the wintry-themed wallpapers for the season because I'm ready for spring!

This desktop wallpaper, Blue Ice, was made from a photograph obtained at ImageAfter.com. I couldn't tell who the contributor was, so I guess he or she will remain anonymous. The quote is from QuoteGarden.com and I thought it was appropriate for the image. Finally, the font I used for the text of the quote is called Rage Italic from the Esselte Corporation and Microsoft Corporation, a commercial font.

You can view then download the wallpaper in one or more of the four sizes on the fourth wallpapers page at Arride Graphics.

Happy New Year!

2008-01-02T15:58:00.000-08:00

Yeah, yeah, I know I'm late. But this is the first work day of the year, so I am not that late. Hope everyone enjoyed their time off for the holidays. I can't believe how fast time goes by between Thanksgiving and Christmas. It's 30 days but it seems so much shorter, especially when you're trying to find the right gifts to give everyone and trying to avoid the crowds at the malls by shopping mostly online.

So, I didn't get much done like I hoped I would, graphics- and site-wise. But there will be changes coming this year, if not this month. Look for a brighter-looking web site here. Out with the old; in with the new!

(Changes mentioned will be to the web site only, not this blog.)

New, Wintry Desktop Wallpaper: SnowTree

2007-12-05T12:07:00.000-08:00

Here's an alternative desktop wallpaper to the December calendar. It's a snow-covered tree, a leafless one at that, that I photographed a year or two ago. I applied Virtual Painter's Pointillism effect in Paint Shop Pro which gives the photo a complementary snowy effect. The cool blues and purples of this image chill - just the feeling you get when you walk outside on a crisp winter morning and forgot to put on your ear muffs and scarf.

Download one of four sizes of SnowTree on the fourth Wallpapers page and enjoy.

This is absolutely the last graphic I'll be releasing this year. I've got a ton of maintenance work to do on my web site in anticipation of the new year (wow, it's almost 2008?).

While you're on the wallpapers page, do check out the other offerings on the site as well. Maybe you haven't started a web page yet, but see what's available. Looking around might spark your interest; if not a web site, then a social-networking page perhaps?

New Background Tile

2007-12-03T17:15:00.000-08:00

Alrighty! In keeping with the wintry theme, here's another snowflake background tile you can play with. Created from a Microsoft Wingding, this background tile can be used on web pages or your computer's desktop. The sample pages offer different ways you can use this tile on web pages. Go to the patterned tiles page 5 for more information and the download.

Note: the thumbnail image above is just a sample at 60% of full size. The full size 100x100 pixel graphic is more detailed.

(Edit 12/5/07: Thumbnail image removed due to someone in Florida thinking that was the download.)

Double Delight: Desktop Wallpaper & Background Tiles

2007-11-27T14:26:00.000-08:00

Today's offerings are December's Desktop Wallpaper and Snowflakes Background Tiles! I haven't done background tiles in awhile, so what better timing than now and with a pattern that's popular at this time of the year. So is the image used in this month's desktop wallpaper: red berries, green foliage and snow.

The image for the desktop wallpaper comes from a photographer whose nickname on the web site, Image Temple, is Raistlin. It's a pretty picture that I left untouched other than putting those translucent boxes for the calendar. The font used on the calendar is called Girls Are Weird created by Robot Johnny AKA John Martz. Download a desktop wallpaper now in one of four sizes.

The background tiles were created using the dingbat font, Snowflake, from type foundry P22. I created the tiles with Paint Shop Pro, first making the "full strength" tile, then adding some translucent layers of white to create the two "faded" tiles. The sample page shows how you can use all three tiles with nested tables. You don't have to do that on your web pages; use just one tile or two tiles. View and download the snowflakes background tile now. By the way, these tiles can also be used on your desktop. Just set a tile as desktop wallpaper and make sure you indicate that it should be tiled, not stretched or centered.

The desktop wallpaper calendar is the last for this year and forever. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I will not be making these any more for the public. I hope that those of you who downloaded the previous months enjoyed them as I did.

November's Desktop Wallpaper

2007-10-25T15:15:00.000-07:00

Hey, it's here! Download November now in one of two looks: Regular or Enhanced. Regular starts out with one of my landscape photos that I applied the Watercolor filter to and using the font, Pristina by the Esselte Corporation, created the latest calendar desktop wallpaper. Enhanced goes a step further with autumn leaves from a PSP tube. While I really like how the regular calendar turned out, I thought it needed a little something extra to give it more "oomph"; thus, the leaves. So I offer for this month two versions of November.

Choose one or both versions from the fourth page of the Wallpapers section. You can either download the image to install later or apply the desktop wallpaper now. Instructions are on each window of the size you choose.

More news: December will be the last calendar desktop wallpaper I'll make. I'm not sure how well these are being accepted because I don't receive any feedback. So instead of me working hard to create these graphics for the public, I'll resume creating them for my personal enjoyment only. But I will continue to make desktop wallpapers in general.

Top Border Backgrounds: Reversed Gradients

2007-10-24T16:13:00.000-07:00

Earlier this year I released a group of top border backgrounds with gradient colors. Reversing the graphic so that it starts out with a white or near-white background then slowly transitions to the color is something I've been thinking about doing for awhile. So here it is now.

I hope that for some of my visitors wishing to use a gradient background for their web pages, this selection fits better than what was offered previously.

You can find the reversed gradients on the fourth top border backgrounds page.

Birches, Clouds & Sky: New Desktop Wallpaper

2007-10-23T15:02:00.000-07:00

While we are going through another warm spell, I'm releasing this scene on the latest desktop wallpaper of the European birches in my back yard against a backdrop of the brightest blue winter sky and fluffy clouds. But this is not your ordinary photo. I've taken the admittedly plain Jane photo and touched it up with Paint Shop Pro's Virtual Painter. I used the Drawing Effect on Washi paper to come up with this abstract desktop wallpaper rich with textures. I love it and hope you do, too.

Go to the fourth desktop wallpapers page to find the links to four sizes and set or download the wallpaper of your choice. Remember, the wallpapers are meant for your desktop, not for web pages. They are too large, even the 800x600 size, to use for web pages. Not everyone surfs with high speed connections...yet.

The November desktop wallpaper will be released on Thursday. So check back to the web site then.