Do you think that only professionals with expensive tools and years of experience can work with web graphics? This guide tosses that notion into the trash bin.

Painting the Web is the first comprehensive book on web graphics to come along in years, and author Shelley Powers demonstrates how readers of any level can take advantage of the graphics and animation capabilities built into today's powerful browsers. She covers GIFs, JPEGs, and PNGs, raster and vector graphics, CSS, Ajax effects, the canvas objects, SVG, geographical applications, and more -- everything that designers (and non-designers) use to literally paint the Web.

More importantly, Shelley's own love of web graphics shines through in every example. Not only can you master the many different techniques, you also can have fun doing it.

Topics in Painting the Web include:

• GIF, JPEG, PNG, lossy versus lossless compression, color management, and optimization
• Photo workflow, from camera to web page, including a review of photo editors, workflow tools, and RAW photo utilities
• Tricks for best displaying your photos online
• Non-photographic raster images (icons and logos), with step-by-step tutorials for creating popular "Web 2.0" effects like reflection, shiny buttons, inlays, and shadows
• Vector graphics
• An SVG tutorial, with examples of all the major components
• Tips and tricks for using CSS
• Interactive effects with Ajax such as accordions and fades
• The canvas object implemented in most browsers
• Geographical applications such as Google Maps and Yahoo Maps, with programming and non-programming examples
• Visual effects such as forms and data displays in table or graphics
• Web design for the non-designer

Graphics are not essential to the web experience, but they do make the difference between a site that's functional and one that's lively, compelling, and exciting. Whether you want to spruce up a website, use photos to annotate your stories, create hot graphics, or provide compelling displays for your data, this is the book for you.