Signature Questions & Important Threads *GREAT READING!*

[icklemiss21]

I thought it would be helpful to have a central thread with all of the main questions that come up about siggies to help people find the information they need.

So first of all, the forum rules regarding signatures

9. Signatures, Photos and Images: Every member enjoys personalizing their posts with a unique signature. In order to speed forum loading time and avoid excessive scrolling for all members, we have instituted these guidelines for signatures.

• Total signature size can't be larger than 30 Kb (30,000 bytes). This also includes any smilies added to a signature.

• The max total height of a signature with NO TEXT is 150 pixels high.

• The max total height of a signature with one line of standard sized text (size 2) is 134 pixels high.

• The max total width of a signature is 640 pixels wide.

• If you decide not to use an image, you may have up to 4 lines of standard size text, single-spaced.

• In general, if you have an image banner, no other text, ticker, smilie, etc. will be allowed. Exceptions may occur if your image is small enough for the signature not to exceed 150 pixels in height with the text included.

• You may include a discreet link to another site in your signature. You may not advertise your site in the main body of your post.

• Member signatures are subject to review and deletion by the moderating team without advance warning.

• All signatures are subject to the same rules and regulations as any post, and are subject to the same disciplinary actions and editing by moderators if it is deemed necessary, up to and including banning.

Any embedded photos or images posted at TCS may not be larger than 640 pixels wide. Photos or images larger than 640 pixels wide may be deleted by a Moderator and disciplinary action may take place at the discretion of the Moderator. This includes photos and images that are hosted anywhere on the Internet. Photos that are attached to a thread are restricted by the attachment manager settings already in place and cannot be over-riden.

The 'usual' size for signatures on TCS (smaller to allow better quality) is 550px wide by 134px in height so that should the user decide to use some text, they can.

Signatures are also subject to the same rules regarding the use of copyright images as the rest of the forum is, so to be safe, all images should be your own.

The full list of rules can be found here

We also have several members who are willing to make signatures for other members.

 Please wait until you are a Young Cat before asking for a signature to be made.
 Unless specifically stated in your request, it is assumed that graphics made or manipulated here will only be used on TheCatSite Forums, unless permission is explicitly asked of the artist after the fact.
 Please only use the Signature Request Thread to request signatures, not other graphics.
 Please note that as these graphic signatures are created for free to the users, the designer retains all rights and credit to the graphics.

There is a list of these members here where you can find out who makes them and PM the person about having a signature made.

We also have a signature request thread, where you can post your pictures and have several people work on them. The signature request thread is here and once the signatures have been made for you, they will be posted here. The list of requests is fairly long and the signature makers do not always have a lot of free time, so be patient and check the completed thread often as not all signature makers will PM to say there are signatures there for you.

There is also some information in this post that you should read before posting your request as it will help you know what the signature designers need.

If you are not sure how to upload and post the pictures (they can not be sent to the thread directly from your computer, you need to link from somewhere on the web) there is help here and then you can follow the instructions given in the post above regarding requests.

Once you have a signature made for you, there are instructions on how to post it here

If you prefer to try and make your own signature, there are a lot of posts with helpful hints and resources.

The main one is the graphic help and resources thread which has links to types of software, brushes, backgrounds and fonts as well as tips on how to use them.

There are some premade backgrounds here

For those who want to try making their own, there is a tutorial (using photoshop) here that will help you with the basics

There is also some discussion of the main software programs here that might help you with your decision

A tutorial on how to size your sig for TCS is here.

If you are new to TCS, there are some (very small) waiting times before you can use a signature here.

You need at least 24 hours in membership and 5 posts before the system will allow you to post a signature. If it is just over 24 hours or the number of posts, please be patient as the system sometimes takes a little while to catch up.

 

[cheeseface]

This thread is now the official sticky on signatures.