Creating Insignias

I'm starting up a business in which I mostly create insignias through Photoshop CS4. I've been practicing, but it seems every time I upload an Insignia it looks a lot smaller in the Groups Insignia Box then other groups Insignias. I'm currently using 342x242 to create the insignia then save it as a 24 bit targa. What am I doing wrong?

Thanks!

Well, for one thing, 342 x 242 is a strange size. When it's uploaded to SL, it will be re-dimensioned to 256 x 128, because those are the closest "power of two" dimensions. If nothing else, that will make your work look a bit distorted. Read the sticky on file sizes and formats at the top of this forum. My guess is that you want to try a 256 x 256 file or maybe a 512 x 512. You may need to pre-stretch your image to preserve its height:width ratio in the insignia box.

How do you pre-stretch your image?

Read through the recent discussion concerning how to get the right proportions on Profile pics, which are similar to Insignia pics, especially post #13. You'll get the idea, I think. The thread is /109/36/300826/1.html

Or,

You can just make sure you fit your insignia within a power of two square. Especially if you are using them for group or profile images as they are Always square. If you are making an image that is longer than it is high then you can do something like 256x512 or any of the other power of two
combinations. Or if it is not that much different then you can just make your image normally
then resize it to a square for upload and then stretch it once applied to a prim to the correct proportions.

Thank you, Infiniview. I stand corrected. Insignias actually ARE square, so you can ignore my comment about pre-stretching them. Just be sure that your original design in Photoshop is square and that you re-size to a legal "power of two" set of dimensions before you upload to SL. Profiles, on the other hand, are WAY out of square. The ratio of width to height there is 4:3. They DO need dramatic pre-stretching.