Daffodil Lane

Corel is a great program but, since it's vector-based, the learning curve's a little steep.

What, exactly, are you wanting to do graphics-wise? Sometimes a publisher program with a good clipart collection (MS publisher is superb) will fit the bill.

For linux there's GIMP and for windows there's the venerable Adobe solution (e.g. Photoshop, Illustrator) and Macromedia (Freehand).

"Bring out the GIMP!" (cue Pulp Fiction music)

I personally use Photoshop, but I'm no graphics professional. I just need to make small pictures for websites.

I actually am interested in making my own clip art. I usually use Power Point to make banners for our site and then convert them to .jpeg in Paint, but I don't like how you lose quality and clarity in the switch over. I want crisp, clean graphics that also aren't overly large in terms of file size and that aren't pixelated. I like to be able to change the size of the graphic without losing quality. The vector based thing doesn't scare me. I pick up on things quickly.

re: "want nice gr*phics that don't go to cr*p when they're converted..."

Yeah, welcome to my world. And, if my pro gr*phics friends are any indication, everyone's world. It's the conversion from "quality-at-all-costs" vector format to "small-size-at-all-costs" web-common bitmap formats that cause you grief, and no gr*phics program in the world's gonna get around that. If you guys could only see how pretty the gr*phics on our site look when they're vector-based...

That said, I'd highly recommend CorelDraw over Gimp. Gimp is free, but in this case (from everything I have read) you most definitely get what you pay for. You get a student discount right now, yes? Take a look at the prices, and pick one up if you find it reasonable. Buy a book too!

(*'s included because of your blacklist entry... go remove the "cr[first letter of the alphabet]p' restriction... can't say gr*phics with it in place)