Help needed

This is currently my first "sig" on PS and I need maybe some help and pointers on how to do a BG. This took me 5 minutes and I've only had PS for about a day, so if anyone here could help me and show me a good tut on BG that would be helpful. As far as no BG, I would just like to know how it looks without it. Maybe some hints or feedback. Thanks.

 

Better than anything I can make

 

How it looks without a BG...1) The 'crop' (Cutout) of the picture looks extremly choppy in places around the edges.2) Needs some sort of a border (unless im overlooking it)3) WTF is 'On the RTY'?4) Itd help you to choose bigger pictures from now on....

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (AdropOFvenom @ Mar 8 2006, 01:49 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>How it looks without a BG...3) WTF is 'On the RTY'?</div>I think it's supposed to say "On the Fly" but the font overlaps the top line of the F with the L to make it look like that.

 

I need help with BGs, and text effects and player effects (basically everything) and i'll be good to go.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (AdropOFvenom @ Mar 8 2006, 04:49 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>How it looks without a BG...1) The 'crop' (Cutout) of the picture looks extremly choppy in places around the edges.2) Needs some sort of a border (unless im overlooking it)4) Itd help you to choose bigger pictures from now on.... </div>Take all that advice, cuz I agree with him

 

K thanks. I told you it sucked, but hey gotta start somewhere. The reason I made this is for feedback so thank you.

 

Yup starting is not the easiest thing to do, but once you start to experiment, good things will happen.

 

I guess I'll just post this to see if you guys like it any better. I know I need a lot of work on all of this, but I'm still learning. Maybe it's better than my 1st 1

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (D WiLLiAmS @ Mar 9 2006, 06:04 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>I guess I'll just post this to see if you guys like it any better. I know I need a lot of work on all of this, but I'm still learning. Maybe it's better than my 1st 1 </div>Looks pimp

 

How'd you do the BG?

 

I just used 1 layer as black and orange of one brush and then gradient for the other layer.

 

to get some different bgs go to filter-render-clouds