Open a new image with 16.7 million
colors and a white background. The
image should be just a bit larger than
the desired size of the finished bar.
Draw a rectangle that will be close to
the finished bar size. Use the shape
tool set to an outlined rectable with
a line width of 1.

Zoom in to about 4:1.

With the image zoomed in, once
again go to the shape tool and this
time select an outlined circle.

Start to make the circle with the
cross hairs even with the top edge
of the image and a bit farther in
from the end than the height of the
bar. Now, drag the circle diagonally
toward the end until the circle matchs
the width of the bar.

Select the paint brush with these
settins: Brush type=Normal, Size=1,
Shape=Round, Paper texture=None.
Now, with the Foreground black and the
Background white, you can paint white
by using the right mouse button (for the
background). If you mess up, use the
Foreground color (black) by using
the left mouse button to paint in black.

What you want to do is clear the black
lines leaving only a rounded end on your bar.

Next, you have to fill in the spots where
a fill color will escape. Do this by adding
a black pixel with the paint brush where ever
the pixels are diagonal to one another. Like
in the image to the right. Put your colored
pixels inside the existing ones.

Do the same with the other end of the bar.

Go back to normal viewing size.

Double click on the Foreground color on
the right side and bring up the color window.
Choose your basic color here and click OK.

Select the fill tool. I am going to
use the solid color fill style.
Fill the new bar.

To add some pizzazz, use the magic
wand and select the background around your
bar. Now go to Selections|Invert to
select only the bar.

For the spice, let's use Magic 6 of
the Filter Factory Gallery K. Go to
Image|Plugin Filters|Filter Factory
Gallery K|Magic 6. Of course you have
to have the filters installed for this part.

Adjust the sliders until you get a
desirable effect and click OK.

With the bar still selected, run a
soften filter over it. Go to
Image|Normal Filters|Soften.

Now deselect the bar with
Selections|Select none.

Be sure that the background color is
set to white by using the eyedropper and right
clicking on the background around the image.

You must save your bar as a transparent GIF.
You may want to crop the image some first.
Go to File|Save as.

In the Save as window, name your finished
bar and click the drop down menu to select the
GIF file format.

Click on the Options button for
the File Preferences window.
Choose to set transparency to
the background color. Click
OK and then Save to save the
image as a transparent GIF.

When PSP prompts for a
reduction to 256 colors,
just click yes and it will
do that automatically.