How do I slice up a template 'Properly'

This is my first time slicing up a template and it keeps getting little gaps in it
how do I slice it up properly?

Here is what Iam doing I have a site and the background has to be a gradient
I created in photoshop, the main content area slices up nicely with no issues, the navigation buttons are also good its just the background.

Im not sure whats the best way to split it up or if there is another way to actually get around this.
Ive seen from other sites that the background is another separate file which comes with the images in full instead of being split how do I do this?

Any expert help much appreciated

 

slicing is super ez with photoshop. once you create all your slices, just export for web. it will create the html file with the proper tables to fit all the images snugly. if there's spaces, then maybe your table (or a table in the table) has cellpading or borders set to other than 0. Also problems could popup if your photoshop slices aren't perfect. meaning, some of your slices may be slicing other slices. to correct this, you have to select each slice and make sure the borders dont intersect other slices. they should be touching, not crossing.

hope this helps a bit.

 

Here are some good-tutorials:
http://www.good-tutorials.com/search/query/slice

 

Thanks a lot for the info guys.

 

Is the photoshop the only program that does this properly?

 

No, its actually ImageReady. Anyway, Fireworks does it to.

 

anyone in here interested in doing this for me for $20 a layout? Tried posting in the services forum with little luck.

 

I do it the big and painful way, because I like having control over it. Merge then slice.

 

sure pm me. ill slice and dice for $20. but i swear if you refund the paypal payment ill trip.

 

btw, imageready isnt the only app that supports slices. photoshop does too, and in fact imageready is only good for making rollover and animated gifs. and anyone with skill would prefer doing it with photoshop.

 

In photoshop, sometimes you have to zoom in while slicing to make sure the lines don't have like a pixel or two of space between them. And you should be able to use snap.

Are you also trying to do a looping background?

 

I prefer Fireworks for all my template design and slicing. It also allows you to output the html in a couple of different ways incase you need to manually tinker with the code. With Adobe owning both products now, I imagine we will be getting the best of both worlds or the worse of both worlds soon.