Well, first of all, to be blunt, you should not be picking up graphics from other sites. This is stealing and is a violation of copyright laws. Please don’t do it.
However, if you are making a graphic from scratch in Paint Shop Pro, Photoshop, or Photoshop Elements there is a way to make the background transparent or match it to your blog’s background color.
Paint Shop Pro transparency tutorial and another.
Photoshop/Elements transparency tutorial.
NOTE: .jpg does not support transparency. You’ll need to use .gif or .png
Updated to add: A few comments have pointed out that you can use graphics that you’ve legally downloaded via a subscription or online royalty-free site. This is true. You’ll want to read any site agreements, though, to confirm what you can and cannot do with those graphics.
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Thanks for this post. I’ve saved images with a transparent background and a .png extension. It shows up just fine in firefox (translucent), but still has the white box in ie. Can you think of a reason why this is the case? I went in and changed the background of my image to match the background behind it, but you can still see a slight box-like image. Thanks.
I understand about the “stealing” and all. But if I am subscribed to a service like clipart.com, I can use those graphics — is that right?
Another way in which people may have graphics that are totally okay to use would be when they buy royalty free graphics/images through one of the several online services where you can purchase them.