hi, I`ve created a list of commands using the Script-Fu dialog console that do exactly what I want.... it did take a long time to suss out some of the arguments...but thats fine, i like a challenge. however, I tried creating my own script-fu following the docs...but Gimp doesnt pick it up... (where in my .gimp-1.1 directory does the file i make go? whats all this busines of compiling them?) so..anyway, i tried making a batch file instead. this is what i have so far gimp --verbose -b \ '(set! theResult (script-fu-asc-2-img "motd.txt" "-*-Charter-*-r-*-*-24-*-*-*-p-*-*-*" 45 '(0 0 0) TRUE '(255 255 255) 35))' \ '(set! Finalpicture (gimp-image-merge-visible-layers theImage 1))' \ '(gimp-image-set-filename Finalpicture "motd.png")' \ '(gimp-file-save 1 theImage theLayer "/home/almb/motd.png" "motd.png")' \ '(gimp-quit 0)' \ trouble is the COLOR flags in line two - > '(number number number) the ' is being picked up by the shell and its screwing it all up....any way of getting this to actually run? I've tried escape characters..but iirc \ only does a linefeed! :-( Alan PS whats this for? Well, I grab the important stuff from /etc/motd (lines begin with an *) and then i put it into this and i get a nice text image with transparent background - which I then put onto the login window of the Linux boxes so MOTD is displayed nicely under the kdm login manager.