[thelist] thumbnails and downsized images - quality - gimp & imagemagick

[Bob Meetin]

I use GIMP and ImageMagick (convert ...) for modifying images. 

With gimp, and large clipart gifs, when downsized to 100x100 (even 
larger) the images tend to break up (less pixels).  Converting to jpgs 
gets better quality, but lose transparency.  Are there any better 
products out there specifically designed for thumbnail creation?  Or 
perhaps are there some options that I can set within gimp to get better 
quality?

For use in my image upload scripts I use ImageMagick/convert to do some 
moderate customizations (quality, size, density, etc).  There is 
supposedly an option to specifiy number of colors for .gif images. 

should be:  -colors $number
as in:  -colors 32

This is failing on the hosting server, regardless of what number it 
breaks and I end up with an image devoid of either black or dark 
colors.  Any ideas?

-Bob