different backgrounds for outside and inside layout wrapper.
 

Hello~

This is my first post and I'm writing because I could not find an answer to my question when I searched the forums. I'm sorry if the question is redundant~

I'm in the process of designing a website (http://sukrungruang.com/) using the latest version (3) of the Atahualpa theme. As you can see, I set the layout wrapper to have a solid border.

My question involves backgrounds. I'd like everything outside the layout wrapper, essentially just the left and right strips of empty space, to have a different background than what is inside the layout wrapper. I'd like the inside of the layout wrapper (the blog/content area) to remain white or a solid color of my choosing. I think that I'd like for the background outside the wrapper to be a tiled pattern.

How would I go about doing this? Changing the background through the atahualpa theme options simply causes *everything* in the theme to take on that background, including the post area, where there will be text :(

Also, suppose I decided to use a single whole image as a background. What dimensions should that image be, so that it is wide and high enough? I know that the main area of the site is 1000px. But what about the remaining space on the sides? How will I know if the picture will reach both sides?

I'm sorry if my questions are very ignorant or even don't make sense. It's 4 am and I haven't gone to bed yet :(

Thank you to whoever answers~!

Think of the page as a series of transparent sheets laid one on top of each other. If you make the background of the first sheet blue, and lay the next sheet over it, because this new sheet is transparent, the blue will show thru.

This is what is happening. Each area of the page, the header, sidebars center area, footer all start off transparent. You need to style each of them to what you want. The sidebars get styled in the side bar options, the center in the center styling option and the same for the footer.

as for a single image, for the background, the width is easy to figure out, it is the maximum width of the page you set, however...remember that the height of a page will variable depending on the amount of information on the page.