how come people like aslan have huge avatars and i can only have 50X50???

Your avatar is only 50x50 because that's the size of the picture you've uploaded. If you uploaded a larger picture your avatar will be larger.

The maximum size for an avatar is 115x115pixels, with a 20k filesize.

Aslan's avatar is larger because it represents his special position on this board. Saruman gifted it to him after he wrote a wonderful post on the different kinds of cheeses. also, he wrote a series of posts extolling the use of American slang by British persons and how it defines their character.

never ask about Aslan's large avatar again please... he is far too modest to ever admit these things.

cue "is that an Avatar in your pocket?"

What file type is the smallest? Jpg,gif,bmp? I would like to know because I have some cool pictures I would liketo make my avatars but they are huge, file wize. How can you downgrade the quality?

Jpg or Gif are the smallest, jpgs are best for photos, where there are a huge amount of different colours, gifs are best for cartoons or drawings where there is more likely to be 'flat' colours

Also gifs support animation, jpgs don't