Newbe Dev Stack

Answer : I think you've installed an incomplete version of gd . When you compile the gd extension, use the flag --with-jpeg-dir=DIR and --with-freetype-dir=DIR ps. dont forget make clean picture below is the incomplete version of gd: picture below is the complete version of gd: In my case, GD was missing after upgrading to PHP 7.3. So, I just added it by using the following command : sudo apt-get install php7.3-gd

Answer : imagealphablending( $targetImage, false ); imagesavealpha( $targetImage, true ); did it for me. Thanks ceejayoz. note, the target image needs the alpha settings, not the source image. Edit: full replacement code. See also answers below and their comments. This is not guaranteed to be be perfect in any way, but did achieve my needs at the time. $uploadTempFile = $myField[ 'tmp_name' ] list( $uploadWidth, $uploadHeight, $uploadType ) = getimagesize( $uploadTempFile ); $srcImage = imagecreatefrompng( $uploadTempFile ); $targetImage = imagecreatetruecolor( 128, 128 ); imagealphablending( $targetImage, false ); imagesavealpha( $targetImage, true ); imagecopyresampled( $targetImage, $srcImage, 0, 0, 0, 0, 128, 128, $uploadWidth, $uploadHeight ); imagepng( $targetImage, 'out.png', 9 ); Why do you make things so complicated? the following is what I use and so far...