Highlighting an specfic area on a image?

Can it be done?

[bondjamesbond]

Is there any way to highlight a specific area on an image when the image is loaded? Say for example a user types into a form they are from the UK, when the load the next page a map of the world is show with the UK highlighted. Forgetting about the form input, is there anyway this can be done dymically, without having to create a image for every single country (in this example).

I thought that this could be done using an imagemap. It could somehow pass the coordinates of the UK on the image and then it would highlight the UK. I am looking to have a couple of images (in this example it may be like America, Europe etc) and then the image would know where to highlight as the coordinates would have been passed from the previous page.

I have tried to get this to work on the imagemap but have been unable to get an pre-defined area to highlight on mouseover, let alone anything else?

I hope I have made sense! Can anyone suggest any ideas? Thanks!

[Alternative Future]

Hi bondjamesbond,

Have you looked at the z-index property, where you could have your world map in the background and a transparent gif of a red circle shown in front using image map co-ordinates?

-gs

[korkus2000]

I would consider using Flash for this.

[henry0]

create a world map built in gathering
each world part and each part being a country
and each country has two versions a regular one and a higlithed one

so for ex: in php the map will default by using only all regular parts
if an user will come from UK
your code will read
if.. UK then map = all regular parts minus regular UK plus UK Highlighted

does that make sense?

[bondjamesbond]

Thanks for all the suggestions, I will have to look into it to see which is the best option to use. Thanks.