[Wildfires3]

As a (sort of) quick fix, remove the background image so you can see the checkered transparency background, then zoom in and you will see the white pixels. Also set your brush to maximum hardness when you are erasing. Teh whit pixels you are seeing are a result of anti aliasing when you erase. Does Quark handle Alpha channels? If it does then you may be better off saving the selection with an alpha.

[Wildfires3]

What you need to do is use a combination of tools to isolate the background. The best ones for you to use are the lasoo, magic wand and then clean up by using the quickmask function. After you have done this, cut the image on to a new layer, preserve the selection and save the selection as an Alpha channel. Delet the background image and save the image as a TIFF with the save alpha box checked. It should import fine now.

If the image is the wrong transparencey, then open up Photoshop and inverse the Alpha Channel.