the image that i am trying to center is within a table cell - taking it out of the cell puts it outside the flow of the table in Netscape - there are not any css specifications on the table, but on the cells. i am not sure what else to do - i've published my frustration at http://www.schumpert.net/question.htm so someone can look at it (the breaks are there to show that the css keeps the positioning in IE but not in Netscape)