June 13, 2000
iEntry Network
Content is King
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One of the most common and misused phrases relating to the web is,
"Content is King". More often than not, the truth is more like
"Content is Lacking". This is because web developers' bosses or
clients tend to confuse a good-looking site with one that's useful.
It's a legacy from the days of print marketing, when ultra-glossy
brochures and catalogs were essential to promote a successful company
image. Images are still a vital part of marketing, but use of them
on the web requires a slightly different approach.
We hope that you enjoy this article.
Peter Thiruselvam
Editor
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Content is King
Archive
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"Content is King"
- Big Graphics:
On the Web, big graphics files take ages to download. Curious about
what your site looks like to those without access to the latest
technology? Then unplug that leased line, replace it with a 56K
modem, set your display to 800 x 600 with 256 colors, and switch off
he external CPU cache in your PC's BIOS. Empty your browser's cache
and access your site now. If the home page takes much longer than ten
seconds to load, or looks badly designed, you can bet that a sizeable
proportion of new visitors to your site will get bored and go
elsewhere.
- Increase the Load Speed:
There are simple steps you can take to increase the load speed of your
site. First, don't do as one Webmaster did, and assign four separate
image files to four identical home page logos, thus ensuring that the
page took around three times longer to load than was necessary... On
a more sensible note, treat your graphics images as MP3 files -be
aware that you can remove some of the 'unseen' data and yet maintain
the quality appearance of your site.
- Choose Your Format:
Choose your format carefully. JPEG is great for photos and other
color-rich images; use standard encoding rather than progressive
encoding, as some older browsers don't support the latter. JPEG
is a glossy compression format, and on the Web you can afford to
lose a bit of detail in order to save space. Typically a 30-40%
compression level will retain enough detail to keep the image usable,
while dramatically reducing the size of the image. Some images,
notably those with plenty of continuous tones, will compress better
than others. Experiment with compression settings until you're happy
with the result.
- Reduce Your Buttons:
For small buttons, logos and other navigational icons, GIF is often
preferable. It requires less processing power to decode, and the files
are often smaller than JPEG where few colors are involved. Use an
image editing program that allows you to set the number of colors as
2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128 or 256. Many programs only allow 4, 16 and
256, which will inevitably lead to waste. Experiment with color
reduction; in most cases you should be able to reduce your
navigational buttons to 16 colors or fewer with no loss of image
quality. If you find that you require at least 128 colors for a
particular file, consider changing it to JPEG format, as this could
save more space.
Other Tips:
- When shrinking images, resize first and reduce color depth second,
for the best anti-aliasing results.
- Reduce color depth in steps - 256 to 128 to 64 to 32 to 16 - as this
will often produce better weighted colors than a jump from 256 to
16.
- Whichever format you use, be sure to save images at a resolution of
72 dpi, as anything higher is a waste when images are displayed on
screen.
- HTML pages can also be pared down to a minimum. There's plenty of
software around that will help with this task - a search on 'HTML
optimization' or 'HTML compression' will lead you in the right
direction.
- Include WIDTH, HEIGHT and ALT tags in all your image references, so
that people can navigate your site while the graphics are still
loading.
- Only use graphics where you need them. A good designer can produce
a clean, attractive and easy-to-navigate site with just a few well-
placed image files.
- Above all, remember this: Web surfers have a very short attention
span, so a fast site is a popular site.
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Alex Cruickshank is a freelance IT journalist and contributor to the
UK editions of PC Magazine, Mobile Computing and various other titles.
He's also the Editor of IT Reviews and The Glass Belljar. Perhaps not
surprisingly, both sites make very careful use of graphics. |
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