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Avoid Graphical Overload
When designing a website, it's easy to start loading it up with
graphics. While tempting, you have to resist -- otherwise,
you'll end up with graphical overload.
Why is that a bad thing? Here's why.
It Takes Too Long to Download
The first reason to cut down on graphics is that the more there
are, and the larger they are, the longer it will take each of
your pages to download. People are impatient when waiting for
pages to download -- you only have around 5 seconds before your
visitor hits the Back button.
What can you do about this? Apart from using fewer pictures, you
can also make sure that you resize your images in a graphics
editor. This actually makes their file sizes smaller. If you
just resize images by specifying a width and height in HTML or
CSS, they will still be slow to download because the full file
size is being used.
You should consider turning on compression in your image editor.
JPEG files can often be compressed by up to 25% before there's a
noticeable difference in quality. Try different formats and
compression levels to see what works.
It Gets Too Busy
If you use a site with more than 4 images on the page at once,
your eyes are being pulled all over the page. They're not sure
where to focus because the page simply has too much going on.
Look at the front pages of newspapers, and notice how they lead
on 1 picture. Putting 2 pictures on a front page is considered
to be poor: the reader doesn't know where to look.
That goes double for websites, where the viewable area is much
smaller than a newspaper page. Even if you
have more than 1
thing to say, it's better to 'go large' with 1 picture and then
explain the other things in text, next to or below it.
It Distracts from the Content
Users visit your site to get information, not to look at your
graphics. Too many graphics will distract from your content, or,
worse, force readers to search for it. Any time your graphics
get in the way of people readily using your site, you're
suffering from graphical overload. And that is a bad thing.
What's the solution? Simply decide which of all those graphics
are really necessary. Remember, don't add graphics just to look
nice, each graphic must have a specific purpose.
An Exception: Photo Galleries
If the purpose of your site is photo presentation, then clearly
multiple images are appropriate. However, don't just stick up
several large photographs -- provide thumbnails: smaller
versions of each image. If interested, the visitor can click on
1 to make it larger.
This fits more pictures on each page, and avoids wasting user
download time and your bandwidth.
Keep in mind that in all web design, the images are there
strictly to support the content. Even when the content is
graphical.
About the author:
Visit Web
Design DIY to learn more. Ron King is a full-time
researcher, writer, and web developer, visit his website at Website
Copyright 2005 Ron King. This article may be reprinted if the
resource box is left intact and the links live.
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