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Images like pictures and clipart can give a cool website that final touch. However some detailed photos and clipart can make a web page load slow if overused. To prevent this you need to "optimize" your photos to make them web page ready. It is a common conception that you can just click on the little box on the corner of an image and drag it towards the center to make the image smaller. Yes it looks smaller on the page, but the file size is still the same as it was as a larger looking photo. And with today's high quality cameras, you can take a picture of 1680x1200 pixels with a file size of over 1 megabyte each. The optimal file size for a photo on a web page is around 400x300 pixels maximum and a file size of 40,000 bytes or less. (1 megabyte is 1 million bytes). To rectify this situation, you need to use a photo editing program to both resize and compress your images. You need to physically determine the desired size of your photo first. Then you can experiment with photo compression. Over compression can make a photo look muddy, so you are better off limiting the number of photos on a page and use light compression. You may even have to use two different programs to attain a professional result. The first free program you could use to "resize" your photos is called IrfanView. It is an excellent photo editor that every webmaster (and emailer) should have. Download it free HERE. My favorite free program to use for photo compression is called Riot. It is a lightweight easy to use program. Download it free HERE. If you are using clipart, they may be "GIF" images. You can compress these images easily by reducing the colors that are not needed. You can do this for free at http://www.myimager.com/. Upload the GIF then under optimize, click "colors". Then enter the number of colors needed. The following site also has free online image editing. |
