Load Images Faster on URL

Does anyone have any ideas in how to make the graphics in the site load faster? Don't quote me but, I believe they are saved as GIF WebSnap 128.

Thanks,

Lindsey

http://www.firstmatemarine.net/

GIF's are fine, but use png instead. They are of a higher quality, and generally smaller than GIF's.

I heard that pngs are not supported by all browsers. Can someone tell me how fast it loads on a dialup connection?

png's are supported - if they are only images, unanimated. The speeds depend on the size. You can expect a 56k to load images at approx. 2-3kb/s.

If you are looking for "speed" jpegs load the fastest. Take any image you want in Photoshop and change the output settings. I used a multi-colored image just to see. A gif at 128 colors took 2 seconds, gif at 256 colors takes 3, png-8 at 128 colors takes 3 and at 256 colors takes 4, png-24 takes 4 seconds to load. All the same image just different file types High quality jpeg 1 second......

MNS

pngs support quite alot of thngs but not all browsers support everything. IE doesn't (easily) support tansparency. they are my personal favorite though. you could also make a javascript image preloader

Originally posted by MotherNatrsSon
If you are looking for "speed" jpegs load the fastest. Take any image you want in Photoshop and change the output settings. I used a multi-colored image just to see. A gif at 128 colors took 2 seconds, gif at 256 colors takes 3, png-8 at 128 colors takes 3 and at 256 colors takes 4, png-24 takes 4 seconds to load. All the same image just different file types High quality jpeg 1 second......

MNS It depends on the picture. Personally, if I ever had to save a .gif file in 128 colors I would be aghast. The most colors I have ever needed to save a .gif in is 64 and that was but once. I am sure a .gif with a reasonable color pallete will load faster than a jpeg in almost all cases.

Granted, there are a few cases in which .jpeg's are usually better such as photographs and other complex images (think 3D renderings/abstract digital graphics).

Of course, I have little to no experience with .png's and that is why I never mentioned them!

I took the same image and to get it to load in 1 second as a gif it could only use 8 colors. At 16 colors it was still 2 seconds.

MNS

Originally posted by me....
Granted, there are a few cases in which .jpeg's are usually better such as photographs and other complex images (think 3D renderings/abstract digital graphics).What type of picture were you testing again?

Originally posted by MotherNatrsSon
If you are looking for "speed" jpegs load the fastest. Take any image you want in Photoshop and change the output settings. I used a multi-colored image just to see. A gif at 128 colors took 2 seconds, gif at 256 colors takes 3, png-8 at 128 colors takes 3 and at 256 colors takes 4, png-24 takes 4 seconds to load. All the same image just different file types High quality jpeg 1 second......

MNS

JPEG's are not the fastest to load, both png and Gif formats load quicker.

PNG's also have greater quality than a JPG imo.

this one. It is a small image that I was attemting to make a background image out of. Lots of color and it was a handy one to use to compare.

MNS

Originally posted by ionsurge
JPEG's are not the fastest to load, both png and Gif formats load quicker.

PNG's also have greater quality than a JPG imo.

Why does the load time specified for each by Photoshop 7 disagree with you?

I agree the quality of png's is the best...png-24

MNS

I now have three versions of the home page.

+ one all GIF images
http://www.firstmatemarine.net

+ one containing JPEG images (except tab, logo, and anchor are gif) (better quality jpegs, quality set to =60)
http://fmm.lindseymarshall.net

+ one all PNG images (except tab, logo, and anchor are gif and boat image slices are jpg)

http://fmm.lindseymarshall.net/indexpng.htm

Let me know your opinions on these sites

I have a cable modem so they all seem to load about the same speed. The one that "looks" the best to me is the one with the jpegs.

MNS

Wierdly, your png files average around 48kb... :confused:


Anyhow, the JPEG version did load the fastest which was surprising.

Originally posted by ionsurge
Wierdly, your png files average around 48kb... :confused:


Anyhow, the JPEG version did load the fastest which was surprising.

It depends on which version of png one uses. If you use a png-8 it is more like a gif and you can select the color palete to use and reduce the file size by reducing the colors. If you use png-24, they are large files but great quality images.

MNS

I tryed using a 8 - png. I can't get them to load though. They work correctly in Dreamweaver but I can't get them to work when they are on my server. I have an Unix server

http://fmm.lindseymarshall.net/indexpng.htm]

That is a strange one. Are you using the ftp in Dreamweaver to upload them? I am going to attempt a page using png-8 and I use the ftp in Dreamweaver to upload my files do I will check it out and see if I have a problem too. In the meantime I would check the ftp log in whatever program you are using to upload files and see if there was not some error in that process, or contact your server and see if they know of "issues".

MNS

I personally feel progressive jpgs saved for web (in PS) to the desired px size and low res /low res bw image to downlaod before the actual image downloads is a good option. also code your page to pre-load images.

Originally posted by whackaxe
pngs support quite alot of thngs but not all browsers support everything. IE doesn't (easily) support tansparency. they are my personal favorite though. you could also make a javascript image preloader
How do I make an image preloader?

On my system, with Windows XP Pro, Internet Explorer 6.0, and ADSL, the jpeg version loaded the fastest, the gif version took a little longer, and the png version seemed to take forever.