A picture is worth a thousand words, but on the Web, especially with the connections most people have, it will take much longer to display than all that text. If you do it right, you can drive away everyone who's actually paying for their connect-time. My suggestions are:
|
Make it big, very big (anything under 75K is almost loadable, especially as the frequency of 28.8 modems increases). |
|
If you can't make it big, make it many (a dozen, or better yet, 2 dozen smaller graphics on a page will take ages to load; for maximum effect, animate them). |
|
Don't use in-line images (a.k.a. thumbnails); use the fullsize picture right there, at the top of the page, with no text around it for the viewer to read while waiting. |
|
If you must use in-line images, make sure they're very small and muddy, so the visitor has to click on them to figure out what the heck they are; also, don't mention that the fullsize picture is 200K -- once they've waited 5 minutes and can only see the top 1/4 inch of the picture, they'll figure it out for themselves. |
|
Finally, in combination with any (or all) of the above, make it irrelevant -- nothing will drive a surfer further away from your site than waiting 10 minutes for a baby picture of you, or a fuzzy snapshot of your pet of choice. |