B
bubipoo
hi guys,
what's the best picture format to use on html pages?
regards
darren
what's the best picture format to use on html pages?
regards
darren
L
Leif K-Brooks
Depends on who you ask, but I'd use PNG.bubipoo said:
R
rf
Leif K-Brooks said:
For pictures most definately jpeg. A png can be 8 times as big since a png
does not use lossy compression whereas a jpeg does.
I have a roo,
http://users.bigpond.net.au/rf/roo.jpg [38K]
http://users.bigpond.net.au/rf/roo.png [245K]
http://users.bigpond.net.au/rf/roo.gif [65K]
A png should be used where no loss can be tolerated, for example a
graphically designed (ie not a picture) company logo.
If colour depth is not an issue, for example pictures of text or graphic art
with few colours then a gif may be better. Even better if you can reduce the
colour depth of the gif further then the maximum of 256 colours. There are
sites around (forget just now) that will take your gif and flatten it for
you, often reducing the size by an order of magnitude.
Best bet is to construct one of each, look at them and choose the smallest,
keeping in mind colour depth and compression losses.
Cheers
Richard.
B
bubipoo
thank richard and leif.
i was using bitmaps but they bog things down a bit.
regards
darren
i was using bitmaps but they bog things down a bit.
regards
darren
rf said:
R
rf
bubipoo said:
AAARRRRRRGGGGGHH.
Never ever use a bitmap (I assume you mean BMP). They are not compressed at
all, that is there are three bytes in there for every single pixel, plus a
bunch of Microsoft invented overhead. They are also not supported by many
browsers.
My roo comes in at 504K as a bmp, something I just don't have the space on
my web site to publish.
Phew, I'm glad you asked your question
Cheers
Richard.
E
EightNineThree
bubipoo said:
Typically, jpg is better for photo quality images or images with a lot of
gradient.
gif is better for line art stuff and things without much gradient.
gif is often smaller in (data) size to a certain point. Although jpg can
compress further, it tends to really turn to shit quite fast after a certain
point.
png is quickly coming up as the format of choice because it:
a) supports transparency
b) is very light
c) supports photo quality
Someone else here may be able to give better info on PNG, but it wasn't well
supported until relatively recent browser versions.
With the rate of browser/ OS upgrade, I think PNG is safe to use unless your
target user is using old browsers.
N
Nico Schuyt
EightNineThree said:
I never managed to make a PNG transparent (in IE)
What do I do wrong?
Regards, Nico
R
rf
Nico Schuyt said:
You have used IE. IE does (AFAIK) not support transparency in PNGs.
Cheers
Richard
H
Headless
rf said:
It does to a limited extend, Alpha Transparency is not supported at all,
24 bit single colour transparent png's aren't supported either afaics,
but palette based single colour transparent png's are supported (IE6
anyway).
Headless
R
rf
Headless said:
Interesting Headless. That explains all, well most of it
It also narrows the playing field considerably, does it not?
Transparency --> gifs
I don't use PNG's anyway. jpegs and gifs are enough.
Cheers
Richard.
D
Dylan Parry
rf said:
As you have said, GIFs are for transparency, but I find that when I want
to use an image that would normally be a GIF but _doesn't_ contain
transparency, then a PNG is better - mainly due to being that tiny bit
smaller thus saving on the old data transfer allowance.
H
Headless
rf said:
Effectively png's offer the same cross browser compatible options as
gif's with regard to transparency (limited to 256 colours).
Pity, non transparent png's have the advantage of not being restricted
to 256 colours, and you get lossless compression at 24 bit.
Headless
T
Tom J
Using PNG would lose 1/2 the browsers because they don't support it.
Using PNG would lose 1/2 the browsers that do support it, because they
wouldn't wait around for the page to load. If a page doesn't load in around
30 seconds at 52k it's too slow. The majority of viewers are still on
dial-up.
I use thumbnails and then have each photo on a separate page for those that
want to see the larger photo.
Tom J
C
Chris Morris
Tom J said:
No. The browsers that support GIF but don't support PNG [1] are
incredibly rare. Netscape 3 or earlier, Mosaic, early Internet
Explorer (4 and above are fine). In other words, browsers that are
almost extinct, and getting rarer.
PNG is smaller than GIF except in a few limited cases (small image
with <= 16 colours). If you use PNG as a JPEG replacement then you
will get this problem, but PNG isn't intended as a JPEG replacement.
True, though if it doesn't load in 10 seconds at that speed it's too slow.
[1] There are a lot of browsers that don't support PNG, but most of
them don't support any other type of image apart from displaying the
alt attribute as text.
L
Leif K-Brooks
E
EightNineThree
Tom J said:
First, PNG images are able to compress smaller, much like gif.
Second, its actually 8-15 seconds when people bail out.
R
rf
Leif K-Brooks said:
Er, MS Image Composer (yeah I know but it comes with my system).
Not bad. There is a noticible difference in image quality though, expecially
colour (the orange bits).
Cheers
Richard.
M
Mark Parnell
rf said:
I noticed that, but it certainly isn't 7 1/2 times worse. You could
probably find a happy median in there somewhere. Probably still bigger than
the jpg, but definitely smaller than your png.
R
rf
Mark Parnell said:rf said:
I noticed that, but it certainly isn't 7 1/2 times worse. You could
probably find a happy median in there somewhere. Probably still bigger than
the jpg, but definitely smaller than your png.
I'll admit I was a little startled when it came up that big. Image
composer(*) gives me no options to change anything for a PNG. It just saves
it. Same with gif's. Can't flatten them at all. Have to take them somewhere
else for that :-(
(*) Not a very smart program. What you'd expect from a Microsoft give-away
but it's all I have. If I want serious artwork done I farm it out
Cheers
Richard.
L
Leif K-Brooks
rf said:(*) Not a very smart program. What you'd expect from a Microsoft give-away
but it's all I have. If I want serious artwork done I farm it out
You could at least get the GIMP!