Graphics Optimization: Mistakes To Avoid
The process of optimizing graphics for the Internet is an incredibly wonderful tool that everyone who owns or develops web sites should familiarize themselves with! However, when one engages in this type of process for improving their site's performance, the phrase "proceed with caution" should also come to mind.
While graphics optimization is a wonderful tool, it is most-definitely possible to over-optimize one's imagery. Colors may become dull. Photos might become blurry, etc. When this happens, you know you've taken the optimization process too far! When people think graphics optimization, they necessarily think "smaller file sizes and faster downloads/displays." However, the true secret and POWER behind graphics optimization is to dramatically reduce the size of one's imagery without anyone noticing that anything has changed on your web site whatsoever (other than being pleasantly surprised at how quickly your site's content now loads).
Another thing to be careful of as you embark upon this wonderful journey is to make absolutely sure that you understand how changes to the imagery you are optimizing will impact their appearance and/or functionality within the overall site. For example, several of the image optimization software programs in the marketplace will take transparent imagery and remove the transparency if one applies optimization processes to it. Not good. Another thing to be aware of is working with tiled imagery. If you adjust compression settings or the number of colors differently across tiled graphics, the resulting tiles might not "blend" perfectly as they did before.
Please do not this information scare you as you begin to optimize the imagery on your own web site! Rather, simply pay close attention to the resulting output you are generating, as to make sure that you have not negatively altered the quality of your images.
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