Another thing I have been revisiting is sizing of my pictures on my web site. My current size on the long dimension is 700 pixels. I am planning on reducing that but to what I am not sure. I have experimented with about six different sizes.
A site looks less cluttered when you press F11 and go to full screen. I know this works in Firefox and IE. I have a message on my galleries "For optimal viewing, use Full Screen mode (F11 to enter into and exit from Full Screen mode)". Is it reasonable to think that the average Joe visiting my site would read that and do that? If it is, then I can go around 500 pixels. If it isn't, then I need to go 400 pixels. The problem with 400 is the pictures in the gallery 'home' page show some pixelation, although they don't once viewed individually or in slide show mode.
I think I have been in IT too long to know how an average Joe thinks in front of a computer (other than the usual assortment of swear words that comes to everybody's mind when using Windows!).
My site is naturebydesignphotography.com.
So what do you think - is it asking too much for a site visitor to use F11. Should I design and size based on it not being used (even though that has the aforementioned drawbacks)?
I think that, given your concern is about how big to make the pictures, you should be more worried about what screen resolution your average visitor is using, and design around that.
I did some research on that. According to millions of random samples taken by Google, the new 800x600 is 1024x768. I always switch to that resolution when assessing my web site for things like this.
You don't create any horizontal space by going to full screen (assuming that your page scrolls in full screen). You only create some vertical space, so switching to full screen would not alleviate the issue with not having enough horizontal space. That said, 700 or even 800 pixels is suitable. Curently the majority of internet users, at least those in developed countries, are operating at resolutions higher than 1024/768. Many are using widescreen monitors.
There are many free Flash Web photo viewer that perform well. These will scale large images to fit within a user current browsers window. So you can have large image that will display well on large screens in full screen mode and also display well if a user is using a small screen or small window. The only reason IMO for having small web images is you want to support dial-up users the have slow Internet connections. Personally while I feel for those that use dial-up I publish large images and know dial-up users will not look at my site. I fit images to 1600x1200 here is an example http://www.mouseprints.net/albums/ use F11 or hover the mouse over the bottom of images to see the gallery menu bar and select its full screen support.
Mdude85, I based my decision to size for 1024x768 based on analysis done by Google. There sampling of millions of users show that 80%+ use 1024x768 or smaller, with the large majority of those being 1024x768. Although I don't have statistics to prove this next thought, I am pretty sure that the largest group of users with higher resolution would be gamers and photographers (and graphic designers), and I am hard pressed to think many of those would buy somebody else's wildlife and landscape photographic works. My challenge is the vertical not horizontal, so F11 would be very helpful, if in fact most people would use it.
Mr Mouse, I can see that I made a key omission in my post. My web site is built with Gallery, which is not a particularly sophisticated product such as Flash.
I believe that forcing people to scroll to see one image in its entirty is the kiss of death for a site. So I have to figure out what is the best I can do for the most people I can do it for.
Mhayes5254, as mentioned above, I have a message at the top of each of my galleries mentioning better viewing using F11, so it is not a question of whether they know about it but rather whether the average Joe would use it.
EverLearning wrote:
Mhayes5254, as mentioned above, I have a message at the top of each of my galleries mentioning better viewing using F11, so it is not a question of whether they know about it but rather whether the average Joe would use it.
Obviously they would not use it if they did not know about it. Could you please provide the link to the analytics citing the figure of 80% using 1024/768 or less. I think the actual figure is that AT LEAST 80% of users browse with at least 1024/768, and that a minority of users (15-20%) browse at 800/600 or less.
mdude85, when I did my research several months ago, Google's numbers were as I mentioned. Finding that info served my needs, so I did not record the link. Feel free to interpret those numbers however you please.
mhayes5254, instead of being so focused on proving yourself right to everybody, you should focus on helping others by providing thoughtful commentary and statistics that are not misleading. From your link:
"These statistics were gathered from visitors to a website dedicated to web technologies, so there may be an over-representation of both higher resolution monitors..."
Nor does your link or the web technologies site mention what their sampling size was.
I will stick with the far more representative statistics coming from the million+ samples of Google!
My thoughts, F11 does not always work. I use Firefox and most of the time pressing F11 make sit go full screen, but not all the time. I'm not sure why this is and it appears to be random for a site. It did work on your site when I tried it.
Your site does seem to be designed rather small and narrow. If I were a consumer, I'd be turned off by that as I would be inclined to think that "really professional online companies make effecient use of the screen while this guy looks like he is using some stock template free from the internet."
I personally suggest you would be better utilizing more width and placing your thumbnail bar on the left rather than below. This would be good as the "average consumer" probably has many more tool bars and search boxes at the top of their browser then I do. IE and AOL seem really bad for monopolizing vertical space simply for the browser.
Besides, telling customers they have to do something special to view your site will only annoy them. Many regular folks don't know the quick shortcuts nor will they notice your text at the top. They are going to your site to view photos, not read directions. I was looking for the text and it still took me a few seconds to see it. I think you should assume most people won't notice it either.
A final though, and this goes in a direction I usually don't head, but..... I would suggest that you reconsider how your replies to people sound when removed from the context of the internal voice in your head. It seems to me that when you don't like someone's advice, or when you are unwilling to consider exactly what they seem to be saying, that you become a little over defensive. That is certainly not a way to attract internet business.
Just because some reads your statement about F11 doe snot mean they will use it. Further, if they are not already familiar with that trick, they will be even less likely to try it. Further still, its your responsibility to create a site that will pander the the short and lazy attention span of the average consumer. It's my opinion that if you have to ask if something is a good idea regarding site design, you are responding to something you yourself find uncomfortable or distracting. Generally in cases like this, if you have to ask you already know the answer. I even further suggest that people would rather click to another page than take their hand off the mouse.
Finally, the statements regarding the interpretation of your statistics may be more valid that you are realizing and may have changed since your last research (and don't tell me to do my own research, its your question and thus your responsibility). The prices of wide monitors has dropped a lot in the last several months and I be believe that most people have larger monitors than we expect, even including the average user. Go to Walmart or BestBuy today and notice the size of the monitors, then remember what they were 6 months ago. 20-22" used be be very big, now that is the average to small size available. You also need to consider the demographics of the people likely to buy your images and the type of monitor they have. Don't assume that because they are "average" they get average things, usually the "Average Joe" is the average American, for whom bigger is better, especially for things you watch.
EverLearning wrote:
mhayes5254, instead of being so focused on proving yourself right to everybody, you should focus on helping others by providing thoughtful commentary and statistics that are not misleading. From your link:
"These statistics were gathered from visitors to a website dedicated to web technologies, so there may be an over-representation of both higher resolution monitors..."
Nor does your link or the web technologies site mention what their sampling size was.
I will stick with the far more representative statistics coming from the million+ samples of Google!
Unfortunately you have not been diligent in providing the statistics that you claim to stick with, which, in any event, were most likely misinterpreted given what we know about current browsing resolution trends (that a very small minority of users, about 5-15%, still browse at less than 1024/768 resolution; in fact you're more likely to find someone who has Javascript turned off than someone who is browsing at 800/600 resolution).
Dennis, thank you for responding. I take no offence with your 'final thought'. That is how you see my comment to mdude85. The challenge with e-mail or other forms of electronic communication is interpreting what the writer meant.
After your post and 'final thought' comments, I gave my post further thought. I decided to ask a few friends how they would perceive mdude85's comment if it was their post, his post being:
"Obviously they would not use it if they did not know about it. Could you please provide the link to the analytics citing the figure of 80% using 1024/768 or less. I think the actual figure is that AT LEAST 80% of users browse with at least 1024/768, and that a minority of users (15-20%) browse at 800/600 or less."
The feedback was unanimous; at best he was saying I didn't have a clue what I was talking about while at worst he was calling me a liar. That was also how I interpreted it. Now take a look at mdude85's last post and ask if it doesn't support that perspective.
I will admit there was probably some built-up frustration with the FM forums, and my posting and even 'lurking' has dropped off considerably. Many posts (mine or others) go without any replies, even though they might be looked at by hundreds. In some posts, the OP asks a simple question about something (F11, a specific tripod, whatever) and get replies that go off on wild tangents are turn into 'religious' wars ("why would you buy anything but a ...").
I think my post is a good case in point. I asked a simple question about F11. I provided context for why I was asking the question. I knew somebody would say to use a higher resolution so I answered that (or so I thought) by mentioning the statistics from a very reliable and representative source that I based my decisions on (hardly any reason for me to lie!).
My site was professionally designed (although it wasn't the "champagne" package with fancy features; this is my first 'go' at a web presence and I couldn't justify spending $3000 at this point). It was designed base in part on those stats. It's what I have to work with until such time as I get my pictures up, get some sales and can justify a fancier site. By that time it will be quite reasonable to go much larger resolution or to go with technologies that manage auto resizing.
Anyway, for what it's worth I thought I would provide some rationale for my reaction to mdude85. It will be up to others to decide if that's good enough.
I would still write that you seem to be very defensive about your web site. You also seemed unwilling to really understand the feedback users gave you. You jumped at that conclusions you need a sophisticated product to use things like Flash where notepad would do. Some flash photo web galleries come with Photoshop Scripts to generate galleries and others have very low cost web gallery builder configurator. The free SimpleViewer Flash Viewer even ships with Lightroom and lightroom has support to generate Web galleries that use SimpleViewer...
Web browsing / web sales is pretty much the ultimate study in ADD. For every extra step you add ( click through from a splash page, extra clicks in the cart, pushing F11 for full size) you will lose xx% of traffic.
Back to the basics- as simple as possible while accomplishing your goal.
