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Preloading images?


V

v.bampton

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Hi!

I'm just in the process of redesigning our business website and I'm coming across a problem. I do all the digital retouching for our photographic studio, but I'm no website designer! I'm having to learn as I go along, and so far it's kind of working, but this is the problem I'm hitting....

The page I'm having trouble with is here http://www.davidbamptonstudio.co.uk/wedgallery1.htm

I'm using dreamweaver 3 to design it, and used behaviours to make the larger picture come up when you click a thumbnail. (With 'preload images' ticked - have I got this right?) The problem I'm coming across is the large images will only show up if they've already preloaded before you click. On a fast connection it's not a problem as they preload before you have time to click a thumbnail, but I tested it on a 256k connection today, and it was a big problem. Unless it's already preloaded, you don't get the image at all. It doesn't load up. Does that make sense? Sorry, I don't know quite how to describe it.

I wouldn't mind if the large image didn't load at all until you clicked a thumbnail, but I can't figure out how to get it to do that. Unticking the preload images doesn't want to display the pictures at all. Any ideas?

Thanks!
 
Checking the Preload option is the right thing to do here. Don't ever doubt that. That's always a good choice.

the large images will only show up if they've already preloaded before you click
Click to expand...
Exactly. There's nothing odd about that. The images can't load in unless they've been downloaded to the user's computer/browser first. That makes perfect sense. And in that case, there's nothing to do about trying to resolve this issue. It doesn't exist.

I checked the file size of your larger photos and they're a pultry 25-35kb each. That's no problem at all for a 256k connection. It should NOT be having problems with those photos showing right away. If it is, then there's an issue with that line (ISP) that should be looked into. Speed of the computer plays a small role here, but for a 25-35kb image it's not a viable issue. In any case, the user shouldn't get nothing at all. They SHOULD get something, even if they have to wait it out. I would test that connection on a speed test site; like www.dslreports.com/speedtests/ .

I wouldn't mind if the large image didn't load at all until you clicked a thumbnail, but I can't figure out how to get it to do that.
Click to expand...
You wouldn't want to do that. That would just cause folks to get irritated waiting for the photos to load. What you might wanna try is using 'Progressive' Jpgs instead. These load in in 3 stages. Starting from a pixelated image transitioning into the full photo. It allows folks to at least see that something is loading in; rather than they see nothing until the full photo has downloaded. It's an option to try. Try it on just a few photos first to test it out, see if it's for you.

I myself have a 5meg cable line so i'll never be able to test that kind of issue. But i've had experience with all types of connection speeds over the past 12yrs, so i do have some knowledge to draw upon.

So see if using the Progressive JPG format helps at all v.bampton.
 
Thanks, I will try that!

The problem seems to be that if you click an image which hasn't already downloaded, you just get the empty grey border, and the picture doesn't come up when it has finished loading, it just stays as the empty grey box. (It's happening on my 750k connection too, but not as much) I'll try the progressive and see if that fixes that.

Victoria
 
Hi, I'm back!

I've tried the progressive and it did improve the situation - now the surrounding box comes up in the right size, but the picture still doesn't load. It's as if clicking a thumbnail stops things downloading. On a slow connection, if I leave it to load everything, and then click, everything's fine, but if I click any of the thumbnails, everything stops and doesn't start again - even the thumbnails that haven't loaded yet never appear.

Any ideas?
 
What browser are you testing this on? IE? Mozilla? Opera?

This is an odd behaviour and might be a bug of some kind with the browser.

If this is indeed the case and it's unresolvable, then my advice would be to go the long route and NOT preload the images. Just let then download on a per-click basis. I'd still use the Progressive JPG format though.

That should resolve the issue.
 
I'm just using internet explorer 6!!!

I'll try turning off the preload, and see if that helps. I'll let you know!
 
I've just been through and turned off the preload on all the images, and I'm still getting the same problem! Back to the drawing board I guess!
 
Got it!!!!

Ok, it was actually 2 problems...

Firstly, having the preload turned on meant some pictures weren't downloading in time, whereas now that's turned off, the pictures are downloading on demand, and still nice and quickly.

Secondly, for some reason I had javascript:; written in the links box, instead of the # that it actually needed. That was what was stopping the download!

Thanks for the tip about progressive jpgs - I've resaved all of the files accordingly, and it looks much better!

Thanks for your help!
 
@ v.bampton -- glad to hear you got your problem fixed! :righton:

I developed something similar to your viewer a while back. when you click on the link -- just choose one of the albums to view. then click on one of the thumbs to see a larger picture. I used mostly javascript to get it to work, and IMHO it came out nice. I also have a different version that let's you just hover over a thumb to view a larger picture.

If you need further assistance, let me know! :righton:

Here is the link:

http://www.mflintjer.com/michaelsfamily/photo.html
 
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