 |
Creating
Images for the Web |
Introduction
File size
Colors
| Colors on the Web | First,
the good news: color doesn't cost you anything extra on the Web. Two
colors, three colors, and colors outside of the print gamut are all
the same price--and you don't have to worry about press checks. Now
the bad news: gradients, blurs, and subtleties of color are
difficult to achieve online (as is just about anything else
refined). |
| the GIF color palette | All GIFs have
a color palette consisting of up to 256 colors (8-bit color). It's a
good idea to make this palette conform to Netscape's 216
browser-safe colors (see the tip below). These colors are a
simplified subset of the Mac's and PC's 256-color system palettes.
By limiting your GIFs to this palette, you won't actually ensure
that your visitors will see the same colors that you see (because
monitors can vary substantially in the colors they show), but at
least your graphics won't dither on either platform. |
| Netscape's 216 colors | If you can
possibly reduce your GIFs to Netscape's 216 browser-safe colors, do
it. There are times, however, when that's not an option. Sometimes
the Netscape palette just annihilates your image. When this happens,
use an adaptive palette (which means that rather than changing the
colors in the image to those of an existing palette, you can choose
a palette that is derived from the actual colors in the
image)--outside of the Netscape 216. It's better that your graphics
look bad on 256-color monitors and good on displays with more
colors, rather tha n look bad on all systems. |
| Browser safe colors | Visit Lynda
Weimans page to pick up a palette with all the colors compatible
with bothe Newscape and Micorsoft browsers. |
How to make a Ski Club Website is brought to you by NWSCC and Chris Miller