Your Blog Images - A How To!

byChristosH

151 followers

6 years ago

Images for Bloggs

Over the past almost two years I've been trying different methods to get my images "just right" for the articles I post on my website - I know, the name is really original 😜

The first thing i recall reading was that .png are better than .jpeg. Until recently.

After checking my website speed (GTMetrix an Page speed) i was hitting an all time low and sluggish loading. The slider has a few bits to answer for but it is relevant, for now.

So I had to revert to jpeg for a number of reasons - one of them is speed of loading.

But before the image above gets the privilege to go on my site, i have to put it together.

And below I will share with you the exact process.

UNSPLASH

I've gone on so many other sites to have that panel come up requesting that I join or even pay for the image - dont get me wrong, I've paid for images and I haven't and it's made no difference.

Unsplash provides a plethora of images to use. What I like is that they provide the link to the photographer so that they can get credit for their image.

You pick your photo and download it. If you are going to credit the photographer for their work copy and paste the credit directly into the post to retain the link or into a page or word document.

Now, I'm a MAC user and would never revert back to Windows. With my image i resize it (using "Preview") and save it as jpg.

The next step is to compress the image to make it smaller by volume - the bit size.

Tiny PNG

Then comes our friendly panda - Tiny png. Drag and drop your picture into the drop window above and hey presto, it gets reduced in size. The most I've had up to now is around 80%. That is a massive saving that will improve my eventual site speed.

Save that and move on to the next step.

Canva

Creation time. Canva is an all-in-one supplier of image creation for just about anything you'll need, from your website to social media.

I've been using Canva from the start and I have not found anything that can replace it. All my images are still on there. And it's FREE.

Download your image and then back to Tiny png to reduce the size.

Why do I reduce the image size twice? Speed. The smaller the image (in bits) the quicker it downloads on Canva. Canva likes small size images!

That's it. Once you get used to the process you'll have your image in less than 5 minutes.

The time consumming part is choosing the picture you want to use. From all the ones you will find on Unsplash it can take a bit longer than 5 minutes to choose your image.

Ofcourse, if you are a photographer yourself and want to use your own creations, the process is the same. Just ensure you convert your RAW images to jpeg, prior to use.

As for the above image sizes, top to bottom, are: 53KB, 78KB, 57KB, 49KB.

All the best with your creations 😁

Christos