Images
Sandvox can make extensive use of images throughout your site. You can use images within your site as:
File Formats
Sandvox can handle any image format that Quicktime supports. However, not all web browsers can handle such a broad range! So, Sandvox ensures that all images in your site are of one of these three formats:
- JPEG
- JPEG images are compressed (to make viewing your site quicker!) and are great for photographs, but can sometimes lose some detail. All web browsers fully support JPEG images. JPEGs do not support transparency.
- PNG
- PNG images are slightly compressed, but do not lose any quality. They fully support transparency, but Internet Explorer (versions before 7) can have issues handling this.
- GIF
- Sandvox cannot create GIF images, but it can utilize existing ones. GIF images are compressed but can only handle a limited number of colors (making them unsuitable for photos). GIF images also allow for basic animation. (Be sure your animated GIF images are the appropriate size and will not be resized by Sandvox; they will not animate if they have been converted to a different format.)
Preferences
In the Sandvox Preferences (above), you can select your preferred format for any images that Sandvox creates. This applies only to images that you personally add to a site. It does not affect any of the images that make up the site's design.
You can select between JPEG and PNG. See above for information on the basic differences between the two formats. If you select JPEG, the quality (compression) of the resulting images can be set as well.
Note that this setting only affects any images that Sandvox needs to create from your originals. Read on for more information on how this process works.
Changing this setting also has the effect of clearing Sandvox's image cache.
Image Conversion and Scaling
As noted above, Sandvox supports many different image formats, but in order for your pictures to be suitable for the web, Sandvox must ensure that they are published in JPEG, PNG or GIF format.
Sandvox also has to consider the size of an image. An image you choose may be too large to fit in a particular destination. There are maximum sizes for images in photo pages and pagelets as well as embedded images If so, Sandvox resizes and converts the image as appropriate.
When converting an image, Sandvox looks to see if it uses any transparency. If so, the image must be converted to the PNG format, regardless of your chosen Preferences, in order to preserve this information.
Probably the best way to understand this whole process is to see a diagram of how it all works:
Advanced
You can also use the Hidden Preferences to adjust the sharpening applied to images.
Cat image courtesy of stock.xchng
