Principles
of Design
Rule 1
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Principles
of Design |
| Rule 1 | Use Images Sparingly While it's okay to put a few images on a page to make it visually appealing, it's not a good idea to stick on every button, icon, sidebar, titlebar, divider, bullet, logo and photo you can find. (People actually do this.) Unless you are a graphic designer, people are coming to your site for information, not pretty pictures. Web surfers don't have a lot of patience, and if they have to wait for a bunch of irrelevant images to download, those who don't move on to another site right away will be plenty peeved by the time they finally see your page. Even more importantly, resist the urge to add spinning bullets, flashing lights, flying mailboxes, and other moving stuff on your page. While these "Animated GIFs" draw attention, using more than one will make your page look too busy--and draw attention away from whatever you're trying to communicate. Why focus your visitor's attention on flying mailboxes rather than your message? |
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Finally, never use "under construction" images. That is, unless you're making a statement about how bad they are. The web is a dynamic thing--good pages change frequently, so they are always "under construction". Announcing that fact is the mark of an amateur. If you don't have anything on your site, or it's not ready, wait until it is ready before you make it available to the world. | ||
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