Somebody Get Me a Magnifying Glass!

By: Steve Outing Photographers and photo editors must not exert much power in online publishing. What else could explain the modest size of photographs on so many news Web sites?

I'll try my best not to rant, but it bothers me that news photos are consistently run so small online. And that there are, at too many sites, so few photos. And that when sites do carry extra photography, it's relegated to separate areas rather than integrated into main coverage.

Short-changing Visuals

Here's a classic example of the too-small phenomenon: Earlier this week The Seattle Times ran a powerful and rare image of workers in Kuwait preparing an airplane full of flag-draped coffins containing the bodies of dead American soldiers for their flight back to the U.S. The paper had come across the image taken by a Seattle contract employee working at the Kuwait airport. (Incidentally, that employee was later fired for giving the picture to the newspaper.) The photo -- stirring and controversial (since the Bush administration has banned media images of coffins returning from Iraq) -- ran on the front page of the print newspaper, along with a story prompted by the photo, "The somber task of honoring the fallen."

But the Web presentation of the photo was weak. A very small version (200 x 151 pixels) accompanied the text -- too small to have much impact or even focus on without squinting. As is common practice, the small image had a "click to enlarge" link.

Alas, the enlarged image also disappointed me. It pops up into a new browser window, and the size is 500 x 377 pixels (approximately 5 3/4 x 4 1/4 inches). Such a strong image deserved larger presentation. Its extraordinary news value warranted beyond-ordinary treatment.

Major newspaper sites often short-change visual images. For example, the home page of latimes.com typically features a main photo up along with the top headlines of the day. But that photo is small: 200 x 200-250 pixels, normally. This photo is usually one of the most important news images of the day, yet its size is too small to make an impact.

You might expect the ability to click on it for a larger version. Nope. When I tried this on Tuesday of this week, clicking on the main image took me to the story associated with the photo -- and the article itself contained no photos at all! So, for one of the most powerful images of the day (Iraqis passing through a checkpoint with armed guards to return to their homes in Fallujah), the only presentation is 2 1/4 inches square. (On other days, clicking through to the main story does lead to additional photos -- again presented small with links to larger views.)

Washingtonpost.com takes a similar approach on its home page, typically putting a modest-size image alongside the top headlines. Its main photo usually runs a bit (but not much) larger than latimes.com's: 228 x 250 pixels. Click on washingtonpost.com's home-page photo and you also go to the story, not an enlarged view of the small photo. On the example I looked at, the "inside" story didn't repeat the home-page photo, but included another image related to the story -- but measuring only 228 x 200 pixels. And that small photo did not include an enlarged-view feature. (This varies at the site; sometimes small photos on article pages do offer the "enlarge" option.)

Nytimes.com does things a little better. It follows a similar home-page design as latimes.com and washingtonpost.com, on a normal news day featuring a single small image (184 x 220 pixels one day; 274 x 210 the next) along with the top headlines of the day. Click on the photo and you go to the accompanying article page -- which usually repeats the home-page image. But above the photo on the home page (and on the article page) is an "Enlarge this image" link. Enlarging the photo brings up a new browser window with the full photo and a caption; the example I looked at produced the photo at 650 x 418 pixels -- a size that allows comfortable viewing of the image's details.

Too Much Stuff

These three major American news sites all ascribe to a similar design philosophy. Each crams a lot of content onto its home page -- so much so that photos cannot take up too much room. Each also has a fairly inflexible home-page design template. Barring unusually significant news, these home pages look pretty much the same from day to day; the only things that change are the headlines, photographs and ads.

Photographs on news home pages won't get much better treatment unless those pages are radically redesigned. I'd like to see news home pages reduce clutter dramatically (a topic addressed in my last E&P Online column -- for subscribers only). With fewer content elements on a home page, there's more opportunity to present larger visuals.

A possible approach is to try a more "magazine"-like look: Run a large image as a dominant element on the home page, then build in a rotation (either auto-running or user-induced) of other images, so that more than one story and photo can get "front-page" treatment. Photos are run large because editorially they deserve it. (Comcast.net represents this approach, as does NYNewsday.com on its home page.)

Of course, larger photos should only be used when appropriate. And that's the problem with many of today's templated sites. While nytimes.com will occasionally deviate from its home-page template when a huge story breaks (Shuttle Crashes; Saddam Captured), it doesn't change much for daily variations. So, if a dull image is the lead for the day, it will be roughly the same size as the next day's photo, which might be an award winner.

I'm afraid that many news home pages are created with the editors' hands tied behind their backs. Many of today's content management systems make it too difficult to craft a unique home-page look each day depending on the day's news, so there's little flexibility on photo size. Images are sized not based on what's appropriate given the content of the photographs, but based on inflexible publishing systems.

The same thing goes for cropping. Because of inflexible templates, editors often are forced to crop photos to fit a pre-defined space -- not to crop for the best possible presentation of the photo. Washingtonpost.com's home page is an example of this problem.

Problems Inside, Too

There are problems on article pages on news Web sites, too.

Photos are often too small. You can take a couple of approaches here: 1.) Present small images alongside articles and include an "enlarge" feature to bring up a new window (as discussed above). As long as you don't get too skimpy on the size of the pop-up image, that's OK. What's not OK, in my view, is to offer only small images that are difficult to comprehend without leaning your head toward the screen. 2.) Present full-size pictures along with article text.

That second approach is where I often see sites fall down. Take, for example, this story on Herald.com, Web site of The Miami Herald. Below the ad is a photo of an escape artist's trick -- presented at 230 x 371 pixels, with no option for an enlarged view. The image is rather small to my taste; I wished there was a way to zoom in.

(By contrast, see this nytimes.com article, which has a strong photograph spread across the full width of the page.)

More perplexing when it comes to article-level pages is that so few photos are used; at most news sites, you're lucky to get one photo accompanying a story. But wait a minute! Don't we have "unlimited newshole" on the Web? Can't we include multiple photos with stories when we've got them?

The Herald story mentioned above does offer additional photography about the escape artist. That's nice, but I find the approach to be flawed: There's a "More photos..." link beneath the caption of the single visible photo. I'm not sure that's a good way to draw people into the slide show. And the image size on the slide show is, again, too small for comfortable viewing.

A site that does routinely offer multiple photos to accompany stories is SFGate.com of the San Francisco Chronicle. As in this example, several thumbnails of photos will be presented atop an article. Click one of them to go to a slide show presentation of full-size images.

The trouble with that approach is the minuscule size of the images accompanying the text: 64 x 64 pixels. That's hardly enough to even get the gist of a photo -- to know whether or not you want to click on it to see the enlarged view.

Perhaps news sites should take a clue from some of the more sophisticated commercial sites. The auto industry, in particular, offers some clues on how to do this better. For instance, take a look at this Volvo page, which features multiple thumbnails of a car attached to a full-size photo. Click a thumbnail and the large-image panel changes instantly. (Mouseover photo change might be more effective than requiring a click.) This approach would improve the SFGate.com article thumbnail photos cited above.

Isn't It Time to Get Bigger?

I can hear the excuses for small photos: bandwidth constraints -- a good portion of online users have slow Internet connections, and enlarging photos would be unwise.

I point you to the latest study by the Pew Internet & American Life Project, released this week. That study found that 55% of all adult Internet users (or 34% of all adult Americans) have high-speed access either at home or at work. Thirty-nine percent of all adult Internet users (24% of all American adults) have broadband access at home -- a 60% increase over a year ago.

We've reached the point where it's rational to enlarge photo size. (And by the way, I'm not talking about a significant increase in file size. A good size Web photo that takes up a large part of a typical PC screen should be able to come in at under 100K.)

On to the Good Stuff

OK, enough with the negativity. Let's take a look at examples of doing online photos right.

Many sites do only an adequate job with photography on their home and article pages, but save the better treatment for photo galleries or special slide shows. The Web site of The Spokesman-Review in Spokane, Wash., for example, creates slide shows using a dozen or more photos for significant events (such as when Gonzaga University's basketball team played in the recent NCAA tournament). Managing Editor for Online and New Media Ken Sands says, "We know that sports fans are nuts for any and all information or photos they can get in addition to what we have in print."

Sites like USAToday.com also favor slide shows and photo galleries. While the site generally features small or medium-sized photos (often without an enlarge option), the photo features are a regular staple. The home page always includes the Day in News and Day in Sports photo galleries, and often another is included. An example of the site's photo galleries can be found on its Olympics page. But even the slide shows feature photos that are too small.

I give MSNBC.com average marks for use of photography on its home and article pages. It typically uses medium-size photos on article pages -- a bit too small to view comfortably, and often with no enlarge option. (Here's an example.) But where the site shines is in its photo galleries and slide shows, which are a frequent feature. You can find a listing of them here. MSNBC.com's slide-show techniques are among the best in the business -- and I have no complaints about photo size. Its use of audio narration and auto-running or user-controlled photo presentation is particularly commendable. Of course, MSNBC is a site that has made a business out of catering to broadband users; they make up the majority of site visitors, and the site's editors cater to them by creating plenty of bandwidth-heavy multimedia content. Let's hope it can lead the rest of the news industry.

On the topic of slides shows and photo galleries, I have to wonder why sites that do a great job presenting these image features don't put as much effort into presenting photography to accompany text articles.

At LJWorld.com, site of the Lawrence (Kan.) Journal-World, they have a daily special page, the PhotoViewer. Small versions of all photos are included along with captions and links to their respective stories. Click on a photo to see the enlarged view.

According to LJWorld.com Web Developer David Ryan, the idea was to create a unique way to browse photos and stories within which they appear. "It's apparently quite liked by our users: the PhotoViewer routinely is in the top of our entrance pages stats," he says.

Also noteworthy is this newspaper's approach to photo slide shows and galleries. As you'll see on slide shows from the company's KUSports.com, photos are offered in smaller and larger high-res versions; select the photo size to view based on the speed of your Internet connection. This is a nice approach in a mixed-bandwidth world, when a big chunk of your audience is still using dial-up access.

StarTribune.com, Web site of the Star Tribune in Minneapolis, breaks convention with its home page, which uses multiple thumbnail images instead of larger photos. Click on one and you get a pop-up window featuring the enlarged photo and caption -- rather than the more common approach of click on photo and go to the story. I find this approach to be more intuitive. The site's chief designer Jamie Hutt explains, "By ensuring that photography is handled in an absolutely consistent fashion, we feel confident that users aren't missing out on an opportunity to really explore a photograph." If I had my way, I'd mandate this approach for all news sites: clicking on a photo always brought up the larger version of it.

The Web site of the Billings (Mont.) Gazette takes a fairly standard approach to photos (small images on home and article pages, with enlarged-view feature), but it has added a nice touch: Any photo by a Gazette photographer automatically gets an "order this print" button. That provides a "small but significant revenue stream -- especially during high-school sports season," says Andrew Katkin, managing editor for online.

At The Olympian in Olympia, Wash., the staff has chosen to showcase their best piece of art each day on the home page in a magazine-like fashion. TheOlympian.com also has photo galleries that have become the site's most popular pages, according to the paper's Paul Bucalo, online news editor. He says the galleries account for 10% of overall site traffic.

----------

Letters

To see readers' feedback on this column and others, please visit our Letters page.

-----

Stop the Presses Schedule

The Stop the Presses! column runs once a month. The best way to keep track of when I publish a new column is to sign up for free e-mail alerts here.