It always, always, always comes down to the details. Even for the case of a great cupcake, ingredients, appearance, and other small factors determine if it is a worthy piece of scrumptious delight. In the case of photojournalism on online news sites, the details and layout matter too.
Both Yahoo! News and MSNBC News have a "This Week in Photos" segment. Both have a pop-up screen displaying images of significant events that have occurred in the past week. Both have captions/blurbs on the side of the screen. Both screens, at first glance, even appear the same. But what differentiates them from one another? What makes one more appealing for viewers?
"The Menu"
Perusing the menu is the process of deciding whether or not one would want to try a particular store's cupcakes. A menu that simply lists its cupcakes through words will struggle in luring hungry crowds than a menu that gives glimpses of its diversely delicious dishes.
The very BEST part of Yahoo's photo slide show is the small scroll of minimized photos at the bottom of the page (see fig 1). It allows viewers to pick and choose what they want to click on and see instead of blindly clicking image after image.
Example: If someone wanted to show a friend a picture they saw earlier in the day, that person would need to click through each picture to eventually find the desired photo if using MSNBC's (see fig 2). But if they used Yahoo! News' slideshow, the small icons would allow the search to be much faster.
No time would be wasted on looking at more photos of the Iraq War when all you wanted was the cute fluffy white polar bear.
Both Yahoo! News and MSNBC News have a "This Week in Photos" segment. Both have a pop-up screen displaying images of significant events that have occurred in the past week. Both have captions/blurbs on the side of the screen. Both screens, at first glance, even appear the same. But what differentiates them from one another? What makes one more appealing for viewers?
"The Menu"
Perusing the menu is the process of deciding whether or not one would want to try a particular store's cupcakes. A menu that simply lists its cupcakes through words will struggle in luring hungry crowds than a menu that gives glimpses of its diversely delicious dishes.
The very BEST part of Yahoo's photo slide show is the small scroll of minimized photos at the bottom of the page (see fig 1). It allows viewers to pick and choose what they want to click on and see instead of blindly clicking image after image.
Example: If someone wanted to show a friend a picture they saw earlier in the day, that person would need to click through each picture to eventually find the desired photo if using MSNBC's (see fig 2). But if they used Yahoo! News' slideshow, the small icons would allow the search to be much faster.
No time would be wasted on looking at more photos of the Iraq War when all you wanted was the cute fluffy white polar bear.
FIGURE 1 - Yahoo!
FIGURE 2 -msnbc
"All About Presentation"
True or False. A chocolate-colored cupcake looks tastier than a blue-colored cupcake.
Cynthia says true.
Yahoo! News has a dark grey and black background that accentuates the colors in the photo. Everything (the sky, faces, mother nature, etc) is highlighted when the background is darker. Take a look for yourself (see fig 3).If the background was a dark grey or black for this msnbc picture, the ranging shades of purple and orange would be enhanced a lot more. An aspect as simple as the backdrop could change the experience for a viewer.
FIGURE 3 - msnbc
"The Cherry on Top"
There are a lot of additional applications that I felt were pretty neat. MSNBC gives the option of an automated slide show for the click lazy (see fig 4). Missed last week's photos? MSNBC also has a direct link that takes viewers to archived photos. (Yahoo! provides old photos too, but not directly.)
Figure 4 - msnbc
Overall, both websites have pros and cons, but I think Yahoo! takes the cake (no pun intended, really).
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