🖼️ Image Workflow, Optimization & File Strategy
I’ve put a significant amount of effort into refining how media is handled on my site. Early versions—visible on the Wayback Machine—looked rough: just grey cover blocks with text and YouTube screenshots. It was functional, but not elegant.
🎯 Purpose-Driven Media Use The aim is to enhance each quote or theme with an image that reflects the related artist, band, or concept. Visual relevance matters, and the goal is to integrate art and meaning fluidly.
🔧 Open Source Workflow I’ve leaned heavily on open source tools:
yt-dlpto download videos from YouTubeVLCfor clean, overlay-free video screenshotsffmpegto extract clips for GIFs or video editing These are later refined or converted into optimized formats for the site.
🖼️ Image Format Migration Initially, I underestimated the load these images would generate. I’m now converting all legacy images to WebP format—smaller and more efficient. Unfortunately, this means:
- Manual renaming for consistency
- Manual replacement due to the need for exact filenames
- Cover blocks also need to be captured and replaced with static images
📸 The Power of Featured Images One of the most impactful upgrades I’ve made was integrating featured images. I used to ignore them, but now each chapter has its own visual identity—used both at the top of the chapter and on the main page via grid thumbnails. This graphical structure replaces the old method of forcing users to navigate via a single post view and the left-side or bottom links. Now, the visual grid allows intuitive browsing and gives each section presence. Even better, featured images enhance how my pages appear in search engine results, adding both aesthetic and practical value.
🛠️ Partial Automation with Limits While tools like WP-CLI and various plugins help, the manual steps are unavoidable due to my structured file naming strategy. Full automation isn’t possible when each image is uniquely relevant and named.
📊 Future Integration All of this meticulous handling pays off. Once unified, these images will become key components in dynamic queries and custom post types. Combined into hub pages, this allows new content to emerge from what’s already there—automatically grouped and presented with logic and purpose.
🗺️ Next Steps After all WebP conversions, the final phase will be replacing every cover block with an optimized static image. This will streamline mobile performance and lay the foundation for a highly structured and dynamic content engine.
More on this will be expanded in the Content Structure & Taxonomy sections.