CSS Rollover Image Effect - Change Image on Hover

Rollover image is a design feature where an image changes when your mouse hovers over it. Think of a light bulb that turns on and off when you move your mouse cursor into that area of a page. When a page is loading, rollover images are preloaded into it to ensure that the rollover effect is displayed quickly.

This used to be implemented using JavaScript, which is fairly easy with just a small amount of script involved. To make rollover images functional, onmouseover and onmouseout attributes are used to a link tag. The code is then added to a blog gadget or into a new post. It proved to have a number of disadvantages, however, which is why many web developers are using a CSS-only method.

How to create a rollover image using CSS

Here is how to implement a rollover image using CSS. Before getting started, we need to have two images ready, one in its initial/static state as well as its rollover state.

The Image

Place both the static and rollover image in one file and make sure that the rollover image is placed on top of the static one. To achieve the rollover effect, we'll write a code to display the static image and crop the hover image, so that only one image state is displayed at a time.

For this tutorial, we'll use the following as a CSS rollover image.

Creating an HTML Anchor Element for our Image

Instead of adding the image file in a <img> tag, we'll display it as a background image of an </a> (anchor) tag. Here's the HTML that we need to add:

<a class="rolloverimage" href="#URL">Rollover Image</a>

Note: if you want to make the image clickable, replace #URL with the url of the webpage where you want the link to point to.

Using CSS to Set a Background Image

To create the mouseover image effect, we'll use the :hover CSS pseudo-class. Then, we'll use the background-position property and set the values to 0 0 to move the background image to the upper left corner which will create the rollover effect.

<style type="text/css">
.rolloverimage{
display: block;
width: 56px;
height: 90px;
background: url('https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqre_OvZE0C1OET31DPYWrMMMfzqhjzFyOK2E1nyEycwO8iWfec1vcdKQHWbQC78grNXLcdMQorbUem9ynZsW74ZBYedIIhexGk8HYAHbpICJBMiXQzd9poPOyUup9hzh-9bJ-MhC3mRBe/s180/rollover-image-light-bulb-on-off.png') bottom;
text-indent: -99999px;
}
.rolloverimage:hover{
background-position: 0 0;
}
</style>

Note: Replace the text in blue with the url of your image file. Please pay attention on the width and height values marked in red, these should be different depending on your file, where the height value is for only one image and not the entire image file!

The result

Hover your mouse cursor over the light bulb to see the rollover image effect in action:

Rollover Image

Adding Rollover Image to Blogger

To add the rollover image as a gadget: copy both the HTML/CSS codes and go to 'Layout' > click on the 'Add a Gadget' link > select HTML/JavaScript, then paste the codes in the 'Content' box.

Or, if you want to add it inside one of your posts, when you create a New Post, switch to the HTML tab and paste the codes inside the content box.

And this is how you make images swap on mouseover using CSS. Enjoy!

How to Create a Static Home Page in Blogger

When it comes to home pages, most websites can be divided into two: static and non-static. As their name implies, static home pages stay permanent no matter how many times the website is updated, while non-static home pages reflect the changes that are made to the site and show the latest posts first.

The latter has become well-known nowadays due to the rising popularity of personal and even corporate blogs. However, there are still many people who prefer static home pages because it makes their websites look more organized and professional. It also gives them more control over the readers' experience on their site and helps them create stronger brand awareness through the uniform message that their home page presents.

Fortunately, if you own a Blogger site and want to make your home page static, you'll find that creating one isn't as difficult as it seems. You can create a static home page in Blogger by taking these steps:

1. Create your static home page

The first thing you should do is to create a new page for your blog. This will serve as your static home page but, for now, it will look and act like any other page in your site.

To make this page, you'll need to go to the main menu of the Blogger dashboard and click on the "Pages" option on the left side on the screen. Doing this will lead you to the "All Pages" menu window. Here, click on the "New Page" button and you'll enter an editor that looks similar to the Blogger Post editor that you use when publishing a new blog post.

At the top box, enter the title that you want for this page - in this case, let's call it the "Welcome" page. In the larger text box, type the content that you want to appear on your home page; this can be a paragraph, or two about yourself or your business and what your site is all about.

Once you're done, click "Publish". The window will return to the main "All Pages" menu, and you'll see the new "Welcome" page you've created. Copy the URL of the "Welcome" page since you'll need it later on. To do this, right click on the 'View' link and select 'Copy Link Location' from the menu.

2. Redirect the default home page to the static one

Once your "Welcome" page is up, the next thing you should do is to change Blogger's default homepage. This involves redirecting from your site's original home page to the static homepage that you've created so it would be the first thing that people see when they visit your website.

Related: How to Set Custom Redirects in Blogger

To do this, you'll need to go to main Blogger editor menu, click on "Settings" on the left side of the screen, and choose "Search Preferences". Under the "Errors and redirections" section, you'll see the "Custom Redirects" option with an "Edit" link beside it. Click on the "Edit" link to open another window, where you'll see two boxes named "From" (with your blog's URL beside it) and "To".

In the "From" box, enter only a forward slash symbol "/". In the "To" box, paste the URL that you copied earlier and add the latter part of the URL of the "Welcome" page. For instance, the page's URL of our demo blog is static-home-page.blogspot.com/welcome.html, so we'll remove the "http://static-home-page.blogspot.com" address and add only "/p/welcome.html" in the "To:" box. The "/p" signifies that it's a static page.

Next, check the little box beside "Permanent", click on the "Save" text link, and press the "Save changes" button. Doing these will redirect your site's main URL to its new static home page. Access your blog on a separate browser to see if it works.

3. Make tabs for your site

If you're not planning to make tabs visible in your blog, you can stop at Step #2. But, if you want your site to have tabs that indicate the home page, the main blog page, and other pages you may have (such as the FAQs and Contact Us pages), you'll need to take another step.

Why is this important? Basically, when visible tabs are enabled in your site, they will show that you have two existing pages: the default home page and the new "Welcome" page you've created - both of which redirect to the same static page. This can be confusing for your readers and may even affect your search engine rankings.

To fix this, you first need to enable tabs by going to the "Layout" menu item and click on the "Add a Gadget" link. You can choose to add it below your blog header or sidebar. In many cases, it's advisable to add it below blog's header since they're more visible and give your website a sleek, professional look.

Once the pop-up window opens, scroll down and click on the 'Pages' link:

This will open another window named "Configure Page List". Here, under the "Pages to show" section, you'll see the default home page and your new static homepage with small boxes beside them. Uncheck the box beside the default home page to hide it from view, check the pages that you want to display in the menu and then click on the "Save" button to save the changes.

You can stop at this point but, if you want, you can also create a specific tab that will lead to your main blog post page. To do this, edit the "Pages" gadget that you just saved and click "+ Add external link".

On the new window that would open, enter the title you'd like for the page (such as "Blog") along with /index.html web address, then hit "Save Link" and click the "Save" button on the "Configure Page List" window.

Now, view your site and you will see the pages menu containing the "Welcome" page and "Blog" tabs. To see how this works, you can also visit our demo blog. Enjoy!

Final Note

Having a static home page can be beneficial for your blog. Follow the steps above now to create a static home page in Blogger!