Display just a fraction of a picture

Just recently, I had a surprising discovery when I right-clicked on the cross icon and noticed that the background image in the Tags section of the Ask Question page contained multiple icons beyond just the cross. Curious about how this was achieved, I searched for information online and learned that it was done using a combination of HTML and CSS. Despite my efforts, the search results didn't provide the answers I was seeking.

As someone new to HTML, I stumbled upon the language of CSS during my search. While this question may seem simple to experts, it's proving to be quite a headache for beginners like myself. I would greatly appreciate any guidance on how this effect is achieved.

Thank you in advance for any help you can provide.

htmlcss

Answer №1

1. The technique involves utilizing the CSS properties background-image and background-position on an element with specified width and height.

Check out this example on jsFiddle (featuring a Facebook image):

http://jsfiddle.net/axF59/

2. You can figure out these CSS queries on your own by using the Inspect Element tool. Just like you can view a background image by 

Right Click > View Background Image
, you can inspect the CSS of a webpage by Right Click > Inspect Element in browsers like Mozilla, Chrome, and more.

Answer №2

A spritesheet is what you're looking for. There is a wealth of information, advice, and tutorials available when you search the web for spritesheet + js/css

Answer №3

To achieve this effect, the CSS properties background-position and background-image are utilized. These properties enable the loading of all sprites using a single image.

The background-position CSS property specifies the initial position [...] for each defined background image.

Source: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/background-position

The CSS background-image property assigns one or multiple background images to an element. The images are displayed on successive stacking context layers, with the first one specified appearing closest to the user. The element's borders are then displayed on top of the images, and the background-color is displayed beneath them.

Source: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/background-image

Example

HTML

<span class="sprite sprite1"></span>
<span class="sprite sprite2"></span>
<span class="sprite sprite3"></span>

CSS

.sprite {
    display: inline-block;
    /* Replace this with an actual image. */
    background-image: url("http://www.example.com/example.jpg");
    height: 16px;
    width: 16px;
}

.sprite1 {
    /* The default position. */
    background-position: 0 0;
}

.sprite2 {
    /* Shift 16 pixels to the left. */
    background-position: -16px 0;
}

.sprite3 {
    /* Shift 16 pixels up. */
    background-position: 0 -16px;
}

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