Thanks for your comment – and good question!

Animations on the web today are primarily done with SVG graphics. While they add some bulk to the code, they are much leaner than animated GIFs or flash animations.

Excessive use of photos or videos will definitely slow down the page load speed. However, a lot can be done to compress images (reduce the file size), and hosting videos on Vimeo or YouTube can help as well.

Adding typography elements typically involves CSS, which is much quicker for a browser to load than images.

While page load speed is definitely something to consider, the most important thing is user experience. We have developed quite a few websites with large, full-screen background images and videos. While this does slow down the page load speed a bit, the images and video vastly improve the overall user experience. Page load speed is just one factor that search engines consider when ranking; quality content and mobile-friendliness are far more important.

Of course, if a page takes so much time to load that the user hits the “back” button, that’s another story. 🙂