Those views are counted only after the voting is over. It is not possible to vote from anywhere but the photo's main photo page -- can't be done from the thumbnails page.
You can't vote on a photo from the thumbs page, so during voting your photo has been viewed at least as many times as you got votes (assuming people did let the photo load, and I am sure the vast majority must so).
Technically not true...You can vote from the thumbs page, but only after you've viewed and voted on all of the available entries. If you go back to the thumbs page after voting on all entries you'll notice that there are numbers below each thumbnail allowing you to vote from that page without actually opening up the image.
Originally posted by Natator:
You can't vote on a photo from the thumbs page, so during voting your photo has been viewed at least as many times as you got votes (assuming people did let the photo load, and I am sure the vast majority must so).
