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Change the colour of grey text back to black on website using poor contrast text

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Re: Change the colour of grey text back to black on website using poor contrast text

#41

Post by hexo »

chrisseaton wrote: post #30
cwillu wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Meta-irony at its finest.

What contrast do you want? A billion to one? At some point it's excessive, right? So there's some value less than infinite that you're after. Why is your monitor's maximum contrast the right value?

Yes, billion to one. Or at least like 1000:1, which todays monitor easily achieves. Whatever maximum contrast value of whatever monitor I look atm is OK, anything lower is not (including OLEDs). I don't get why we should be "forced" to look at #aaa text on #eee background "contrasting" text. For me, even #222 is "too much", to the point I usually notice something is off and then Imma mess with inspector and fix colors, which is annoying, takes my time, and wastes CPU cycles, especially when one tries to use some plugin to fix this automatically. The extension is usually CPU hog, so the "low contrasting text websites" are actually harmful to society much like needlessly JSheavy sites.

Re: Change the colour of grey text back to black on website using poor contrast text

#42

Post by tomrod »

I'm so glad to see this. I don't feel alone anymore. This is one of my biggest headache-producing tasks, reading poor contrast websites.

On the flip side, it is a great job candidate filter for design positions to show them a website and see if it's among the improvements they recommend.

Re: Change the colour of grey text back to black on website using poor contrast text

#43

Post by rectang »

httpsterio wrote: post #17
mikae1 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The thing about pure black isn't that it's unnatural, but that when paired with white its contrast can actually be uncomfortable and less accessible than a slightly toned down color combination (especially on full brightness). Can you find a citation for that statement? WCAG 2.1[0] mentions minimum contrast, but not maximum. The success criterion page itself is written in #000 on #fff. :) https://www.w3.org/WAI/WCA…

https://dm-ed.com/info/contrast-sensitivity/ A lot of high contrast combinations are less accessible and even if it doesn't make the text illegible, too much contrast is going to be a strain on the eyes for most people. Generally, WCAG AA or AAA is enough for most people and you hit that already with #555 on a white background. Something like #1a1a1a is close to the darkest I'd use in most cases.

I'm sympathetic to the idea that some people need reduced contrast to read comfortably. They are in the same boat as people who need maximum contrast because of other visual impairments, most commonly focal issues.

Why wouldn't people who need less contrast simply reduce the contrast on their monitors, though?

It seems to me as though designing for those who need low contrast excludes those who need high contrast, but not the other way around.

From your link:

> The solution for contrast sensitivity

> If you feel that your child may be suffering from this issue, the first thing to do is test some tinted acetate sheets placed over the page of text.

Re: Change the colour of grey text back to black on website using poor contrast text

#44

Post by rectang »

hnbad wrote: post #10
mikae1 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find there's often a high degree of educated comments here on HN. But, when it comes to monitors, readability and the physics of light something happens. #000 on #fff won't burn out your retinas. :)

There's a difference between using "soft black" and using low-contrast gray like you're Apple in the 2010s. The thing about pure black isn't that it's unnatural, but that when paired with white its contrast can actually be uncomfortable and less accessible than a slightly toned down color combination (especially on full brightness).

> The thing about pure black isn't that it's unnatural, but that when paired with white its contrast can actually be uncomfortable and less accessible than a slightly toned down color combination (especially on full brightness).

For those with fuzzy vision (obviously an extremely common situation), contrast is reduced naturally when the black and white bleed into each other. Reducing contrast harms those users, belying your "actually less accessible" assertion.

Re: Change the colour of grey text back to black on website using poor contrast text

#46

Post by waffle_ss »

jraph wrote: post #7
sssilver wrote: post #3

I love the “nothing in nature is true black so don’t use #000000” argument. Correct, nothing is, and your #000000 won’t be either once it’s shown on a physical screen.

Very much related to my comment [1] two days ago on Please Stop Using Grey Text [2] that says essentially the same thing with more verbiage [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31421666 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31420938 (397 points by marban 1 day ago, 376 comments) - https://tangledweb.xyz/please-stop-using-grey-text-3d3e71acf...

What is the point in linking this? Imagine the mess that comment threads would be if everyone who made similar comments about something did this.

Re: Change the colour of grey text back to black on website using poor contrast text

#47

Post by kuschku »

mikae1 wrote: post #4
sssilver wrote: post #3

I love the “nothing in nature is true black so don’t use #000000” argument. Correct, nothing is, and your #000000 won’t be either once it’s shown on a physical screen.

I find there's often a high degree of educated comments here on HN. But, when it comes to monitors, readability and the physics of light something happens. #000 on #fff won't burn out your retinas. :)

> #000 on #fff won't burn out your retinas. :)

There’s a massive difference between the contrast of that outdoors on a shitty panel (where you’re lucky to get 5:1 contrast) and indoors in a light-controlled environment (where 200:1 contrast is easily reached).

And yes, that 200:1 contrast can get painful, especially if you’ve got astigmatism.

Re: Change the colour of grey text back to black on website using poor contrast text

#48

Post by kuschku »

hexo wrote: post #38
chrisseaton wrote: post #11

Some times less is more, when it comes to things like contrast.

Yea, glad you can lower contrast setting on your monitor and leave normal contrast to the rest of us.

I can’t, as then I’d have to re-calibrate it again. But you can easily just increase the contrast setting on your monitor and leave sensible defaults for the rest of us :)

Re: Change the colour of grey text back to black on website using poor contrast text

#49

Post by frankfrankfrank »

jmlucjav wrote: post #22

Anybody has some extension to change colors when background is black and text is white? I don't know if this is common or not, but I just cannot look at that for more than a few seconds, my eyes burn. I never found an extension for Chrome that fixed this.

I’m not totally sure if this fully addresses your issue; but safari reader mode on all devices uses a gray text on black or dark grey backgrounds.

Re: Change the colour of grey text back to black on website using poor contrast text

#50

Post by Forgeties79 »

rob74 wrote: post #40
hulitu wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And nothing is true white so don't use #ffffff. We can continue with blue, green, red. /s

True magenta (#f0f) and true cyan (#0ff) are the worst if you ask me...

I’m getting flashbacks to AIM and my putting what could only be described as “neon green” on a black background.

But hey, at least it had some contrast I guess?

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