Sorry that yesterdays post gave impression that I was going to not blog. What I meant was that I was wondering why at a time that I am finding myself censoring much of what I might post.
I have already done the I am not gonna blog thing and I still did just kept the posts private.
For those keeping track the most viewed post of today is one on model ship building again. Next – the Orange you glad post. Coming in 5th yesterdays post.
“There is nothing wrong with your television set. Do not attempt to adjust the picture. We are controlling transmission. If we wish to make it louder, we will bring up the volume. If we wish to make it softer, we will tune it to a whisper. We will control the horizontal. We will control the vertical. We can roll the image, make it flutter. We can change the focus to a soft blur or sharpen it to crystal clarity. For the next hour, sit quietly and we will control all that you see and hear. We repeat: there is nothing wrong with your television set. You are about to participate in a great adventure. You are about to experience the awe and mystery which reaches from the inner mind to… The Outer Limits.
— Opening narration – The Control Voice – 1960s
So I have been spending way too much time messing with blog. I have received some comments on the last post. Hey “anonymous” with no email or website? Really? Discussing the matter of the text and color selection usage on blogs is “. … rather gestopoish”. Well, first off let me say there is no such word “gestopoish”! Second you can light gray text on a white background with extra small text if you want too – I won’t visit your blog. Just to show you how controlling I am – yours is one of the few comments ever (other than sp-am and Diane’s made up blogger) that I will not post.
Well I finally cleaned out all the widgets and bling that were causing validation failures.
Added a few fun things to play with if you want:
So worthless?
Which of them do you like the best if any?
Should we all just use news readers and never visit each others blog sites?
Is the blog going back to it’s roots and becoming more content oriented than eye candy?
Do you ever really use the past posts and latest comments listed on the side bar?
Are blog rolls good or bad?
“Errant computers can be reprogrammed, imperfect machines redesigned… but human beings are another matter.” – Awakening, Closing from The Outer Limits
I have been going nuts trying to read some blogs unless I do so using my news reader. Heck, I was having trouble reading my own dang blog LOL. Actually this is not really funny. What I figured out real quick – the DUH factor – was that the text and background colors I had were hard for me to read. For the past 6 months the evil optic neuritis deal has been going on with my left eye – big time.
So when I changed my blog theme when the last WordPress made my old theme obsolete I started playing with text and background colors. It is obvious to me that certain color and text combos are horrid when it comes to the readability factor. I started out with basic shades of gray and have been working on it hoping to come up with something that is not only easier to read but with the potential to eventually not be boring. I know – it is rather drab at the moment but I can read it!
The second thing I noticed is that long paragraphs frustrate the heck out of me. I loose track of where I am reading, and honestly my pea brain can not process big chunks of type. I gotta break it down into smaller blocks. Not so easy when I loose my place in a long paragraph. Breaking up text into smaller paragraphs is a good thing – really it is.
While beautiful blog themes are great eye candy they really do put some folks at a disadvantage. Just like videos without captioning suck for those with hearing problems. I know there are Windows setting to use high contrast, and Firefox has compatibilities also but I freaking hate setting those up and detest missing out on some really nice artistic blogs and sites. Some people spend a lot of time tweaking on their themes and why should I miss out? I love eye candy.
The W3C has recommendations on the color contrast levels for the visually impaired and color selection (for colorblindness). They even have a nifty formulas:
Colour brightness is determined by the following formula:
((Red value X 299) + (Green value X 587) + (Blue value X 114)) / 1000
The difference between the background brightness, and the foreground brightness should be greater than 125.
Color difference is determined by the following formula:
(maximum (Red value 1, Red value 2) – minimum (Red value 1, Red value 2)) + (maximum (Green value 1, Green value 2) – minimum (Green value 1, Green value 2)) + (maximum (Blue value 1, Blue value 2) – minimum (Blue value 1, Blue value 2))
The difference between the background color and the foreground color should be greater than 500.
It leaves me wondering why as a group MSr’s tend to have visual problems yet many of the blogs out in cyber-land whose target audience is primarily those with MS are using combos that are so dang unreadable?
My little box the about me section is a major bomb is the markup department umm . …
Here is a favorite of mine I found surfing the net. The White House home page. If you scroll all the way down to the very bottom in small light gray letters (under the www whitehouse come link) it the link to a discussion on LOL accessibility.
What say you?
Monday school started back up. The first day for Adaptive P.E and Tuesday I have Adapt. P.E. and the first day of Adaptive swimming. Umm … wonder how I am going to like swimming? It is suppose to be over 100 deg. so I dunno – I might melt!
My friends and I needed to purchase our parking permits at the college admin office. Good grief the line was all the way out the building and it was hot. So, we decided to walk on by all the youngsters in line and went into the building. Cathy walked up to the first available window and told the gal she wished to purchase a permit. The clerk obviously noticed she had just cut in line but sold her the permit and then me one also. Then she asks me if I had just walked in and cut in front of everyone while glancing over at the security person. Cathy tells her yes we did – you should really have a handicapped line and then she walked away. The gal just gave me a funny look and I turned and walked off also.
I spent the afternoon reading a few chapters and then I started playing with the video’s again. I am starting to figure out the green screen effects but have a long way to go.
I bought some green cloth yardage and made my own and a few pieces of green poster board. It is kind of interesting to me how it all works. Lighting the screen is problematic since I do not won any studio lights. It makes it hard to get it right using my room lamp and desk light. It is like setting up the flashes for photography shots. Only I have a good set of photography flashes and I do not have any lights . … see I just had to B about something!
Today’s attempt at a video: