Can you read this ad?
An outdoor advertising by Nike in NYC, 2024
Just returned from NYC, where the city was electric with marathon energy! Nike had these bold “you can’t, but actually, you love it” slogans everywhere in black text on a red background – intense, just like the athletes themselves!
As a designer, I couldn’t help but notice:
Black on red is eye-catching, sure, but it’s not always eye-friendly. For many, especially those with red-green colour blindness, this combo can be tough to read.
A strike through on top of that is still another way to make reading more difficult, but for the message to be conveyed here, it just had to be there.
Thankfully, the large text size make it work – but it got me thinking about colour contrast standards. I recently learned about APCA (Accessible Perceptual Contrast Algorithm), a new standard that considers how we truly perceive contrast, unlike WCAG’s traditional contrast ratio guidelines.
WCAG’s ratios can overlook human perception; in fact, nearly half of the colour combos it approves may still be hard to read, while some that fail are easier on the eyes.It’s exciting to see design standards evolving for real-world accessibility that works for everyone – whether you’re running the marathon or cheering from the sidelines!
