TIL a trick for picking dark mode colors from a talk at a meetup in Austin

I was at a small design meetup in Austin last month, and a speaker showed us how to pick dark grays. She said to start with pure black and only add white until you can just barely see the difference from the background. I tried it for a sidebar on a project, and it took adding 8% white to the black to get it right. It sounds simple, but it stopped me from making things too light and losing the dark feel. I've been using that method for three weeks now and my themes feel way more consistent. Has anyone else picked up a simple rule like that from a talk or a blog post?

3 comments

3 Comments

grant5692mo ago

Sounds like a lot of work just to pick a gray.

diana5519d ago

Have you ever looked up the science behind gray paint? I read an article that said certain grays have blue or green undertones that shift in different lighting... @phoenix845 is right to think about text color too, a warm gray works way better for readability than a cool one. And honestly, the "work" is just grabbing a few samples and testing them on the wall, not a big deal.

phoenix8452mo ago

So you just keep adding white until the shape barely shows up? What do you do for text color on top of that gray?