Project "ATS Dark Matter" -- The Evolution Continues...

great work guys... things are looking excellent.. I like how you change it around every-now and then... it should almost BE set on random.. keeps people on their toes .. reading everything looking for new stuff.. lol

I can't wait till you guys get all the kinks worked out.. amazing work guys.. keep it up!
The internet almost doesn't exist without this website.. lol

One month of everyone hating it, three months of how'd we do without.


Stick it out. Looks good.

The background is way to dark for me,can't see.

Originally posted by rdang
The background is way to dark for me,can't see.

Click on "LIGHTEST" on the top of this page then... Look above the first post on this page and you'll see the words "Darkest, Dark, Light, Lightest" click on lightest and POOF(!) it's all bright.

S...

I'm still having problems with reading these:



[edit on 2006/12/8 by GradyPhilpott]

Looks awesome!!!!!!!! Good work Amigos!

Im having a tough time with this new format. Everything is dark and everything is compressed into 1/2 a page with a thick border on the right hand part of the page taking up about 5" or so.
I tried looking for where it says LIGHTEST but I can see it.

Don't listen to em Springer! It's damn purdy if ye ask me! And even I figured out the dark - light - lightest bit.

I can't find the lightest button tonight either...and everything is dark again. Maybe it has something to do with the site being down earlier??

Edit to add** I now see the lightest button at the top of this thread, but it wasn't a the top of other threads I viewed tonight...

[edit on 12/8/2006 by jensouth31]

Skeptic Overlord
I'm currently working on refining the color scheme choices down to two selections (2 were intended from the beginning)... one will be optimized for the dark background and light text, the other for lighter backgrounds and darker/black text.

The default will be for the dark backgrounds, with obvious options to alter your settings, and even guests will be able to select their desired option.

Does that mean we'll get dark/light ops of display at our hand in the post we view?

Really could dig such an option, so you don't have to race to the top of the page when you wanna change.

[edit to add]
Yes Skeptic, the '

-panes' are far too dark for the lighter settings, reverse the text and brighten the background.

[edit on 8-12-2006 by khunmoon]

This new website layout is an effing mess. There's no other way to describe it. It's unreadable. The fonts and font sizes are messed up. The website leaves about 5 inches of blank grey space on the far right side. You have insane colour choices of black text on a dark grey background - or occasionally a bright red on the grey which looks downright nasty and makes one's eyes bleed. The white on the grey is horrible too. Your eyes have to be like less than a foot away from the screen to be able to read any of it. Say goodbye to leisurely reading pages of brilliant research, if the layout continues to look like this, then I will simply not read it anymore. Even a one-liner is an uphill task to cast eyes upon, let alone try and read something worthy of one's time. With a site like this, it's important that the information is presented as clearly as possible - ideally, bold black text on a white background, with colour via user avatars. This new look, while "cool" and "uber" and "L33T" or whatever these so-called high contrast labels are spun, is just not working.

Here's a screenshot from my pc. Windows Vista, 1920x1200 native resolution on my Dell 24" widescreen, Opera 9.02:

img209.imageshack.us...

It's simply ugly. Unworkable. Look at that big black ugly bold heading at the top. The blank grey space on the right. The lack of contrast, despite the "high contrast" intent. Good Gawd.

While I'm not adverse to change normally, I think the previous incarnation of ATS was more user friendly (which roughly translates as I was used to it and now have to relearn how to navigate the site).

relearning how to navigate the site is just a challenge thats there, you might as well enjoy it really. It seems a shame that some might stop using this site just because it now looks different. Give it a week at least.

[color=0000EE]Maybe the quotepanes should be marked by a frame only, different font but same background.
Much as it is on politics above right now.

I presume fonts and colors still need alterations, but take care not to have too big contrasts between page and its different panes.

Tell me how this 0000EE blue works as font-color at different settings at different monitors.

The forum colors on the New Posts page is too pastel now. What was wrong with the color scheme we had before? (The non-inverted one)

Originally posted by RiotComingYou have insane colour choices of black text on a dark grey background - or occasionally a bright red on the grey which looks downright nasty and makes one's eyes bleed.

That said by someone who has an orange background on the mini-profile is a little amusing.

But yes, the readability of the site was reduced with this change, specially the thread titles, page numbers and first and last page, black over dark gray is not a good choice.

Was this designed using a CRT or a LCD monitor? Remember that there are some colours that LCD monitors can not show.

Originally posted by khunmoon
Tell me how this 0000EE blue works as font-color at different settings at different monitors.

Almost unreadable with the darkest, readable but horrible with the dark, readable and acceptable with the light and the same with the lightest setting.

Originally posted by RiotComing
This new website layout is an effing mess. There's no other way to describe it. It's unreadable. The fonts and font sizes are messed up. The website leaves about 5 inches of blank grey space on the far right side. You have insane colour choices of black text on a dark grey background - or occasionally a bright red on the grey which looks downright nasty and makes one's eyes bleed. The white on the grey is horrible too. Your eyes have to be like less than a foot away from the screen to be able to read any of it. Say goodbye to leisurely reading pages of brilliant research, if the layout continues to look like this, then I will simply not read it anymore. Even a one-liner is an uphill task to cast eyes upon, let alone try and read something worthy of one's time. With a site like this, it's important that the information is presented as clearly as possible - ideally, bold black text on a white background, with colour via user avatars. This new look, while "cool" and "uber" and "L33T" or whatever these so-called high contrast labels are spun, is just not working.

Here's a screenshot from my pc. Windows Vista, 1920x1200 native resolution on my Dell 24" widescreen, Opera 9.02:

img209.imageshack.us...

It's simply ugly. Unworkable. Look at that big black ugly bold heading at the top. The blank grey space on the right. The lack of contrast, despite the "high contrast" intent. Good Gawd.

I agree... Also, the dark - darker - ligheter whatever has NO EFFECT as far as I can teel. Still too dark. Don't mean to be dissing the designers, but you really should read up on colour combinations!

OK, here is my report about the new look os ATS.

Home page - Excelent, but a little more contrast for some parts of the text (number of thread, number of posts and last post; the mouseover text about that forum) would be better.

On the Website-Related Discussion forum, the pink(ish) letters are readable on the dark background, but on the SubForum area, which have a lighter background, are almost unreadable.

The message saying that I do not have access to the Really Above Top Secret forum is almost unreadable, black text is almost invisible on that background.

The ATSNN forum page has a lighter background behind the threads list.

The Collaborative Writing forum has a SubForum area that suffers from the same problem of the one on the Website-Related Discussion Discussion, but this is even more difficult to read because the is grey over grey.

The [Mysterious Subjects] forums do not have the text in the colour that identifies those foruns (green).

The message saying "Sorry, you are not permitted to view this forum" on the restricted forums from the Information, Business and Development Forums area is unreadable.

The text on the Member List is invisible.

The text on the user's profiles is also invisible.

On the MyATS page, the threads from BTS have a very dark blue that makes it difficult to distinguish from the others.

PS: Before I posted this I noticed some changes were already made. Keep the good work.

Originally posted by DrLeary
I agree... Also, the dark - darker - ligheter whatever has NO EFFECT as far as I can teel. Still too dark. Don't mean to be dissing the designers, but you really should read up on colour combinations!

You do realize that the lightest option makes the content in posts the exact same as they were before the changes, right?

There are other areas that need touching up, but if you all would have read earlier in the thread, Skeptic is working on it ... it's gonna take some time. Just be patient, it's not fair to place judgement on something that's still a work in progress.

New Post page looks much better and is much better on the eyes. I still think the "old" color scheme would fit with the new dark matter color scheme better but oh well.