In this article, you’ll learn the best font to pair with Times New Roman to bring a modern look to your designs.
Times New Roman is a classic serif typeface dating back to the 1930s. This is most likely the first font you ever saw installed on a desktop computer. In this article, I’ll show you some good sans serif fonts to pair with Times New Roman.
More Fonts to Pair With Times New Roman at Envato Elements
If you’ve been wondering what font to pair with Times New Roman, hands down, sans serif fonts are the best. So when you need good sans serif fonts to pair with Times New Roman, Envato Elements should be your go-to resource. Elements offers thousands of premium mockups, graphic templates, logos, photos, fonts, and much more. And you can download as many of these digital assets as you like, as often as you like, for one low monthly fee.
Devina Rodent is a classic humanist sans serif font. This Times New Roman font pairing is classic and legible. Neither font competes with the other in terms of design. This pairing is suitable for branding, packaging design, and editorial design.
This grotesk style sans serif, Brulia Display, is an amazing variable font inspired by brutalist architecture. This is a good font to pair with Times New Roman due to its sophisticated personality.
Gayaku is a sans serif with a modern feel. The strokes have no contrast, and it has quite a corporate look. This is a good font to pair with Times New Roman if you’re looking for a unique solution.
This ultra-modern display font, Bermont, is bold, heavy, and has a strong character. This Times New Roman font pairing can look contemporary on an editorial design piece or for branding projects and flyers.
Monospace typefaces are good sans serif fonts to pair with Times New Roman. Bergen Sans is a clean monospace font with post-Bauhaus aesthetics. This pairing has high contrast in its shapes, making it look contemporary.
Bolgart is a geometric sans serif with a heavy setting. This stunning font creates a great variation against a serif font like Times New Roman. These are two fonts that complement each other due to their very different anatomy.
Bionzhe is similar to the previous example, but this font has more letterspace, and it’s slightly less heavy. This font pairing with Times New Roman can look strong and powerful. Bionzhe is a great balance to make Times New Roman less serious.
Sans serif fonts come in different widths and shapes. Fraset is slightly wider, and that makes it look like a fun and playful font. This is one of the best fonts to pair with Times New Roman due to its quirkiness.
Mathelo has a good balance between a geometric and humanist font. The characters have a less serious quality to them. If you’re looking for a font pairing with Times New Roman for a younger audience, Mathelo is a good option.
Argon is a new modern grotesk font based on 1950s Swiss minimalism. The characters possess a combination of sharp and rounded curves. For a functional look, Argon is a good sans serif font to pair with Times New Roman.
Arkibal Mono is inspired by old store signs from the 1830s. It’s the perfect balance of classic fonts with a modern twist. While this font is classified as a slab serif, it’s very different from a classic serif font. This Times New Roman font pairing is edgy and cool.
The best fonts to pair with Times New Roman are variable fonts, the ones that allow you to experiment more to get different looks. Agharti is a large family of almost 50 fonts with 7 different widths and weights. By mixing and matching all these options, you can get anything ranging from classic looks to something more edgy and contemporary.
Another versatile font pairing with Times New Roman is Neuething. This clean and simple font has been meticulously designed and refined. This font pairing can look modern and cool on branding and social media posts.
A modern look isn’t hard to create with Times New Roman. Montras is a modern sans serif font with bold strokes and fun details. This font pairing with Times New Roman is great for branding anything youth-related.
Ritola Sans is a sans serif font that pairs perfectly with Times New Roman. The font has heavy strokes that sometimes are contrasted with thin details for a fun look. This pairing is modern, legible, and can look powerful.
That’s It!
In this article, you learned about the best fonts to pair with Times New Roman. This classic font has been around for many, many decades. It’s the default font for many applications on desktop computers and one that we’ve seen on plenty of printed materials.
There are lots of sans serif fonts to pair with Times New Roman. Depending on the different sans serif fonts that complement each other, we can make the Times New Roman combo look classic, edgy, or contemporary. It’s such a versatile font! Which one was your favorite sans serif?
When you need fonts that complement each other in a ready-made combo, Envato Elements should be your go-to resource. Elements offers thousands of premium mockups, graphic templates, logos, photos, fonts, and much more. And you can download as many of these digital assets as you like, as often as you like, for one low monthly fee.
So you’re learning how to use Photoshop, you’re testing the tools, and suddenly „marching ants” appear—tiny lines moving rhythmically over the screen. They can be pretty annoying because after they’ve appeared, nothing works the way it used to. So you may be wondering how to get rid of marching ants in Photoshop.
You may also know very well what these moving lines are, and you have a different problem with them—how to hide marching ants in Photoshop, so that you can benefit from their presence without them covering a part of your picture.
In this short tutorial, I’ll answer both of these questions!
What You’ll Learn in This Marching Ants Photoshop Tutorial
What are marching ants in Photoshop?
How to get rid of marching ants in Photoshop
How to hide marching ants in Photoshop
What You’ll Need
You can use any photo for this tutorial, but if you like the picture of a cute ant that I’ve used, you can find it here:
In Photoshop, you may often want to select one area of the image and edit it separately from the rest—or remove that part, copy it to a different layer, etc. Marching ants indicate the border of that selected area. So to bring the ants onto the screen for the purpose of this tutorial, you can use any of the selection tools:
Here, I’ve used the Lasso Tool (L) to outline the head of the ant:
Now, I can use the Move Tool (V) to move the selected area somewhere else:
Or change the color of the head with the Hue/Saturation (Control-U) adjustment:
2. How to Get Rid of Marching Ants in Photoshop
OK, so you’ve edited your selected area, and now you want to get rid of the marching ants. How can you do it?
It’s very simple: go to Select > Deselect, or use the Control-D shortcut.
3. How to Hide Marching Ants in Photoshop
As you can see, the marching ants are very useful because they’re showing you which area has been selected. However, if you want to see what the image will look like after editing, these ants may stand in the way. So if you want to hide the marching ants without removing the selection, use the Control-H shortcut.
By hiding the borders of the selection area, you get a direct preview of your edits
Caution: always remember to deselect (Control-D) after editing, or make the ants come back by pressing Control-H again. Otherwise, the invisible selection will stay there, leading to a lot of confusion later.
Good Job!
Now you know how to get rid of marching ants in Photoshop, as well as how to temporarily hide them when needed.
Recommended Tutorials
If you liked this marching ants Photoshop tutorial, you may also enjoy our other tutorials for beginners:
Did you know that you can create multi-layered artwork in Adobe Illustrator, and then turn layers on and off in InDesign? Importing Illustrator files into InDesign isn’t as hard as you think. Learn how in this quick tutorial.
Work with multi-layered illustrations like this one on InDesign.
If you’re constantly working on Illustrator and InDesign projects, Envato Elements could be a great source of creative resources for you. You’ll find all kinds of graphic templates, vector illustrations, logos, and more. Once you learn how to convert your designs from Illustrator to InDesign, you’ll have more template alternatives to work with.
What You’ll Learn in This Tutorial on Multi-Layered Illustrator Artwork in InDesign
Wondering how to import Illustrator files into InDesign? You’ll discover that importing Illustrator files into InDesign is quite easy! Here’s what we’ll cover in this tutorial:
How to create artwork with multiple layers
How to open Illustrator files in InDesign
How to turn layers on and off to customize the illustration to match your design
Let’s get started!
1. How to Create Artwork With Multiple Layers
Step 1
Create some artwork in Adobe Illustrator that contains multiple layers. I’ve created a map that contains nine layers. Note that these are top-level layers. You cannot manipulate Illustrator sublayers in InDesign. The layers that are visible here are the layers that will be visible when the Illustrator file is placed in InDesign.
Be sure that all of your artwork fits on the Illustrator artboard. Any artwork that extends off the artboard will be cropped when the artwork is placed in InDesign.
Step 2
Adobe Illustrator AI format is the preferred format for importing Illustrator artwork into InDesign. AI format works better than EPS for a variety of reasons. You must use AI format if you wish to manipulate the Illustrator layers in InDesign.
Choose File > Save As. Choose Adobe Illustrator (AI) for the file format, and then click the Save button.
Fill in the Illustrator Options dialog as shown below, and then click the OK button. You can choose a later version of Illustrator, of course, but the Create PDF Compatible File option must be selected.
2. How to Open Illustrator Files in InDesign
Now, open an Illustrator file in InDesign. Choose File > Place. In the Place dialog box, check Show Import Options, then select the Illustrator file you saved in Step 2, and click the Open button.
A Place PDF dialog will appear on your screen. You may think, „Huh? I’m not placing a PDF, I’m placing an Illustrator (AI) file.” Actually, InDesign sees this AI file as a PDF file.
There are many powerful options for placing Illustrator artwork in the Place PDF dialog boxes. You can use the page selector to choose which page of an Illustrator file with multiple artboards should be placed. You can choose how to crop the image, and whether or not you want the image to have a transparent background.
For this tutorial, we’re primarily concerned with the Layers section of the dialog. In this section, you can choose which layers in the Illustrator file you’d like to have displayed or hidden in the InDesign file. Click on the eyeball icon to hide or display a layer. Click the OK button when you’re finished.
When you see the loaded graphics cursor in InDesign, click to place the Illustrator artwork in your InDesign layout. The Illustrator artwork should look just like it did in Illustrator, unless you changed the layer visibility above.
What if you want to change the visibility of Illustrator layers after the artwork is already on the page? You can do that too!
Use the Selection Tool (black arrow) in InDesign to select the placed Illustrator file, and choose Object > Object Layer Options. In the dialog box that appears, click on the eyeball icon next to a layer name to hide or display a layer.
Click the OK button, and the appearance of the artwork will change on the InDesign page.
You’re all set! Now you know how to import Illustrator files into InDesign. You could even convert your designs from Illustrator to InDesign.
Want to Learn More?
Are you just getting started with InDesign? Learning how to import files from Illustrator into InDesign is a good trick to have. Get some pro tutorials, tips, and tricks from the Envato Tuts+ YouTube channel. We highly recommend going for this InDesign for Beginners free course to get you started:
We also have useful tutorials and articles for you to dive into—not only Illustrator to InDesign tricks, but also a variety of beginner and advanced content. Take a look at this selection we’ve made for you:
This Illustrator into InDesign technique is extremely valuable for using several variations of artwork in different places, all by placing a single file.
Take your company logo, for example. You may have many variations, all stored as separate files: color, grayscale, with tagline, without tagline, etc. Instead, you could have all these variations as separate layers in a single Illustrator file. Then you can convert from Illustrator to InDesign and design more efficiently. Think about how this might affect your workflow…I’m convinced you will find a use for it!
Editorial Note: This post has been updated with contributions from Janila Castañeda. Janila is a staff writer with Envato Tuts+.
Check out the best cursive calligraphy fonts inspired by handwriting, calligraphy brushes, and much more.
In this article, we’ll answer the questions „What is a cursive font?” and „What is a calligraphy font?” These two words are often used interchangeably, and while there are similarities between these two styles, it’s important to know what they’re all about. Let’s take a look at their definitions and see some examples of awesome calligraphy cursive fonts!
The cursive style of font resembles the style that some of us learned in school. The purpose of this style is to write quickly and as legibly as possible, without lifting the pen off the paper. Therefore, all the letters are connected. Cursive fonts are simpler than calligraphy since there’s no stroke contrast.
What Is a Calligraphy Font?
The calligraphy style of fonts contains characters that use specific strokes. Both of these styles of fonts are usually based on real handwriting, but the pen and the construction of the calligraphic character are different. The purpose of calligraphy is different to the cursive style because in calligraphy, lifting up the pen is not a problem, and many different pens can be used. Fonts can be cursive and calligraphic at the same time, and vice versa.
Unlimited Cursive & Calligraphy Fonts at Envato Elements
When you need amazing calligraphy fonts, Envato Elements should be your go-to resource. Elements offers thousands of premium mockups, graphic templates, logos, photos, fonts, and much more. And you can download as many of these digital assets as you like, as often as you like, for one low monthly fee.
Vendetta is a cursive calligraphy font with an authentic handwritten style. The end strokes of the characters have a good balance of movement and a relaxed feel. This is a great font for branding, logos, and social media designs.
Saltacrus is a signature style font that’s modern, and you can sense the flow of the ink in each character. This calligraphy cursive font is great to enhance a photography studio’s branding or to use as a signature for a wedding invitation or a logo. It’s unique and full of energy.
This handwritten font can be used as a cursive calligraphy tattoo font, and it is legible and distinctive. The pack contains a large number of ligatures and punctuation. Use this sophisticated font for branding, wedding invitations, or cards.
If you’re looking for an energetic font, Southland letter is a great option. This calligraphy cursive alphabet font has signature-style ascendants, very tall and slim. The pack contains uppercase, lowercase, and numeral characters.
Add a modern touch to your design with Randelion. This calligraphy feminine cursive tattoo font is vibrant and loud. This font is suitable for social media posts, branding, and apparel design.
Cursive handwriting calligraphy fonts with high-quality line work are hard to come by. Edinburgh is a modern script font perfect for projects that need a feminine touch. Suitable for social media posts, branding, and posters.
This monoline font has cursive calligraphy font traits. Cursive fonts are based on pen strokes: a single line with no contrast. Falcon has a good balance of cursive and calligraphy style fonts.
Famtterna is a modern calligraphy cursive font. It has the intricacies of the calligraphy style and the fluidity of cursives. This font is suitable for wedding invitations, headers, and branding.
Winston Heyvante is a calligraphy cursive alphabet font with a decorative flair. It is suitable for wedding invitations, blog branding, and book covers. The pack contains multiple stylistic alternatives to elevate your designs.
This cursive handwriting calligraphy font is energetic but extremely legible. While it’s expressive, the characters have a high contrast in the strokes, which makes it look more elegant. Summit Foxes includes ligatures and alternates to mix up different characters and get different looks.
Pueriel is a vintage cursive calligraphy font with a traditional flair. If you’re looking at vintage-inspired fonts that can help you recreate objects and letters from that era, this is a great choice. Pueriel comes with over 200 glyphs that can help you create a natural vintage look.
Fragmentix is a font with very little contrast between the characters. Packed with tons of ligatures and alternates, this font is suitable for anything from book covers to movie titles. Mix it up with a serif or sans serif font to achieve an edgy look.
Butter Milky has plenty of calligraphy cursive alphabet font alternates that make it suitable for multiple design projects. This handwritten style is very vintage from the 50s and 60s. It can add a nice touch to vintage-inspired projects.
If you’re looking for an expressive cursive calligraphy font, Maistoray is a stunning choice. This font is suitable for brand design, book covers, and social media. The strokes resemble a flat ribbon moving in the air, and the font has a beautiful air of elegance.
Herittage is a signature-style cursive font. It’s versatile and suitable for a wide range of projects, from posters to wedding invitations and branding. The strokes on the font have a relaxed look, perfect for vacation-themed projects.
Asterika is a handwritten cursive calligraphy font with elegant curves. The font has a heavy ink look, and the curves flow nicely. This script font is suitable for wedding invitations, social media, and packaging.
If you’re looking for a looser and more organic font, Matterlyse can get the job done. This font is suitable for print projects as well as websites. Use it for branding, social media posts, and book covers.
Ronatalia is a romantic font that resembles cursive calligraphy fonts. The characters have a high contrast between the strokes and look expertly crafted. This font is suitable for social media posts, branding, and personal projects.
If you’re looking for the ultimate high-end elegance, Blanchard is a regal option. This font is calligraphy oriented, expertly made, and looks expensive. It’s suitable for brand design for high-end brands, social media, and invitation cards.
Gillbert Hittola is an easygoing font that communicates fun and stability. It’s one of the fonts that, regardless of its application, can be classic and confident. Gillbert Hittola is suitable for printed designs, branding, and posters.
Ametta is an elegant and fashionable cursive calligraphy font. The energetic characters are great for projects that require a great deal of personality. The pack comes with alternate characters and ligatures to make every word special.
If you’re looking for a sharp, elegant, and all-around regal font, Ranlikha is all that. The characters have beautiful swirls that also look romantic. Mix this font with a serif to get a classic look suitable for restaurant branding.
Malliandra is a calligraphy feminine cursive tattoo font inspired by handwriting. This font is also suitable for wedding invitations, packaging design, labels, and book covers. The pack contains multilingual options and many beautiful swashes and ligatures.
If you’re looking for a more formal old style of calligraphic cursive font, Ofinitti is inspired by real brush strokes. The brush strokes look realistic, and the character shapes are clean. This font is suitable for branding and quotes.
Mattinha is a font with strokes that look heavily inked. This is a nice touch if you’re going for a handmade look in your design projects. Pair it with a sans serif font for a modern look in your wedding invitations.
Fonts created with a flat pen can give off a very classic look. Kidnatting is a good-looking font with characters that look energetic. The strokes change in thickness the same way real handwriting does.
Sellicite is a modern handwritten font using a thin stroke that almost looks monoline. The low contrast in the strokes keeps the font subdued and classic. Sellicite is suitable for enhancing and accompanying sans serif fonts.
Another monoline font that comes in a signature style is Breaket. This font is wider than it is tall, and the counters inside some of the vowels are non-existent. This last feature helps enhance that signature style. Breaket is suitable for invitations, brand design, and quote posters.
Hellow Script is a feminine-style cursive calligraphy font. The characters feature elegant swirly strokes that enhance the girly look. This font is suitable for brand design, packaging, and book covers.
If you’re looking for a true handwritten cursive font, Marina Bullock is a great option. This authentic handwriting font is great for projects that need a human touch and an organic look. The pack comes with a variation of glyphs to achieve an even more natural look.
Lenteras is a thick monoline cursive font that resembles the style of middle-school handwriting. Since the stroke is thicker than most monoline fonts, Lenteras looks fun, laidback, and young. This font is suitable for book covers, movie posters, and social media.
This cursive calligraphic font, Qitamesa, is inspired by brushes, with a slight contrast between the strokes. Use this modern script font on business cards, brand design, and posters.
Kaytha is a romantic monoline font with simple strokes. This cursive calligraphy style font features swirls at the end of each character, which makes it look modern and stylish. The pack comes with many stylistic sets, swashes, and ligatures to customize the characters as much as you would like.
Questario is a stylish script font inspired by brush calligraphy. The font is edgy, modern, and gives out a confident personality. Questario is suitable for branding, social media, and posters.
If you’re looking for a classic yet impactful font, Kiramba brings those two attributes to the table. The contrast between the strokes is high, and the swashes on the strokes have a tear-shaped end, which adds a contemporary feel. The font is suitable for stationery, invitations, and logos.
Brush pen calligraphy has been around for a while, but never in the high quality in which Azkia is presented. This script font was based on real analog sketches and later redrawn on a computer. The pack contains 1,200 glyphs, more than enough to bring variation and uniqueness to your design projects.
If you’re looking for an elementary school feel, Lazy Ride is a cool font for that. This cursive calligraphy font started out as a logo and is now extended into a font. With more than 670 glyphs, Lazy Ride can cover anything from brand design to quotes and posters.
Fanland is a cursive calligraphy font with an elegant touch. It’s romantic, classy, and beautiful, perfect for a wedding invitation. The pack comes with multiple stylistic sets to make the characters just different enough that they look handwritten.
A feminine font like Ashfall is perfect for projects that need a feminine touch. Suitable for branding for restaurants, flower shops, and skincare brands, Ashfall features a smooth texture and beautifully balanced characters.
If you’re on the lookout for an elegant font, Moranhill is the perfect cursive calligraphy font. It has a low contrast in the strokes and gives off stability and class. The pack contains many ligatures and stylistic alternates.
Raffiator is a modern, smooth, and classic font, with simple lines. The font features a high contrast in the strokes and slightly open counters, making it look handwritten. Raffiator is suitable for wedding invitations, newsletters, and book covers.
Metalurdo is an elegant cursive calligraphy font with style. This font has a classic look that can make any project travel back in time. Metalurdo is suitable for product labels, wedding invitations, and social media posts.
Donatellia is a font that exudes luxury, perfect for high-end branding projects. The font features beautiful lines that make it look like a true handwritten font. The tear shape at the end of the strokes resembles pooling ink, enhancing the handwritten effect even more.
Playlist is an energetic, dramatic, and stylish font. Made with modern calligraphy in mind, this handwritten style font features characters that look true to real handwriting. Playlist is suitable for any music-related projects, band logos, merchandising, and poster design.
Bellanaisa is a modern calligraphic font featuring a high contrast in the strokes. Dramatic, classic, and fresh, this font is great for book cover designs, wedding invitations, and letterpress style posters. The pack contains multiple language support and many stylistic alternates.
That’s It!
Now that you know the differences and similarities between cursive and calligraphy fonts, you’re ready to explore. Which one of these fonts was your favorite?
And remember, when you need cursive handwriting calligraphy fonts, Envato Elements should be your go-to resource. Elements offers thousands of premium mockups, graphic templates, logos, photos, fonts, and much more. And you can download as many of these digital assets as you like, as often as you like, for one low monthly fee.
THE ORIGINAL? Michelob Ultra “Mc Enroe vs Mc Enroe”– June 2022 “2022 John McEnroe is playing a match
against a younger version of him” Cannes GOLD Lion (Digital Craft)
Watch the Case Study Video
Agency : FCB New York (USA)
LESS ORIGINAL Nike “Never Done Evolving” – Sept 2022 “2017 Serena Williams is playing a match
against a younger version of her” Source : Ad Age
Watch the Case Study Video
Agency : AKQA (USA / Australia / Brazil)
Those of you who have been reading CSS-Tricks for a while may remember that we used to publish a little thing we called CSS-Tricks Chronicles. Our friend Chris Coyier would write up a reflection from the past couple of months or so, and it was a great way to get a pulse on what’s happening around CSS-Tricks, the site, and what the team is doing.
We like that and want to keep it going. It’s a new era, though! So what we’re going to do is welcome you back to what we’re now calling Behind the CSScenes. You’re going to meet some new and familiar faces in these updates, starting with Haley Mills, who is kicking off the very first issue.
How’s the transition going?
[Haley Mills:] Before we dive in, let me start by introducing myself! My name is Haley, and I’m the manager of Content Integration here at DigitalOcean. I’ve been at DigitalOcean for 5 years and previously worked on our editorial team, helping authors publish all sorts of topics through our Write For DOnations program.
Many folks here at DigitalOcean (including myself) are avid readers of CSS-Tricks, and we still have to pinch ourselves for how lucky we are to be entrusted with this community. We recognize that CSS-Tricks is a critical free resource for devs across the world, and my goal is to keep it that way.
Since the acquisition, we have published 95 pieces of new content and look forward to growing that number.
In the month of August, we performed maintenance on 6 existing pieces of content.
That said, change is to be expected when passing a torch.
I think we all know that no one can replace Chris’ voice — it’s a big reason why CSS-Tricks is, well, CSS-Tricks. His ability to have you laughing while learning something new is a skill that few can compete with. I know many of you miss his writing because you told us so in a survey (which we’ll get to in a bit), but it also opens up a huge opportunity for us all to take the torch and continue doing what CSS-Tricks does best:
Find creative solutions to problems and share them with the world. Chris brought people together this way on CSS-Tricks — and you can give back, too.
Your blossoming idea could turn out to be what the Flexbox Guide is for me and so many other people, so I humbly encourage you to reach out in our Guest Writing Form and talk to us about your topic ideas. We have two awesome editors, Geoff and Brad, to help you shape and bring your ideas to life to share with the CSS-Tricks community. In addition to paying you for your contribution, we will now also make a matching donation to a tech-focused charity of your choice.
Next up, we have Product Manager Karen Degi with some survey result highlights.
The results are in…
[Karen Degi:] In June, we shared a survey to collect feedback to help shape the future of CSS-Tricks. We received almost 900 responses, including some great written responses that helped us understand what CSS-Tricks means to the larger community.
Many of you also volunteered to talk to us directly, which has us thinking about the best way to gather those thoughts. If you’re one of those folks, know that we haven’t forgotten about you and still want to hear from you. We just want to make sure we approach this in the most effective way!
The survey confirmed some things we already suspected and brought new things to our attention. The top few things that grabbed our attention are:
Engaging, high-quality content is at the heart of CSS-Tricks. We’re working to make sure that we continue investing in in-depth guides on front-end topics, as well as providing short articles about quick tricks and tutorials with embedded demos.
You love RSS! As we continue investing in CSS-Tricks and bringing new functionality, we’ll make sure we keep an eye on how our changes affect the RSS feed.
You come to CSS-Tricks to learn, to be entertained, and to do your jobs better. You do not come to CSS-Tricks because you’re excited about being sold…well, anything, really. Although we think DigitalOcean is pretty great, and we’ll probably continue to talk about ourselves where it makes sense, we understand that we need to do so in a way that is honest, trustworthy, and connected to your needs as a front-end enthusiast.
Next up is Logan Liffick, Senior Digital Experience Designer, with redesign updates.
A redesign is in the works!
[Logan Liffick:] If you’ve worked on the front end — or really anywhere on the web, you’re bound to know CSS-Tricks. It’s where I, and many others, started the journey. So, when I was asked to spearhead a redesign for the site, it was nothing short of an honor. Without a doubt, undertaking a brand update for something so familiar to so many is a challenge of incredible magnitude
If I were to do justice to this project, I’d need to pay tribute to the original. That mentality became the underlying theme of my work, and any effort to rejuvenate took inspiration from existing patterns and styles from the site.
Upon first glance, you’ll notice the fresh coat of paint. Past that, you’ll recognize the site reads more “editorial” than before. This was a purposeful decision to accentuate existing type stylings and, more importantly, to pay homage to the essence of CSS-Tricks as an informational resource.
Preserving the element of “fun” was also top of mind. Sprinkled throughout the site are various snippets from the actual CSS “tricks” shared on this site — for example, there’s going to be a little Easter egg tucked inside a sticky footer using Preethi’s slide-out effect that’s my personal favorite, a fantastic suggestion from Geoff himself. Gradients are now a core color-way in the system, and border-radii have been rounded out.
We wanted to give ourselves permission and space to explore an open-ended and malleable system far into the future, which lines up nicely with the overall mission and goal of CSS-Tricks: to explore what’s possible with CSS. This is just the beginning, there’s so much more to see, do, and learn with CSS-Tricks living in our (digital) ocean.
Next is Geoff with author highlights!
New authors!
[Geoff:] We’ve added a few new faces to our growing list of guest authors who have contributed to CSS-Tricks:
You may have also seen our editor Bradley Kouchi’s name pop up a couple of times, and you can expect to continue seeing him on a semi-regular basis.
That’s 16 new authors! You can be one, too, by filling out our guest writing form.
On a related note, I’m pleased as punch that we still get regular contributions from a large band of familiar faces from before the DigitalOcean acquisition. Just look at all the fine folks who’ve continued to share their great ideas with us:
Big shake-ups like the one we’re going through today can be scary. Seeing these familiar names in article bylines has helped me a ton as far as continuity and consistency go. CSS-Tricks still seems very CSS-Tricks-y to me, and that’s a big deal.
Until next time…
We hope you’ve enjoyed this little peek behind the CSScenes! We’ll do it again… and again and again. As you can tell, there’s a lot of activity happening around here, which means we’ll have lots to share in the next edition.
Oh, and if you’re one of the many who’ve told us just how much you miss the newsletter, it’s still here! We’re sending it just once a month while we get back in the swing of things, and you may very well need to re-subscribe to get it (we had to do a lot of scrubbing after the keys to the site were handed over).
A screen reader is an important accessibility tool for people with no or limited vision. People who are blind or those with low vision can use a screen reader to navigate the computer. Screen readers will read contents on the screen and explain to the user what is on the page. Screen readers allow people to use the computer for daily tasks.
There are many screen reader software available for people through their operating system or through open source projects.
A 2021 research by WebAim found that from 1568 responders, more than 53.7 percent of people surveyed used JAWS on Windows, more than 30.7 percent of people used NVDA on Windows and little over 6.5 percent of people used VoiceOver on macOS.
JAWS and NVDA for Windows and VoiceOver for macOS are the most popular screen readers people use.
First, I should clarify that this article will be written from my point of view. To give background, I have been a front-end developer at a non-profit for people with learning differences for over three years. I, along with my colleagues, seek to make our projects more accessible every day. I am not visually impaired and do not use these tools on a regular basis. For work, I have a Mac machine and test accessibility using VoiceOver.
Here is my planned testing methodology:
Navigate the page by heading, until “Accessibility APIs” section.
Reason for this step: A 2016 survey by Heydon Pickering found that most people who use screen readers navigate new pages by headings
In the “Accessibility APIs” section, read the content and the unordered list inside.
TAB to hear focusable items in the unordered list.
Jump to the Search field.
TAB to hear a few items in the navigation section
To find similarities and differences between them, I decided to test a set of steps with each screen reader on a Wikipedia page about screen readers. I will browse the web with Chrome for my tests. Testing all screen readers on the same page and browser will reduce the amount of variables and keep the tests consistent.
JAWS
JAWS is an acronym for Job Access With Speech and is the most widely used screen reader in the world. It is only available on Windows. Depending on the plan and features, JAWS can be purchased anywhere from $90 yearly license all the way to $1605 for perpetual license.
JAWS has predefined keyboard commands to navigate the web. Full list of keyboard commands can be found on their website.
Demonstration
JAWS Demo
In the beginning of the demo, I am clicking on H key on my keyboard to go to the next heading. JAWS is moving down the page, reading me the headings along with their level.
Later in the video, I am clicking on number 2 and number 3 on my keyboard to have JAWS read Heading Levels 2s then later Heading Levels 3s. This is a great feature because we can move down the page and sections by heading level and get a better sense of the page layout.
When I reach the “Accessible APIs” section, I press the DOWN ARROW key until the third item in the unordered list.
Later in the demo, I am clicking on the TAB key for JAWS to read to me the next focusable item on the page, which is inside this list. I click TAB until I reach a focusable element in another section.
Then I press F key to focus on the search field, which JAWS reads to me.
Then I click on TAB and JAWS focuses on the navigation elements that are on the side of the page.
Pros & Cons
Pros:
JAWS is more customizable than other screen readers.
There are more options to navigate through the page.
JAWS is industry standard.
Widely used, which means there are lots of user to user support.
Cons:
JAWS is more complicated to use than NVDA or VoiceOver.
Some commands are not intuitive.
There are a lot more commands for the user to learn.
More learning curve for users.
JAWS is also not available on the Mac, which limits its users.
Costs anywhere between $90 – $1605 for the user.
JAWS has different key commands for desktop and laptop which may make it harder for users to transfer knowledge and may cause confusion.
NVDA
NVDA, or NonVisual Digital Access, is available on Windows only. Users need to download the software from NVDA’s website, NVAccess. This software is free to download but does not come already installed on Windows machines. NVDA is the second most popular screen reader in the world according to WebAim’s 2021 survey.
Like other screen readers, NVDA has defined keyboard commands to navigate the web. NVDA’s full keyboard commands can be found on their website.
Demonstration
NVDA Demo
In the demo I am clicking on H key on the keyboard to go to the next heading. First, NVDA reads me Heading Level 1, which is “Screen reader”. Then NVDA goes to read Heading Level 2s and 3s.
When I reach “References” I begin to click on TAB on my keyboard for NVDA to focus on next focusable items.
After focusing on a few items on the list, I click ENTER and go to the New York Times page.
Pros & Cons
Pros:
Overall, I found NVDA was able to provide me with information on the screen.
The out-of-the-box keyboard commands were easy to use and easy to learn.
NVDA is open source, which means the community can update and fix.
NVDA is free, which makes it an affordable option to Windows users.
Cons:
NVDA is not available on the Mac, which limits its users.
VoiceOver
VoiceOver is the screen reader used in Mac. VoiceOver is only available on Mac not available in Windows. VoiceOver is free and is already installed on the computer, which removes barriers because this is part of the computer setup and the user does not have to download or purchase any additional software.
VoiceOver has defined keyboard commands to navigate the web. VoiceOver’s full keyboard commands can be found on their website.
Demonstration
VoiceOver Demo
In the demo, I am on a Wikipedia page and I am clicking on the VoiceOver Command (which is Control+Option) along with Command+H to navigate through the headings. VoiceOver reads the headings in order, starting from Heading Level 1, “Screen Reader”, to Heading Level 2, “Contents”, to Heading Level 3, and so on.
When I reach the “Accessibility APIs” section, I click on VoiceOver Command plus the RIGHT ARROW, to tell VoiceOver that I want it to read this section. Later I am clicking on the VoiceOver Command plus the RIGHT ARROW on my keyboard, to navigate the section.
When I get on to the third item on the unordered list, I press TAB on my keyboard to focus on the next focusable element.
I press TAB a few times, then I press VoiceOver Command plus U, to open the Form Control Menu. In the menu, I press DOWN ARROW until I hear the “Search Wikipedia” option. When I hear it, I click ENTER and the screen reader focuses on the form field. In the form field, I press TAB to navigate to the navigation section.
Pros & Cons
Pros:
VoiceOver is easy to use and learn.
VoiceOver’s commands are intuitive.
Free tool that comes installed in every macOS device.
Cons:
VoiceOver is also not available on Windows, which limits its users.
VoiceOver is not an app and can only be updated when Apple releases macOS update.
Key Takeaways
A screen reader is an important accessibility tool for people with no or limited vision. Screen readers allow people to use the computer for daily tasks.
There are many screen reader softwares available. In this article I compared JAWS, NVDA, and VoiceOver.
Here is a comparison chart overview of the three screen readers:
JAWS
NVDA
VoiceOver
Operating System
Windows
Windows
macOS
Price
$90 – $1695
Free
Free
# of users
30%
50%
6%
Ease of Use
Hard
Easy
Easy
I found that for basic screen reader testing, most screen readers follow a similar keystroke pattern and knowledge from one screen reader can be used for others.
All screen readers have their pros and cons. Ultimately, it’s up to user preference and also the operating system they use to determine which screen reader software is best for them.
Ahmad Shadeed got an early jump on container queries and has a growing collection of examples based on everyday patterns.
And, if you missed it, his latest post on container queries does a wonderful job covering how they work since landing in Chrome 105 this month (we’ll see them in Safari 16 soon). Some choice highlights and takeaways:
Containers are defined with the container-type property. Previous demos and proposals had been using contain instead.
Container queries are very much like the media queries we’ve been writing all along to target the viewport size. So, rather than something like @media (min-width: 600px) {}, we have @container (min-width: 600px) {}. That should make converting many of those media queries to container queries fairly straightfoward, minus the work of figuring out the new breakpoint values.
We can name containers to help distinguish them in our code (e.g. container-name: blockquote).
That’s because the variable is recognized as a string and what we need is a number that can be interpolated between two numeric values. That’s where we can call on @property to not only register the variable as a custom property, but define its syntax as a number:
You’re going to want to check browser support since @property has only landed in Chrome (starting in version 85) as of this writing. And if you’re hoping to sniff it out with @supports, we’re currently out of luck because it doesn’t accept at-rules as values… yet. That will change once at-rule()becomes a real thing.