html color compatibility

Need to show more than 216 of them?

[automotivetouchup]

I need to sell a whole lot of painted widgets, an assortment of any color were the cell bg color is the color selection for a widget. It seems that the 216 isn't enough. Is there away around breaking the 216 rule without creating a jpeg? I was thinking about making jpegs for them all, but I'm looking at resembling 10,000 colors. while only trying to resemble the color instead of duplicating them, 216 is close for most of them, but not all working out at all.

What happens for breaking the 216 rule too.

Oh, and is there some kind of chart too?

Any help would be great.

[tedster]

If you break the 216 rule, then monitors that are set to a color depth of 256 will dither some of your colors - that is, they will show a dotted mix of two colors that your eye averages out to a single color (well, sort of, if you are far enough away from the screen.)

However, a 256 color setting is not very common today at all - most visitors will be able to see millions of colors.

It is important to know that monitors will vary in the exact color displayed. Monitors are also using "refracted" color - a direct light cource, rather than "reflected" color that we normally see when we look at objects. The two will always be different.

Most graphics programs will have a color spectrum chart of some kind included, allowing you to find close matches for the colors you want. The top-end programs lke PhotoShop even include equivalents for Pantone colors.

When it comes to colors in cell backgrounds, you can have a choice of about 16 million just by declaring a hex color, such as background-color:#57ec01.

You can make those same color choices in a .gif file, which is probably a better choice than jpeg if you are creating one solid color swatch. Older computer equipment uses a slightly different rendering for background colors and image colors in images, but those differences have become negligible in recent years.

In short, the concern about 216 "web safe" colors is sort of an antique idea today. Here's a three-year old thread that already had the same conclusion:

[webmasterworld.com...]

The 216 color limit was always a bit problematic anyway. Here's a 4-year old thread:
[webmasterworld.com...]

[bufferzone]

You could always write a statement in the top of the page saying that 32 bit colour is necessary in order to view the colours correctly and maybe provide a little jpeg sample of the colour. You should also write a disclaimer explaining that the colours of an image on a screen might look different in real life and that your customers should take this in to consideration

[pageoneresults]

There are other issues you need to take into consideration also. It is very difficult to convey color on the web, no matter what specification you use.

Everyone is going to have different monitor settings, display quality, etc. The differences between a CRT and and LCD are shocking when it comes to color.

I work with a few clients who offer colored widgets. They've finally come to understand that all the time and effort involved with making colors exact is negated once it translates to the web. It is an absolute must though for their traditional printed materials.

[automotivetouchup]

So "web safe" really means across the board monitor safe colors for all monitors? I thought some colors had problems with browsers. So if most people had 24 or 36 bit color, rather than 16 I'd be able to use almost any color? And rather than breaking, it would just choose something close or dither? So I can still be of content use for the mass amount with an up to date or a normal setting, and people that choose a low color setting will still see a similar color.

How would we go about choosing the other ones? Does anyone have a url? or a poster example? I have used a visibone poster chart for the 216 websafe, and a variety of urls, for the websafe choices as well. Or is a program like adobe photoshops color picker havesomething like 24bit or 36bit color choices? Or is there someone else's program a little bit cheaper? like the microsoft picture it pro version?

[automotivetouchup]

Would it be wise to stay within the hex chart for webmasters? Or any wild color I can use in photoshop will workout just fine?

By the way thanks for all the guidelines!