truscum and transmeds suck, so here's a guide to making your rentries cute



I'm not gonna get into the basic stuff, if you wanna know how to do the basic things, the how tab will be your best friend. Maybe take a few templates and dissect them to see how other people do it. Also, FIND INSPO. If you're taking direct or heavy inspiration, always make sure to ask the maker of the rentry if its ok first. Don't worry if what you make isn't super neat at first, you'll get better. We all start somewhere

Accessibility

First of all: readability is super important. I understand that you want to make your rentry super pretty, but this can make it less accessible for people who use screen readers, or people who find it difficult to read in general. Hell, I don't have any sort of problems in that regard and some people's rentries are still too hard to read. What's the point of putting information if no one can read it?

Some tips: My biggest advice is to make an easy to read version of your Rentry. The majority of people will need an easy to read version of their Rentry. If you use symbols, fonts, pixels, lots of text colors, or replaced text with images, you should make an easy to read. (Also, please try to put the easy to read link in plain text.)

Regarding fonts, I recommend you don't use them for key information, but small, not-so-important bits are okay. Say you decide to put your name, pronouns, age range, race, and MBTI on a Rentry. Your name, pronouns, and age range are rather important imformation for people to know when interacting with you, so I wouldn't use fonts for those at all. Race and MBTI, though, aren't as important in my opinion, so if you used a font in parts of it that's fine. You decide what's important or not.

Regarding colors... Please please please make sure your text and the background contrast enough for it to be readable. Some of y'all have these white themes where the text is 2% darker than the background... I think it's pretty, I suppose. My favorite color is white. But the contrast is so low that I have no idea what you're trying to convey!

For those of you who stumble across one of these super low contrast themes, or can't read because of the font color in general, the half-circle icon in the top left will turn off all font colors and revert it to the default text color.

Please also use readable fonts for genuine information. Some people can read cursive, but some can't, so it's best to use fonts with individual letters if possible. However, I'm mainly talking about those super curly fonts with lots of overlays, smudges, and other things on it. Alt text is super great, but I think it's best if you made the original text readable in the first place...

Design

Now, to graphics. This part is a lot more flexible, since rather than focusing on accessibility, it focuses on design. Since design is a creative activity, you could technically do anything you want. If you're having fun making your Rentries you can ignore everything here.

In general, I find that simple, versatile masks are easier to use in graphics than the intricate, themed ones, as they'll be harder to layer. The latter are better used for profile pictures.

This one might boil down to personal taste, but graphics tend to look prettier and more eyecatching if you use more than one hue. There's a certain aesthetic you can achieve with just using one hue and various shades of it; for example, Saint (@avpd on retrospring) does it often and does it well. But it's a very particular style that specifically works well for most of hir Rentries... Shi also uses pure black and white in hir color palette, which improves contrast. Contrast is really important, y'all... Otherwise it looks kinda washed out 😕

Using too many symbols in the text portion of your Rentry can make it look cluttered and overwhelming. Likewise with pixels. Try not to overdo them. I really like using big spacers in my text portions so it's easier to read through.


And that's it for now... I'll update this when I have more tips to talk about

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Pub: 17 May 2024 19:26 UTC
Edit: 14 Aug 2024 06:20 UTC
Views: 198