Hello! In this post I will be exploring two websites that I have already viewed and used in prior projects and analyze them to assess their accessibility and cross cultural interface. The two sites that I will be using are Force of Destiny: The Rosa Ponselle Collection at the Peabody from Optional Project 15 and Richard Pryor’s Peoria from Optional Project 18.
The first site I looked at was the Rosa Ponselle website, initially looking at the text colors and font there are some issues with visibility. Some of the writing is on a red background and some of the text is red. This color can be difficult to see on the screen, some of the writing is in yellow on a white background which is very difficult to see. I would recommend that the colors get changed to a darker color and keep the light background throughout the site rather than having a red background for the heading. The font used for the body text is simple, however it is thin and small which makes it hard to read. Some of the headings have a different font that is more decorative which could make it difficult to read for those who have low vision and for those who do not read English well.
Image showing the Rosa Ponselle website
The navigational buttons at the bottom of each page directing users to the next page are easy to use. However, the text is small and thin and is yellow on a white background making it difficult to see where the site is taking you next. To fix this I recommend doing the same thing as with the rest of the text by making the text a darker color and changing the font to be thicker.
Image showing the navigational buttons on the Rosa Ponselle Website
Images and videos on the website do have descriptions, however there is again the issue of visibility as the text is small and not easy to see. For users with a screen reader this wouldn’t be a big issue, however those who don’t use a screen reader would have a hard time reading these descriptions.
Image of Rosa Ponselle Website showing the image descriptions featured on the site.
Next, to consider cross cultural interface and universal design I looked at what the site looks like across devices. On a computer the site is readable and easy to navigate, but on a phone the site becomes difficult to work with. The size of a phone screen prevents the information from displaying clearly and leads to a lot of zooming in and out and scrolling to see all the information. This could be fixed with a universal design that could accommodate many different devices.
Cross cultural interface would need to assess how this site would be received across other countries and languages. Making sure that the site could be translated into multiple languages is important for this. As of right now the only option to change the language of the site is to allow google translate to do it. Google translate is not always accurate and may not have the language a user needs to access the site. Other aspects of the design are not cross-cultural friendly such as some of the text infers that the reader already has some background knowledge on some American pop cultural information and does not always explain further.
Next, I looked at “Richard Pryor’s Peoria” site which is much more readable with the colors and font used. The only issue with coloring is that links on the page appear in a light tan color on a cream background making those areas of the page difficult to see. There are some pages on the website that are covered in small text this can be hard to read. I would recommend that the pages full of text be changed so that there is less text and the text could be bigger
Image showing the landing page of the Richard Pryor website
The photos on the website all have descriptions of them, however the videos do not have any audio descriptions making the videos not accessible for all. The navigational buttons are easy to use and lead users from one area of the site to the next.
The same issue came up for this site as the Rosa Ponselle website with universal design as the website is hard to access on a phone and the best way to see the information is with a computer. Creating a universal design that adapts for all devices could really help this site.
There is no way, on the Richard Pryor site, to change the language of the text or audio on the videos. This limits the website as non English speakers would have a difficult time understanding this website. This website also infers that the viewer will be familiar with Richard Pryor, however if this site was geared more for a non-American audience then more context would have to be given about Pryor.
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