Which do you prefer?

[.... _]

Just curious if you prefer dark or light background colour schemes in websites you visit, especially photography sites.
Feel free to explain why and/or vote.

I'm just revamping an old site and can't decide whether to go for light or dark background.

[mgilbuena]

For forums, white. This especially helps on mobile devices as it is difficult to read white-on-black on a small screen such as an iPhone.

For photographic sites, I enjoy either -- as long as it is pure white or black.

[sisser]

Light color or white is so much easier to read. Hate the black graveyard background.

[x-ray]

I prefer white. I just had a new site put up using white.

www.x-rayarts.com

[sepiareverb]

White. Likely because I'm used to looking at images on paper.

[.... _]

Looks good Don. One or two little niggles with it. The sideways scroll bar always appears at 1024 screen width. Doesn't obscure anything as no scrolling to right is required but the scroll bar doesn't need to be there untill something is obscured.
Also there is no apparent way to come out of flipping through images. I discovered Esc key does it but its not obvious.
Overall I think I prefer white backgrounds. However, dark backgrounds have greater initial impact but after a while looking at them I want to switch to light backgrounds. I think there is a lot of visual psychology going on with backgrounds like with bokeh which is why I'm asking other peoples view on it.

[Lauffray]

Depends on your content, despite what people usually think BW images look better on mid grey backgrounds (I decided to ignore this and use black on my website )
I personally find colour pictures to look better on white backgrounds.
If you have a lot of text, then white background.

The thing you have to remember in design is that the enclosing color influences our perception of the colours inside. So the same red square on a black background will look darker than on a white background

[.... _]

So far loks like a 50 50 split between light+white and dark+black so I guess there's nothing saying dark or light is preferable over the other albeit a small sampling so far.

I'm thinking I may split the difference and use a dark background with white framing around the images which looks quite nice.

[Godfrey]

My photos are balanced for printing on archival papers with generous borders, so a neutral to slightly warm toned off-white background shows them off best. It's easier to read black or dark grey text on the background too. (RFF's black is very poor on readability.)

[.... _]

Originally Posted by Godfrey

(RFF's black is very poor on readability.)

Yes and no. If you have monitor calibrated for colour printing then YES its poor because the brightness level will be too low. But if you have a fancy new monitor which are very bright then its fine. I use the VBP Iskin cos I struggle to read it with the default skin.

[shimokita]

For text I prefer white background/ black text. For images I tend to prefer gray background or if white at least the image with a dark (/black) border.

Casey

[rluka]

Maybe darker background.
Not that white background is bad, but on screen and if the pictures are much smaller than the whole canvas, that white background cause glare, especially if the room is dark (either way, not good for the eyes)

[thegman]

I think it depends on the overall style. I find RFF in dark easy to read, and Ken Rockwell on white easy to read. I think photographs often look good against black, especially colour shots.

I think if you don't have much text though, it does not matter too much. If you do have a lot of text, think about text size, formatting etc.

[Sylvester]

Prefer black for slide show looking site, white if there's text.

[bhop73]

I put 'not bothered', but honestly, it depends on the site design. I'm a graphic designer so I think about that kinda stuff..

[olle]

depends on the content. I'm more content with black or dark backgrounds. When it comes to photography, it's definitley Pure Black though, white I find too harsh.

[daveleo]

I settled on #404040 ( a dark grey) for a background color on my own photo pages (which have virtually no text). I display pictures with wide white or black borders to simulate them mounted, and it works nicely in my opinion.

[Lawrence Sheperd]

I prefer a neutral grey or black for viewing photos, white with black lettering for text-heavy sites. I use AutoCad 8 hours a day and find if I don't set my drawing background to dark grey I have a raging headache at day's end.

[jtm6]

I like black backgrounds, but I can no longer read white text on black due to ocular headaches. I had to switch the theme here to white.

[benlees]

I just recently switched RFF to the white background after only ever using the black background, which I quite like. No real preference. Will probably switch back and forth.

[seakayaker1]

. . . . . black.

[n5jrn]

Dark (which can be black, but doesn't have to be). Less light blasting into my eyes.

[Cyriljay]

I prefer light coloured and dark colours like this one makes my head turn!

[thegman]

Probably prefer a darker background, a white background on a bright LCD screen can sometimes be a bit of a strain, especially in a dark room.

[Red Robin]

My eyes are a bit light sensitive so the darker backgrounds are easier to read.