[Debate] The Grey Skin Look

[almighty89]

White and silver looks good on websites, since they're neutral colors.
If you have a graphic forum, you don't want the "post area" to be red, since the graphics that members post will look bad on it.
Let's say that someone made an awesome blue graphic, and post it on the forum, it would look ugly on a red background even if it's a good graphic. That member would instead need to put a link to it.

Now that I think about it, I guess that if the only white or silver thing on the forum is the post area, then it's technically not a grey skin. Anyway.

[Xx.simple.wishes]

I think the 'gray skin' look is nice, or maybe a silver-blueish color. Neutral colors look a lot better on forums, especially if the links or catagory/title text colors or the gradients are bright to add some color. But when a forum is all bright colors, it looks bad and not well made.

if you want to use colors, either go for dark or light colors, not darks and lights. Then if it's a dark board, add neutral text, and a nice link color that will pop. At least, that's what I do...

[/blockquote]

[Marie-Cris]

I think grey is okay if you work it into a theme; my default skin is grey with black text and blue link text, mainly because I made a banner out of a black, white and grey photo of the forum's subject. The straight grey default that you get automatically when creating forums is a bit dull for me as it doesn't seem to have much in the way of a theme.

And though colours are good, for those inept at creating graphics bigger than 100x100 ((which is my case, really; I suck with graphics)) the difficulty is choosing a colour scheme that A) Hasn't been done before and B) Doesn't blind you. Again, it's really great if they're part of a theme and that all the colours and buttons and so forth fit into it; if it doesn't it's unappealing ((I actually think this is the case with the PBS Autumn skin; everything works so well until you look at the colour of the member's stars they've chosen. It stands out like a sore thumb and ruins an otherwise perfect skin)).

[smithjohn]

hi
i am new to this Forum but as we are discussing about Grey Skin look it is good because when we write something on gray with the help of white color it is more attractive
_________________________________________
removed

[Former Member]

I really liked the dark-grey and yellow skin they used in proboards version3. Anyone has the color codes of that skin?


EDIT: Or was it version 2? It's been so many years...

[beverlymitchell]

I really like the gray skin color. Even though it's a little dull, it makes the rest of the forum look normal and easy to read.

Over most skins, I'd actually prefer the gray skin look. It's very simple and doesn't give a high loading time to the user using it.

However I do say if you will run a design forum, a gray skin will make your forum look a little amateur and you may not attract very many guests.

[NSX05]

Yeah, grey is a dull colour now. When i first joined PB, i thought it was OK, being new to all of this skin stuff, but a few months in, i decided to change the colours to more of a black to silver gradient.

And as well as the black and grey being a problem, i've noticed about 8 different sites (nearly all of them are inactive and therefore should be deleted - but anyway) with a black and yellow sort of background. Example of this would be [premoved].

[The Guy]

My site is greyish [removed]

[Michael]

Dec 12, 2008 7:14:36 GMT -8 The Guy said:

My site is greyish [removed]

That is direct advertising. Please don't.

[xcessive]

Grey skins look great at first but quickly fade into boringness. Unless another color is used as well, and used a lot, more than just link colors.

[Kami]

Just a reminder to everyone, as per the rules of this board, please contribute with posts that are four, well-thought out sentences or more - this way, the thread can continue to be a discussion, rather than just the same points re-posted with different wording.

Thank you.

[Headmaster of Greens Academy]

We run a site with a grey skin. I feel it gives a classy look as that is what we are going for. Since we are an intermediate to advanced RPG website. We wanted to have a classy feel and our members like it. They have told us that the look on the site is something they look forward to and easy on the eyes.

I think it is messed up when folks put a chat box on their site and they can't match the chat box to the site color. It throws off the site if your chatting in that and look at the rest of the site...sore thumb.

[twilight.Memories]

I generally don't like grey skins.... Unless they have really amazing graphics and border colors to make up for the dullness of the color. I find that the color grey is bleak an uninteresting by itself. However, if you mix in a few colors that match the banner, then it can work. I've seen a coding site that had a mostly grey skin with neon colors in the header and a few matching colors else were, and it looked good. Also depending on the style of the board, a grey skin can look good. A grey skin will also look better then a amateur skin that looks like a very narrow rainbow vomited on the board. xD

[fantasmic]

I don't see what's wrong with using gray =/; I don't know. Maybe it's just me. I have issues reading color contrasts. White on black hurts my eyes, as does black and white. Like, I can do it. But when you're on forums like RPGs with 12 paragraph posts, contrast becomes an issue. Gray kinda cuts that down for me. Nothing is too bright on it. So I prefer those over those black forums, or the light ones, but I guess it depends on the people. I also think gray looks very professional, because even if the people are very light-hearted, I think it's important to keep a professional appearance when you're running a forum. It shows that you're serious about it.


I think the only time dark skins annoy me is when you have a very chipper theme. And then your skin is all dark and depressing. Maybe that's the bigger issue here: whether or not there are too many darker-themed sites around Proboards cutting down on the originality. Because honestly, I think sites should keep to sort of generic colors, as long as they use those colors creatively.

[Shadowolf]

I don't see a lot of gray skins, but I do see a lot of skins that lack contrast in colors. For example, a skin in this situation might revolve only around teal. The colors used in that skin are all some kind of teal, having little to no contrast between them. That's what bothers me. Personally, I like a variety of colors in my skins so that I'm not looking at the same drab colors over and over again in a rephrased representation. It's like the skinners are afraid of contrast in color; sometimes that contrast creates the harmony between colors, like yin and yang.