Can text shadowing be used to meet minimum contrast requirements?

Name: Moe Kraft
Email: maureen_kraft@us.ibm.com
Affiliation: IBM
Document: UW
Item Number: Understanding Success Criterion 1.4.3
Part of Item: Sufficient Techniques
Comment Type: technical
Summary of Issue: Can text shadowing be used to meet minimum contrast requirements?
Comment (Including rationale for any proposed change):
On a recent design review call, the designer proposed that although the text color does not meet sufficient contrast minimum requirements with the background color or image, the border around the text does meet contrast minimum requirements and that the text with shadowing should be sufficient to meet the success criteria of 1.4.3. 

Is this possible? Should there be guidelines on the weight/thickness of the shadow and that it goes around all the text and not just one side? 
Should this be entered as a proposed technique?

A good sample can be seen in the article, Design Accessibly, See Differently: Color Contrast Tips And Toolshttp://www.smashingmagazine.com/2014/10/22/color-contrast-tips-and-tools-for-accessibility/ In the Pay Now images, the middle column shows text with a drop shadow on the foreground text and the tests are in Normal view, gray scale and deuteranopia. http://media.mediatemple.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/buttongradients-large.png

Proposed Change:

Received on Tuesday, 21 April 2015 16:33:47 UTC