Re: Use of the fig caption element

Hi Louise,

the WCAG just demands a text alternative for non textual content.

I think the best thing an editor can do is to eliminate the need for an explicit screen reader only text.

What I mean with this is, that pictures very often have a different meaning to different persons. On a picture of a scene in the street some see playing children, others a bakery or whatever – but the author maybe chose the picture to show pre-pandemic life.

So I always recommend to use in the text next to the image phrases like “the picture shows children playing in the street without thinking about corona virus”. Also you don’t have a problem if the description needs to be looooong (like in your case). Doing so leaves the alt attribute empty for some additional information like “old scratched black and white photography” or “oil painting” or something else about the picture, that is accessible for sighted users and does transport some kind of mood or feeling or something like this, because I think it’s a choice from the editor to put there a drawing instead of a photo for example and there is a reason for this choice (even if the editor is not aware of it) – so the best text alternative is a combination of the text next to the image, which includes information for everybody (not only screen reader users) and the accessible name.

Of course figcaption (and aria-connected values like -describedby, -label, -labeledby) also are part of this combination, which has to make sense altogether.

Also there should be no repeated information like a value for the alt attribute that is identical to the figcaption and the value of the title attribute. The author should think carefully about where to put which non redundant information and the method/ concept should be consistent on the whole website.

So in our example if the figcaption is “oil painting by Salvador Dali” there should not be another “oil panting” in the alt attribute or other part of the accessible name. If every information in the picture is already given in visible text, there is no need for a text alternative exclusively for screen reader users.

In my opinion that is the closest we can get to “the same experience for every user”.

In other words: I’d love to see texts, that “degrade” every given image to a purely decorative image (of course this is idealistic, but it’s the direction I personally heading to and I hope you get the idea).

So my answer to your question is: yes! We should go beyond the alt attribute and put figcaption together with the article, a near heading, longdesc, aria-xxx and all the other things into our image armory, but prefer those things, that are accessible to all users and not sr exclusive.

Just my 2 Cent

Marc


Von: Louise Lister <Louise.Lister@iop.org>
Datum: Donnerstag, 22. April 2021 um 10:23
An: "w3c-wai-ig@w3.org" <w3c-wai-ig@w3.org>
Betreff: Use of the fig caption element
Neu gesendet von: "w3c-wai-ig@w3.org" <w3c-wai-ig@w3.org>
Neu gesendet am: Donnerstag, 22. April 2021 um 10:18


Hello all,

I wondered what peoples’ thoughts were on use of the <figcaption> element and whether it’s a valid option in the accessible image armoury.

I was reading this article here: https://www.hassellinclusion.com/blog/figure-figcaption-extended-alternate-text-screen-readers/


Some of our images depict scientific processes or convey information that may need some text to assist understanding. The closest example to us that I can think of would be how NASA captions their images of objects in the solar system. Supplementary text is helpful for both sighted and blind to fully understand the photograph without disrupting the main page narrative.

We use a few ‘captions’ on our website but they’re not programmatically linked to the image in any way. Just some text next to the image in a smaller font.

I understand the need for the alt text and long description but does anyone else also use captions where appropriate?

Thank you!

Louise




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