What Is Alt Text, and Why Is It Important?
If you’re a writer in any sphere, you’re probably a fan of words. Choosing the right phrase, weighing up one descriptor vs another. Crafting the perfect balanced sentence, setting it against a shorter one.
Powerful.
Taking your reader on a journey through your view of the world; describing the sights and sounds of the scene you’re painting for them.
Then you will spend time finding the perfect picture to go with your piece. Scrolling Pexels or Unsplash or your own camera roll, find a picture that will both complement and enhance your writing.
You’ll select an image that adds useful context, perhaps; showing your reader a location that’s important to your piece or setting the tone of the writing — is it dark and moody, or sunny and full of blue-sky optimism?
Photo by Skylar Kang
Maybe you’ll choose a picture that provides a different slant, instead — one that adds ambiguity to your writing and encourages the reader to look deeper into the message you’ve brought them. Whichever image you choose, you’ve spent precious time making sure that it reflects your intentions for your writing and enhances the message you want to convey to your readers.
Now comes an even more important step — and one that we must not forget. I’m talking, of course, of prepping the photo to share. Just as we review our writing for spelling and grammar accuracy, photos must be prepped to ensure they are ready for posting.
Remember that ACCuracy is key:
Alt Text
Caption
Credit
Today I’ll focus on Alt Text, but do let me know if you would find guidance on captioning and photo-crediting useful.
So what is Alt Text?
Alt Text is short for Alternative Text. It’s a description of a photo, usually in just a couple of sentences. The alternative text is read by assistive screen-reading technology for users who have vision impairments.
Why is Alt Text important?
Just as the photo at the top of this piece is dark and not especially revealing, a picture without Alt Text is a mystery to a user who is blind or has other significant visual impairments. Screen reading technology has come a long way in the last few years, and plain text (and even emojis!) can be easily read by the assistive technology user.
Screen reading software is different from Text-to-speech (TTS). TTS is often utilitarian and will replicate the text in something of a monotone. Screen readers, by contrast, can provide a variety of voices, tones, and expressions. They ensure that a user with visual impairment can fully experience your writing, just as any other reader can.
Screen readers are designed to look for and read Alt Text to its users. If you’ve added a caption to your photo, the screen reader will usually be able to read that, but while your caption may state what the picture is, it often doesn’t describe the actual image.
For example, if you’ve been to Barcelona and you post a picture captioned “Sagrada Familia”, you’ve told the reader what the picture is — but not what it looks like, and that’s a problem for someone who cannot see your image.
Alt Text may say something like “A very old Spanish church with many spires and intricate carvings. It is very large and built of light-coloured stone. There are several construction cranes around it.”
Now the user who employs screen reading technology knows what your image is showing, rather than just the name of it — and you have made your writing that much more accessible and inclusive.
I know I should add Alt Text but I don’t know how!
Adding Alt Text takes a little practice, but it’s super easy, and we’ve already seen above how helpful it can be. Most platforms where you can upload photos offer a function to add Alt Text, but I’ll show you here how to do this on Medium, as that’s one of the platforms I use most often. First, you need to add your picture to your writing — you probably know how to do this!
Medium Story editor — add image screencap
Once your photo is uploaded, you need to click anywhere on it — you’ll see that the picture is outlined in green. Now there’s a menu bar above your picture, and ‘Alt text’ is one of those options. You’ve not added any alt text yet, so it’s still in grey. Click on ‘Alt text’.
Image editor screencap with Alt text option highlighted
Once you’ve clicked on Alt text, you’ll see this pop-up. It will show you the image, so you don’t have to remember it! — and a free-text field for you to enter your alt text. There is an example shown, but unless your picture is indeed of an antique typewriter, you’ll have to come up with your own.
Image editor screencap with Alt text completed
The key is not to get too detailed about it. Make sure you mention the main subject of the photo and a little about the setting — is it inside? Are there hills in the background?
If you’re struggling to know what to write, think back to why you chose that photo, and why it was the right image for your writing. If the picture is of two people, mention what they are doing and whether they look sad, or angry, or happy… whatever the picture you chose adds to your writing, that’s what the alt text should say.
Once you’ve added your alt text and clicked save, you might want to make sure that it’s definitely been added to your picture. To check this, click anywhere on your photo again. Now, when your picture is outlined in green, the option to add ‘Alt text’ will also show in green, rather than grey.
Screencap of Alt text completed with menu option in green
And that’s it — all done. I hope you agree that it’s very easy to do. Now you’ve made somebody’s life easier and your writing is more accessible for people with visual impairments. What a star! Go get yourself a wee treat to celebrate.
The image shown is from Pixabay, and was used in my piece about Fiona the lonesome sheep, who I imagine just wanted to be left the hell alone.
© Fiona McDerment, 2023. All rights reserved.
Article originally published via Medium - visit my profile here