Opaque or completely black shadows would be distracting, ugly, and imply a complete blockage of light, which isn’t what we’re after. The area closest to the object has the darkest shadows, then it spreads and blurs outwards gradually. Look around and observe how shadows behave in relation to their light sources you’ll want to keep this in mind when styling with CSS. When styling the box-shadow property, remember that transparent shadows are the best because they look great on multicolored backgrounds. Shadows in well-lit spaces aren’t black or completely opaque, you can see the color of the area the shadow is cast on. With this, we can specify opacity, which is an important aspect to consider when styling realistic shadows.

We’ll be using rgba() colors because of their alpha value. The spread value set at 0px will make the shadow the same size as the box a positive value will increase its size and a negative value will shrink it. For instance, the snippet above will place the box-shadow on the bottom of the element, but if you add negative values like below, the shadow will be on top: box-shadow: 0px -5px 10px 0px rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.5) The blur radius, which affects the sharpness of the shadow higher values mean lighter shadows, and vice versaĪll of these except the blur radius can be negative values.

The y-offset, which represents the shadow’s position vertically.

The x-offset, which represents the horizontal shadow position.

Let’s look at how a typical box-shadow in declared in CSS: box-shadow: 0px 5px 10px 0px rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.5) When styled properly, it can improve the aesthetics of the webpage. They give an idea of an object’s size and depth, and the box-shadow brings this realism into our online experience. It can tell us if an element like a button, navigation item, or a text card is interactive. The box-shadow property allows you add a shadow around an element on a webpage. You should also be familiar with the box-shadow property.

This is intended for frontend developers with a working knowledge of HTML and CSS. Using box-shadow with the :hover pseudo class and transform property.In this post, we’ll look at the box-shadow CSS property and how you can style it in three different ways: Websites have to look and feel realistic, and shadows play a big part. Nowadays, it’s not enough that a website does its job - it has to take the user on a journey, an aesthetically pleasing journey of hues, fonts, shades, and everything in between. The digital space is massive, full of endless possibilities, let's explore it together! 3 ways to style CSS box-shadow effects I build websites so everyone finds a home online. Oscar Jite-Orimiono Follow I'm a self taught frontend web developer.

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