In this post I'm going to show you how to create dynamic image popups using only CSS. Usually this kind of effect is achieved through the use of the declaration display: none combined with display: block. Although this solution could seem effective, it poses a major accessibility problem with screen reader which interpret the former declaration as speak: none, thus preventing de facto a screen reader from reading the content of an element.
Instead, we'll deploy our technique through a clever use of negative and positive absolute positioning. First, our HTML structure:
<div id="content">
<ul>
<li><a href="#">Link 1</a>
<div class="popup">
<img src="1.jpg" alt="" />
<p>Caption 1</p>
</div>
</li>
<!--more items-->
</ul>
</div>
First, to position our popups correctly, we need to add, among other thing, the declaration position: relative to each list item:
#content {
width: 50em;
padding: 1em;
background: #444;
color: #fff;
}
#content ul {
margin: 0;
padding: 0;
list-style: none;
height: 100%;
}
#content li {
margin-bottom: 0.5em;
height: 100%;
position: relative;
}
#content a {
background: gray;
color: #fff;
padding: 0.3em;
font-weight: bold;
text-decoration: none;
display: block;
width: 100px;
text-align: center;
}
#content div.popup {
width: 250px;
padding: 5px;
background: #fff;
position: absolute;
top: -1000em;
right: 0;
border: 2px solid #ccc;
}
#content div.popup img {
width: 90%;
margin: 0 auto;
display: block;
padding: 10px 0 0 0;
}
#content div.popup p {
margin: 0;
text-align: center;
padding: 5px 0;
font-style: italic;
color: #333;
}
On the normal state, we hide each popup by using negative absolute positioning. Then we add our effect on hover:
#content li:hover div.popup {
top: 0;
}
On hover, the top property's value has been reset to 0. You can see a demo below. Note that the following demo doesn't work in IE6, because we've used the :hover pseudo-class on an element that is not a link.