Weird black vertical gradient over image thumbnails in bubble view.

[ara4n]

Steps to reproduce

1. Enable message bubble view
2. Send an image
3. Get very confused that the image thumbnail has a large transparent-to-black vertical gradient overlaid on it - wrecking the thumbnail, given it gets in the way of showing what the image actually should look like. For instance, when reviewing artwork or photos, the thumbnail now lies - users will see big dark shadows and not know whether they're part of the original design or not (unless they happen to click and zoom).

For instance, this screenshot:

...ends up looking like...

Outcome

What did you expect?

Thumbnails to show a faithful representation of the full resolution image

What happened instead?

Thumbnail shows big black gradient, presumably to ensure the timestamp is visible, but completely at the expense of the fidelity of the thumbnail, severely impacting its usability.

Operating system

macOS

Application version

Nightly

How did you install the app?

Nightly

Homeserver

matrix.org

Will you send logs?

No

[ShadowJonathan]

@design FWIW applications like telegram use small pills when mousing over the image, or at least start their gradient (iirc) only in the last 10% of that image;

Large Image

(Shot on my phone, because desktop screenshot doesn't get the pill for whatever reason)

[robintown]

See #20402 for context of why the gradient exists (yes, it is for timestamp legibility)

[ara4n]

right, timestamp legibility makes sense... but not at the expense of getting a faithful thumbnail.

the easy workaround would be to only show the gradient on hoverover (or put the timestamp on a smaller grey plinth like TG does)

[robintown]

Yeah, and actually, I still find the gradient a bit insufficient for legibility against certain images, so a plinth would be welcome.

[ara4n]

fixed in favour of a plinth, thank heavens

[t3chguy]

Hmm it seems like it is now left with nothing

Which proves rather difficult to read

Should probably get the same banner/pill thing that the file name & size get

[t3chguy]

The code still seems to contain the linear-gradient, it simply regressed to not being visible

[robintown]

The gradient is still very much there, it's just always been subtle on images with a non-white background

[ara4n]

oh :( plz can kill with 🔥

[t3chguy]

In its current state it is broken, only works on transparent images so the layering order is wrong.

[daniellekirkwood]

Might be related: #23409