One of the most common issues that hold back the accessibility of PDF documents is the insufficient color-contrast of text. Color contrast in documents need to be high enough so that people with color-blindness or difficulty seeing can still read the document. To fix this issue in Adobe Acrobat follow the steps below. For those who do not have access to Adobe Acrobat Pro on their own computer, this software can be accessed through computers in the DiSCO.
Open your file in Adobe Acrobat Pro.
Ensure that your file has been turned into editable text and images.
Run an accessibility check on your document.
Ensure that the text of your document is properly tagged and that the appropriate reading order has been set.
Select “Acrobat Pro” in the menu bar of your display if you are using a Macintosh device, however, if you are using a Windows device select "File;" from there, on either operating system, select “Preferences” from the expanded options, and then the “Accessibility” category from the popup Window.
Select the “Replace Document Colors” option and then the “Use High-Contrast colors” option.
Choose the color combination you would like from the “High-contrast color combination” drop-down options (we recommend the “Black text on white” option).
Make sure that the option to “Only change the color of black text or line art” is unchecked and that the option to “Change the color of line art as well as text” is checked.
Select “OK” at the bottom right corner of the Preferences popup window.