Set opacity of background image without affecting child elements

Question

Is it possible to set the opacity of a background image without affecting the opacity of child elements?

Example

All links in the footer need a custom bull

Answer 1

Another option is CSS Tricks approach of inserting a pseudo element the exact size of the original element right behind it to fake the opaque background effect that we're looking for. Sometimes you will need to set a height for the pseudo element.

div {
  width: 200px;
  height: 200px;
  display: block;
  position: relative;
}

div::after {
  content: "";
  background: url(image.jpg);
  opacity: 0.5;
  top: 0;
  left: 0;
  bottom: 0;
  right: 0;
  position: absolute;
  z-index: -1;   
}

Answer 2

If you are using the image as a bullet, you might consider the :before pseudo element.

#footer ul li {
}

#footer ul li:before {
    content: url(/images/arrow.png);
    filter:alpha(opacity=50);
    filter: progid:DXImageTransform.Microsoft.Alpha(opacity=0.5);
    opacity:.50;
}

Answer 3

#footer ul li
     {
       position:relative;
       list-style:none;
     }
    #footer ul li:before
     {
       background-image: url(imagesFolder/bg_demo.png);
       background-repeat:no-repeat;
       content: "";
       top: 5px;
       left: -10px;
       bottom: 0;
       right: 0;
       position: absolute;
       z-index: -1;
       opacity: 0.5;
    }

You can try this code. I think it will be worked. You can visit the demo

Answer 4

To really fine-tune things, I recommend placing the appropriate selections in browser-targeting wrappers. This was the only thing that worked for me when I could not get IE7 and IE8 to "play nicely with others" (as I am currently working for a software company who continues to support them).

/* color or background image for all browsers, of course */            
#myBackground {
    background-color:#666; 
}
/* target chrome & safari without disrupting IE7-8 */
@media screen and (-webkit-min-device-pixel-ratio:0) {
    #myBackground {
        -khtml-opacity:.50; 
        opacity:.50;
    }
}
/* target firefox without disrupting IE */
@-moz-document url-prefix() {
    #myBackground {
        -moz-opacity:.50;
        opacity:0.5;
    }
}
/* and IE last so it doesn't blow up */
#myBackground {
    opacity:.50;
    filter:alpha(opacity=50);
    filter: progid:DXImageTransform.Microsoft.Alpha(opacity=0.5);
}

I may have redundancies in the above code -- if anyone wishes to clean it up further, feel free!

Answer 5

If you have to set the opacity only to the bullet, why don't you set the alpha channel directly into the image? By the way I don't think there is a way to set the opacity to a background image via css without changing the opacity of the whole element (and its children too).

Answer 6

I found a pretty good and simple tutorial about this issue. I think it works great (and though it supports IE, I just tell my clients to use other browsers):

CSS background transparency without affecting child elements, through RGBa and filters

From there you can add gradient support, etc.