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+--- Thread: "Fusion" (ALPHA) skin, a little something i've been working on... (/showthread.php?tid=30582)
- aart - 2008-01-31
very nice work man
- Rand Al Thor - 2008-01-31
Wow! This skin is really coming along nicely.
- RockDawg - 2008-01-31
agathorn Wrote:I appreciate the feedback. I'm confused though. I have a few hundred movies and TV shows in my own library as well, but I don't find it an issue. My main question to you is this: "How does having the view show more titles at once help you find the movie?" Regardless of how many movies you have, you still have to scroll one by one, yes? And if they are in alphabetical order, then you know where in your list it is. Its not like a scavenger hunt.
Maybe i'm just not understanding, but i'd be glad to be educated and have no problem with a view to help for larger libraries. Just help me understand the issue a bit better.
In some skins you can enable a scrollbar which for some views allows you to scroll a "page" at a time (check PM3's "Big List" for example). So if you coded your list view to display 25 titles at a time and allowed similar scrollbar functionality a user could scan through a list of 500 movies with 20 clicks instead of 500. Much easier.
As for finding movies, maybe my wife and I are different than most. The bulk of our library is made up of movies we've seen before and a lot of the time we're not sure exactly what we want to watch. We'll just start scrolling through the list until something catches our eye. So in some regards it can be like a scavanger hunt. But even if you know the title you want to watch, it's easier to get to it if it only takes 12 clicks instead of 200.
Personally, I would much prefer a poster wall like view but nobody has implemented one that I'm aware of although there has been some discussion of how it would work.
Anyhow, this is all just my opinion and I still think you've got a nice looking skin. I'll be sure to try it out when I get the chance.
- agathorn - 2008-01-31
Thanks for the comments. Really appreciate it.
Ok everyone after some last minute "what the heck is going on!" troubleshooting on a problem, I now have ALPHA 3 ready for you all!
Fusion ALPHA 3 Release
Highlights
- Native NTSC windows
- Total new graphics upgrade
- Cascading on-demand menu system
- Dynamic font sizing for plot information boxes
- Smart View Filter
Download
Fusion_Alpha_3.rar (15mb)
Changelog
1145
- fixed: movie plot boxes now work with dynamic font changer
1144
- more work on NTSC native windows -- all windows should be in NTSC now with new graphics layout
- added: new cascading menu system
- added: dynamic font changin for plot boxes
- added: smart view mode system
1143
- first pass at NTSC native windows
- new graphics upgrade -- curreently NTSC only
1139
- added: changelog.txt
- fixed: PAL fonts are now correct
- changed: fonts to only include the used font types
- changed: tightened up the menu wraplist on HOME screen
- agathorn - 2008-01-31
RockDawg Wrote:In some skins you can enable a scrollbar which for some views allows you to scroll a "page" at a time (check PM3's "Big List" for example). So if you coded your list view to display 25 titles at a time and allowed similar scrollbar functionality a user could scan through a list of 500 movies with 20 clicks instead of 500. Much easier.
As for finding movies, maybe my wife and I are different than most. The bulk of our library is made up of movies we've seen before and a lot of the time we're not sure exactly what we want to watch. We'll just start scrolling through the list until something catches our eye. So in some regards it can be like a scavanger hunt. But even if you know the title you want to watch, it's easier to get to it if it only takes 12 clicks instead of 200.
Personally, I would much prefer a poster wall like view but nobody has implemented one that I'm aware of although there has been some discussion of how it would work.
Anyhow, this is all just my opinion and I still think you've got a nice looking skin. I'll be sure to try it out when I get the chance.
Thanks for the input. I'll mull it around and see what comes out
- agathorn - 2008-01-31
For those of you who run in PAL and feel like you are missing out, don't worry too much. You won't have too long to wait. I'm starting work on new PAL windows now, and while I probably won't get them all done today, I will do a release tonight with whatever is done by then.
EDIT: Apparently I totally overestimated how much work the PAL side would be. I'm really flying through it. There will be another release with the PAL side done probably within the hour.
- agathorn - 2008-01-31
Fusion ALPHA 4 Release
Highlights
- New graphics update now available to PAL users as well as NTSC
- Minor bug fixes and tweaks
Credit
Custom backgrounds for HOME screen shown are from Xephyr/Aeon backdrops, and not a part of this skin. Backdrops created by djh, and others and all kudos and credit to thier work.
Fusion is highly inspired by Xephyr/Aeon and Fluid.
All graphics and code for Fusion were created by Agathorn, with the exception of any content used from Project Mayhem III upon which Fusion was built.
Download
Fusion_Alpha_4.rar (15.1mb)
Changelog
1153
- All native PAL windows now use the new graphics
- fixed: screwed up watched overlay in NTSC and PAL
- fixed: navigation bug with cascading menu when in view menu, auto select, with episodes present
- changed: changed most text to be standard case rather than upper case
- bionic1234 - 2008-02-01
freakin' cool can't wait to get home and try it out, thanks for sharing
- agathorn - 2008-02-03
When I was showing my Mom the new features in the skin, I realized that I had made a big mistake in the design of the new cascading menus. I forgot who my target audience and target platform was. On here 32" TV in the living room, which sits probably about 12-15' from the couch, the menu is all but unreadable. It was horrible!
When doing this stuff it is important to remember that what works well on a computer monitor doesn't necessarily work well on a television screen -- especially a standard def one.
In this case it is more an issue of graphics and layout than functionality, so my next focus will be on refining the menu system to be more friendly on its intended platform.
- agathorn - 2008-02-05
Yay its the weekend again! And the weekend means more development on Fusion of course!
I haven't really started rolling with any momentum quite yet, but I'm starting this weekend of updates off with a revamped menu system. Nothing drastically different than it was, just some minor changes and tweaks graphically to make it actually usable on smaller screens and on TVs that are a good distance away.
As you can see the menu font is much larger, making it easier to read. In addition, the menu graphics are slightly larger. There is a dimming of the actual media content in the background, bringing the focus to the menu better. And last but not least, the little arrows indicating menu options that have submenus.
- Hudson_Hawk04 - 2008-02-05
love the progress
keep up the good work
- agathorn - 2008-02-05
Here are a couple screenshots of the latest movie view I have been working on. This was born out of RockDawg's request for a movies view that was friendly to those who have lots and lots and lots of movies to choose from.
In the end it essentially turned into a single combined movie view that I think can please almost everyone at once. In using it i'm really liking it.
This first screenshot shows the initial view. The long list of movies, plus available scroll bar will allow you to flip through very large collections with ease. The nice full size poster on the right side stays true to Fusion's design concepts.
But wait there's more! Pressing to the RIGHT gets you to the scrollbar, to flip through pages at a time, but if you press RIGHT one more time, the view changes itself to what you see in the second screenshot, giving you detailed information on the selected movie.
Easy navigation through large libraries, nice large movie posters, and detailed movie information available only a couple clicks away. It really is nice to use.
- agathorn - 2008-02-05
Hello all. I'm back to ask for everyone out there using this skin, or interested in this skin, to help me generate some ideas.
You see, 99% of what I and my family use XBMC for is the video library. Movies and TV Shows is our thing. The only music I have is in iTunes, and I listen to it mostly only iPod not on my TV. We don't have any photos in the system either, though we are thinking about it. As a result of this, I have really no idea what to do with the music library, or photo library. I have no idea what works and doesn't work, and what would be good for people. Is what is in PM3 just fine, or could we do something that would work better?
I'd love for you all out there to give me some input on this.
- agathorn - 2008-02-06
Latest SVN version now includes the new movies view for both NTSC and PAL.
EDIT: I just realized that when I rebuilt the pop out menu system and separated it into its own includes, I inadvertently introduced a rather nasty bug. The menu will be unaccessible from any of the default views that are in PM3. I didn't notice it until just now when I started skinning the file mode screen, because up until now i've not used any of the default views.
This will be fixed, but not right away, as its going to take a lot of reworking things in various spot. I just wanted you all to be aware of that. In the meantime I would recommend not using any of the default views or you may find yourself kind of screwed
- Hudson_Hawk04 - 2008-02-06
agathorn Wrote:Hello all. I'm back to ask for everyone out there using this skin, or interested in this skin, to help me generate some ideas.
You see, 99% of what I and my family use XBMC for is the video library. Movies and TV Shows is our thing. The only music I have is in iTunes, and I listen to it mostly only iPod not on my TV. We don't have any photos in the system either, though we are thinking about it. As a result of this, I have really no idea what to do with the music library, or photo library. I have no idea what works and doesn't work, and what would be good for people. Is what is in PM3 just fine, or could we do something that would work better?
I'd love for you all out there to give me some input on this.
As far as the photo library I have never used it and I don't see using it in the foreseeable future. On the other hand I use the music library on a rather frequent basis, I have never really tried using i-tunes via xbmc. Most if not all of my music is ripped from cd into a network shared folder on my main pc. The default pm3 views for my music would work fine. Thats just my opinion hope it helps.