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Lithium - Yet another skin in development for XBMC - Printable Version

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+---- Thread: Lithium - Yet another skin in development for XBMC (/showthread.php?tid=57227)

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- Bram77 - 2009-10-13

reddragon220 Wrote:Since designing in a vacuum is never good I thought I'd shake the tree up a little bit and ask everybody two questions:
1) What do you not like about Lithium's interface?
2) How does Lithium measure up against your favorite interface?

1) I don't like that it's so memory consuming (obviously). I think it should be a extremely light weight skins. Especially since it's only a few MB's in total size.
2) The skin is hard to compare to others since the approach is different. There are quite a lot of people I know still using small, non-widescreen PAL tv's. Text is always hard to read with the currently available skins. This skin could be an excelent solution for them, if it will run well on the XBOX!


- paularms - 2009-10-13

reddragon220 Wrote:1) What do you not like about Lithium's interface?
I don't like that the scroll bars are shorter than the vertical content area. It's an unexpected visual that at first made me wonder if it was actually a scroll bar.


- birdie101 - 2009-10-14

reddragon220 Wrote::
1) What do you not like about Lithium's interface?

In the TVSHOWS screen, on the fanart view, it seems to take a while to load the fanart. Thats my only complaint.

PS I registered on the forums just to post, cos I thought you deserved feedback.

Luke


- reddragon220 - 2009-10-17

DaveHope Wrote:I love Lithium, it's certainly up there with Rapier (or will be when it's done).

In terms of what I don't like, I'm not keen on the darker columns for episode number and watched status. There needs to be some differentiation, but not keen on the columns. Perhaps changing the color / size of the episode number and ditching the column might look better? Then maybe a subtle tick / green light for watched state?
I definitely agree that the watched tick could be implemented much better on the episodes screen. Right now my best idea is to remove the watched check column, put the checks behind the episode number, and lower the opacity but I'll keep on thinking about it right now. While the dark columns do take up alot of space it does serve the purpose of guiding the eye, I tried it without and it just make the screen a bit appear to be more jumbled.

Bram77 Wrote:1) I don't like that it's so memory consuming (obviously). I think it should be a extremely light weight skins. Especially since it's only a few MB's in total size.
2) The skin is hard to compare to others since the approach is different. There are quite a lot of people I know still using small, non-widescreen PAL tv's. Text is always hard to read with the currently available skins. This skin could be an excelent solution for them, if it will run well on the XBOX!
Just because I don't have so many graphical assets (yet) doesn't mean I can't be doing a bit of magic behind the scenes in the code!Laugh But right now since the skins in alpha my first goal is to skin all of the windows. Right now the code is pretty much a mess, in the beta I'll begin optimization and hopefully with the help of some xbox users we'll hit that goal performance-wise.

paularms Wrote:I don't like that the scroll bars are shorter than the vertical content area. It's an unexpected visual that at first made me wonder if it was actually a scroll bar.
I'll take care of that.

birdie101 Wrote:In the TVSHOWS screen, on the fanart view, it seems to take a while to load the fanart. Thats my only complaint.

PS I registered on the forums just to post, cos I thought you deserved feedback.

Luke
Thanks for registering just to give feedback! That really means alot. Fanart view is a bit of a drag on the system because of all the background images being loaded at the same time. I'll see what I can do to speed up the process.

Here's the latest mockup that I've been playing with in photoshop. I've started toying around with the idea of the top bar containing static XBMC alerts & information while the bottom bar contains the dynamic information related to the user's media.

Image


- reddragon220 - 2009-10-17

Looking for help!
Are you an artist or coder looking to work on a skin? Post or send me a pm! Lithium is still in a very early stage and could be greatly influenced by your work! Only the very basics have been set in stone and Lithium is still looking for its visual identity.


Wonderful!! - tropicaltuna - 2009-10-21

I joined this forum just because of your lovely skin. It suits my preferences (clean, minimal look, focus on covers/fanart rather than skin aesthetics) perfectly! It looks wonderful in the screeshots and all the new list views you're thinking of are splendid too Nod

I'm using this skin on a Xbox (with main focus on homebrew games and emulation) and somehow - after a short period of testing - I couldn't manage to get it look like yours. So my question is:

-On this thread's first page in the second picture the fanart view is being used, am I right? I like it the most as the icons are quite big and displayed in wide icon format. Is it possible to use this view to display the "default.tbn" from normal applications? "Default.tbn" is basically a .jpg or .png-file that has been renamed and placed in the root folder of the corresponding application.

Generally your skin looks very promising; I have just one suggestion/request for the Multiplex view (post #9): in addition to the current view, the chosen cover would be displayed (if preferred) as big as in your list view mockup (post #20). Just a suggestion, but I just love it when covers have room to come to life.

Also @Bram77: Regarding general memory usage on an Xbox mine is running nicely. Around 35 Mb are free upon launching which is much more than e.g. Aeon (around 25 Mb) that is still sufficient for basic usage (watching DVD's, playing content from local HDD) but network problems may occur with higher resolution videos. So with the "additional" 10 Mb and based on my initial experience (I haven't streamed any content from my pc yet) this skin should be sufficient for every Xbox usage.


- reddragon220 - 2009-10-22

tropicaltuna Wrote:I joined this forum just because of your lovely skin. It suits my preferences (clean, minimal look, focus on covers/fanart rather than skin aesthetics) perfectly! It looks wonderful in the screeshots and all the new list views you're thinking of are splendid too Nod
Welcome to the forums! I'm glad you like the skin so far. Cool

tropicaltuna Wrote:I'm using this skin on a Xbox (with main focus on homebrew games and emulation) and somehow - after a short period of testing - I couldn't manage to get it look like yours. So my question is:

-On this thread's first page in the second picture the fanart view is being used, am I right? I like it the most as the icons are quite big and displayed in wide icon format. Is it possible to use this view to display the "default.tbn" from normal applications? "Default.tbn" is basically a .jpg or .png-file that has been renamed and placed in the root folder of the corresponding application.
Yes the second picture is using the fanart view. I'm not too familiar how xbmc handles application icons with the default.tbn. I think a fix on my side of the things maybe to use the normal image of an application if it has no associated background. Does this sound like something that might work for you?

tropicaltuna Wrote:Generally your skin looks very promising; I have just one suggestion/request for the Multiplex view (post #9): in addition to the current view, the chosen cover would be displayed (if preferred) as big as in your list view mockup (post #20). Just a suggestion, but I just love it when covers have room to come to life.
I'll think about it. I might implement an Alaska/Coverflow type of multiplex down the line.

tropicaltuna Wrote:Also @Bram77: Regarding general memory usage on an Xbox mine is running nicely. Around 35 Mb are free upon launching which is much more than e.g. Aeon (around 25 Mb) that is still sufficient for basic usage (watching DVD's, playing content from local HDD) but network problems may occur with higher resolution videos. So with the "additional" 10 Mb and based on my initial experience (I haven't streamed any content from my pc yet) this skin should be sufficient for every Xbox usage.
Good to hear.

I've been toying around with mock-ups some more. Dropping the container and eliminating the footer gives the skin an apple-tv/itunes/phyek like feel.

Image

Image

Image

Image


- tropicaltuna - 2009-10-22

reddragon220 Wrote:Yes the second picture is using the fanart view. I'm not too familiar how xbmc handles application icons with the default.tbn. I think a fix on my side of the things maybe to use the normal image of an application if it has no associated background. Does this sound like something that might work for you?
Every Xbox application or game has a shortcut icon. However initially it is quite small and fuzzy, so adding a customized "default.tbn" manually provides in XBMC the possibility to display something nicer (similarly to "folder.jpg" for music players). I'm not absolutely sure, but I think the original/normal image associated with the application is also default.tbn so your suggestion might work.

reddragon220 Wrote:I've been toying around with mock-ups some more. Dropping the container and eliminating the footer gives the skin an apple-tv/itunes/phyek like feel.

Image

Especially first pic looks great!


- reddragon220 - 2009-10-23

tropicaltuna Wrote:Every Xbox application or game has a shortcut icon. However initially it is quite small and fuzzy, so adding a customized "default.tbn" manually provides in XBMC the possibility to display something nicer (similarly to "folder.jpg" for music players). I'm not absolutely sure, but I think the original/normal image associated with the application is also default.tbn so your suggestion might work.

Especially first pic looks great!
I'll give it a try in the next alpha release, let me know how it works out.

Here's some experimenting with a rough options screen - how does everybody feel about widgets?
Image


- reddragon220 - 2009-10-23

Today's mock-up updates:
Image

Image

Image

Although I've tested the list views against a white background and they're indeed clearly visible, it still makes me a little bit uneasy. I'll have to think about a solution to it.

Edit: Bumped up the opacity to 60% and i like the results a bit more.
Image


- natew - 2009-10-24

reddragon220 Wrote:I'll give it a try in the next alpha release, let me know how it works out.

Here's some experimenting with a rough options screen - how does everybody feel about widgets?
[link]

Did you do a background blur there? Come to think of it, this picture makes me think that wall view would look fantastic if it blurred the fanart behind the posters.


- reddragon220 - 2009-10-24

natew Wrote:Did you do a background blur there? Come to think of it, this picture makes me think that wall view would look fantastic if it blurred the fanart behind the posters.

Yep that is a little bit of blur going on in the options screen. I've figured out all the aspects of how to blur things via a python script but sadly I don't know enough to make it work quite yet. In that wall view I'm just using a gradient to darken the screen.


Well I tried out a rough version without the containers and the result wasn't so great. Either it gets too dark to properly see the fanart or it's too distracting to have the background moving and read a block of text. I'll shelve this idea for now and may revisit it in the future. I may try again when i get a better grip on blurring pictures.

But at the very least I have a nice info list mockup. I still like the idea of the widgets and an overlayed options screen though.

Image


- reddragon220 - 2009-10-25

October 25, 2009 - NEW VERSION UPLOADED
- new view: info list
- mute bug appears in header
- Updating bug appears in header
- unified footer


- Bram77 - 2009-10-25

Great thanks! If you'd pack the textures into a XPR file I'll probably be able to use it on my XBOX.


- reddragon220 - 2009-10-25

October 25, 2009 - NEW VERSION UPLOADED - V2
- fixed footer transparency bug
- refined episode view

Bram77 Wrote:Great thanks! If you'd pack the textures into a XPR file I'll probably be able to use it on my XBOX.
At this point in time I'm editing the textures on a daily bases so it doesn't quite make much sense for me to pack and unpack them into an XPR. The majority of the slowdown is probably from my code right now as well.

If you want to you could actually create your own XPR for Lithium following the method in the skinning wiki. Feel free to post it if you do.