fonts are too small in most skins !!!
#1
There are a lot of skins which are REALLY nice, but nearly every skin has too small fonts (especially for the plot).
The first skin I found which is readable is "Alaska".

What do others say about this? Are you really happy with such small fonts?




Btw: I am 29 years old, have a 42" Panasonic FullHD plasma ((3m in front of it) and good eyes Cool
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#2
I couldn't agree more, while most skin designers are creating on their PC's, they forget where the skin will eventually end up; on a TV sitting at a much farther distance than their monitors.

I'm sure there are XBMC users that only use it on their PC, where the small fonts look normal, but I hope they are in the minority as XBMC's main intended use is on the television.

Rule of thumb I use, if I can read the text on my 20" monitor from across the room, its going to look fine on the TV.
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#3
I don't know, I have no troubles reading them and I wouldn't consider my eyes particularly good.
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#4
Read this first, then use the 'viewing distance' calculator. For a 42" full hd tv you must sit at 5 feet or closer (1,5 m or closer).
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#5
sergiocos Wrote:Read this first, then use the 'viewing distance' calculator. For a 42" full hd tv you must sit at 5 feet or closer (1,5 m or closer).

...In order to? Experience full HD headache? :-)
My skins:

Amber
Quartz

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#6
I experienced the same, most skins are using fonts which are too small.
In a normal standard-size living-room with a decent - not too large flat- it could be a little bit larger.
As a workaround Fonts could be increased with this.
.
Cheers
ubuntuf4n
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#7
Well I test my skins on my 46" 1080p tv sitting about 3m away and I can read them fine. Sure I could read them easier if it was bigger but I can read them

Oh and i'm 38yo with glasses so my eye site is not great
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#8
@ all
I am not alone with my thoughts Nod
Its not that I cant read these fonts, but if I look more than 5 minutes on my tv with such small fonts I become headaches Sad

@sergio
Maybe you to have to sit 5feet away (42") to experience fullhd, but nobody does this (although you could read small fonts better Big Grin)
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#9
Instead of changing layout in all views there could be a button in video info screen to show the plot in a separate window with bigger fonts. Once this was an idea but never had the time to code and try. There are sure more ideas how to solve this.
As arcanthur mentioned, while coding on a notebook or monitor you think, hmm looks ok, and then you realize another truth at watching your work on a tv.
So any ideas are very welcome to show the plot and info in a separate way.
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#10
I do agree that some fonts are a little small but design wise big font looks strange imo especially large plots I code everything on a 40" Bravia 1080p 2.5m away because I found computer was too hard to code it looks good on small laptop screen but not on the hdtv now when i code if i cant see it well from the couch i adjust the size
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#11
Ok, i agree, 1.5 m or closer seems a bit extreme, but these are THX standards. These way you can fully enjoy HD quality. I have the same size tv (42') and i watch movies from 2 m distance, i never got a headache except when my wife is watching chick flicks.
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#12
I have a projector, and I find most of the font to big.
Admin @ Passion-XBMC
(official french community)
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#13
Jezz_X Wrote:Well I test my skins on my 46" 1080p tv sitting about 3m away and I can read them fine. Sure I could read them easier if it was bigger but I can read them

This is standard, at least in the USA. Most people own 40 to 55" TVs and sit 10' away. I have a 65" TV and sit 12 foot away - and I find at least half the skins have fonts that are too small for easy viewing (with 20/20 eye sight)


sergiocos Wrote:Ok, i agree, 1.5 m or closer seems a bit extreme, but these are THX standards. These way you can fully enjoy HD quality. I have the same size tv (42') and i watch movies from 2 m distance, i never got a headache except when my wife is watching chick flicks.

Ask 100,000 people and I'd bet only 20 would even know there was a THX standard for home viewing... and probably only 1 would know what the spec #s are.
I'm not an expert but I play one at work.
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#14
The question isn't necessarily whether or not if you "can" read the small text, it's whether or not do you want to. If you give me a huge plot description in a smallish font that I need to really sit and focus to read, it makes the experience unenjoyable. The point of having this information on your tv is to be able to sit back and relax and be able to access and "process" the information in front of you with minimal effort.
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#15
@Livin well this forum is full of users from total noobs to hardcore htpc/media center enthusiasts but from what I have seen we have a lot of both a big lot of users have extensive htpc setups with huge home servers and multiple xbmc setups and I know we have a huge amount of audio nuts who would be crazy if they didn't know about stuff like THX standards because so many users are seeking the ultimate setup if anyone has seen tekzilla or hd nation they have talked about it multiple times.

I agree with arc I also don't read huge plots why read the whole story about the movie I like short sneak peak of what's it about also we have trailers so why read the whole plot in other areas I think we could make some text a little larger I will start to include larger font as a option in any work I do but I understand why levin Wants larger font everyone is going to be different
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fonts are too small in most skins !!!2