[agathorn]

And without further ado, I present the episode view

This all went together a LOT faster than I expected. Once you get the hang of it, putting the skin together in XBMC is pretty fast. At least for the basic stuff.

Next stop, the movies view. I don't even have a mockup for that one yet though, so its time to head back to Photoshop.

[Clumsy]

I like everything, except the blue borders - they somehow don't seem to fit in my eyes.

[agathorn]

I like everything, except the blue borders - they somehow don't seem to fit in my eyes.

If you mean the larger blue frames, I agree. It is on my "find a better way" list. the problem is I want to keep the rounded look, but in order to do so I need the thicker frames to cover the square edges.

I'm playing with a couple options to blend them in better.

[SleepyP]

one of the key things to remember when looking at screenies of this skin is that it's intended for use on crappy SD TVs (like the one in my bedroom ) and as such things which look a bit over the top on your nice hi-res computer screen won't be so crazy on a TV.

The only potential issue I see in having the frame graphic the way it is now is that it will look weird with 4:3 screenies and / or episodes with no thumbnail. That particular problem is one I haven't seen very effectively handled by any skin yet. Its a shame there's no way to make it possible to do a logic fork depending on the aspect ratio of the thumbnail.

Maybe you could have two different View options to cover that particular problem?

[agathorn]

The only potential issue I see in having the frame graphic the way it is now is that it will look weird with 4:3 screenies and / or episodes with no thumbnail. That particular problem is one I haven't seen very effectively handled by any skin yet. Its a shame there's no way to make it possible to do a logic fork depending on the aspect ratio of the thumbnail.

Maybe you could have two different View options to cover that particular problem?

Yes this is an issue on the episodes view that i've noticed. Unfortunately I don't see a solution either unless the skinning code exposes the ability to check the size of the thumbnail. If that one thing could be exposed then it could be done. And even if it was something simple like checking if the icon was wide or tall would work.

A separate view option doesn't seem like the way to solve it, at least from what i've seen. In every case where I have a thumb that is 4:3, it is mixed in with other episodes that are 16x9 (The majority).

[agathorn]

Reworked the frame to try something a bit more in line with the rest of the skin. Currently this has only been implemented on the EPISODE page, but this is what I got now.



I think I like this though the jury is certainly still out.

[Livin]

I like the concept... but the overall look of squarish boarders and textured backgrounds inside them reminds me of a powerpoint presentation.

[Rand Al Thor]

I really love how this skin is shaping up. Very clean, very well thought out. Keep up the good work!

[SleepyP]

I like the use of alpha blending on the round screencap edges
And on the mixed formfactor thumbs, thats very counter to my experiences. I have scanned about 50 series from my collection into dbase, using thetvdb.com scraper, and have never seen mixed thumbs like that.

[agathorn]

And on the mixed formfactor thumbs, thats very counter to my experiences. I have scanned about 50 series from my collection into dbase, using thetvdb.com scraper, and have never seen mixed thumbs like that.

Interesting. Maybe my experiences are unique. Some, like Voyager have almost exclusively 4:3 thumbs, Smallville however has a mixture of both.

[agathorn]

I'm in the middle of my work week, so not much happening at the moment. However I did want to throw a couple images out here. I've been dabbling a bit after work on the movies screen. These are still EXTREMELY early and rough concepts, but I thought i'd share them anywhoo.


The two major problems I see about this view is the lack of synopsis information, as well as the fact that it is a horizontal navigation which is in opposition to the rest of the video library. This is more of the "traditional" poster view, however I don't feel it follows the tenants of this skin which is to be as space efficient on a 4:3 TV as possible.


This version I like more than the first one, as it better follows the rules of the skin. For one it makes better use of the square format screen, it puts the focus on the media, and it is a vertical navigation. That said however it still doesn't quite work for me so i'm still playing with things.

I'm also still playing with other layouts and ideas, as this is still very rough.

[agathorn]

A couple more variations i've been playing with. you can also see in these concepts, an idea i'm toying with to try and make the skin feel less constrained and more subtle, putting more focus on the media.





The second concept would shrink the navigation list a bit, making room to put a little bit more information about the movie like the IMDB rating and director.

[Rand Al Thor]

Very nice. Can't wait to try this skin.

[agathorn]

Ok this one at first glance is a little odd. While I was sleeping last night I just had this strange idea, of doing the vertical navigation with a poster on the right and the list on the left, like in other concepts -- but what about instead of using a text list, it was an icon list.

So I fuddled and noodled around and this is what came out of my head. Its odd, yet I kind of like it.



Obviously something like this would only be used by people who didn't want any extra information on the movie while browsing, but I know there are people like that and i'm often one of them. Depends on if i'm looking to watch something specific or trying to find something to watch. I plan to offer more than one movie view, so i'll try to cater to both sides of that.

[agathorn]

Here is a screenshot of the new movies view up and running in XBMC.



This layout seems a bit odd at first, but after using it a bit I really like it. It gives me the navigation and information I want the most, while still showing off the media very well. that said hwoever I WILL be including a second movies view that includes the plot information as well.

One thing i'm noticing while making this skin, is that the images XBMC downloads from the scrapers seem to be stored very small and thus don't look as good as they could in these larger formats.

Does anyone know if its possible to configure XBMC to not shrink down the images it scrapes, or at least store them not quite so small? Is there a reason for this or is it just a space issue?