Hmm, i lreally like al the views that are used in your skin! but still, i have a question, is it possible to make the cd case wrap more like, the dvd case wrap2, so with al little space between the albums? I personally think it will look nicer, but if you think it won't, can you talle me then, how to do that?

greetz

Love the skin Sharpe, Great work!! (and any one else thats helping )
I just have one question/request? Are you guys using the
Watch\Unwatch setting for this skin? Is there a setting? I have about over
200 movies and 15 TV shows, Its just takes too much time scrolling through all the movies /Tv shows to fine the ones I have not watch and sometime I forget whats new.
Thanks

2 things i've observed.
1) Freezes xbmc when trying to go into plugin settings with "Home Theater Plugin", but NOT when going into "Apple Trailer plugin", used to do that before, but then was fixed i think. (Talking about the new name change from "Apple Trailers - Home Theater")
2) When going into the movie trailer (script), there is no audio sounds, and still none when you leave the script, until you play a movie and exit. Then the sounds come back. Going by the memory used its showing, that wouldn't seem to be the problem, as it doesn't drop below 24megs ever.

hi Kautious619

yeah it's something that I overlooked, again mainly because I never use that feature - I'll look into making the views fully support it soon.

hi djdafreund

Still not got into using the plugins - I'll try and suss it out.

Cheers for the feedback.

Okay I've added the watched/unwatched settings in the Video button menu as requested by Kautious619 I've also added "Search" as well.

If I get a chance this weekend I'll try and make the watched/unwatched overlays look a bit more consistent also

Co0l man!!! Thanks Your the best

Sharpe, could u make a option for wallpaper in the skin settings for photos? My pictures have a transparent
frame & don't look good with the curtains or plain black. I need a all white background. Sure would appreciate it. Merry x-mas & new year bro. Thanks.

Are you still working on the skin?

hiya - yeah still here /just kinda busy with stuff - you know how it is.

You want an all white background for MyPics.xml - is that right?

Yes brother....All white background. (just for photos only)I would also need a red text to see the labels. I don't have that at the moment. The red or blue xpr. Thanks for gretting back to me. Yes, this season has all of us runing around all crazy for presents & spending money some of us just don't have right now. Everyone loved your skin last night at the x-mas party. The whole movie look just stood out among the family.

Hows that project bro? I was hoping to add it today since the main family gathering is tomorrow. But if not, thats ok also. Merry x-mas guys.

Too fiddly to make it a settings option /I haven't really got the time. (Lots left to drink round here!)

But here's a modded mypics.xml for you and a white background to stick in the skin's media folder.

White background with Red text like you said.

http://www.sendspace.com/file/hmvnl3

Thanks bro. U got lots to drink, & I gots lots to smoke. That will work.

Just time for a last update of 2007 - I've done a bit of a minor update to a couple of the views - thought I'd best mention it as I often forget to:

Plot View



And Wide Icons



Hope everyone has a great New Year's eve

Hey bro, just a heads up. Since the last build my cd wrap does not work in the movies or music videos section anymore. They just all stay in the background. I was hoping you could fix this problem For me its a big one.
Thanks for all the support. Happy new years guys........................

Could you please add a placemark to the seek bar when seeking? Currently when your seeking through a movie, you don't see anything until you let go of the joystick. Verses the way other skins have it, it shows a little bar or marker so you know what position of the movie your at.
Maybe use the movie film for a marker (small of course), that would fit, and look kind of Kewl. LOL.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[][][][][][][][][[][][][][][][][][][]][][[][] ((. O ')) <---smaller film reel icon
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I never use the controller when watching stuff, so I've not noticed this until just plugging it in now. The skin was missing a little png file from the textures.xpr file (I must have deleted it by accident). I've put it back it in now.

I'll have a look at your idea soon - I'll probably redo the whole osd thing while I'm at it.

Thanks for fixing that. Also, if you want maybe a quick mockup of the idea of concept. One was like above, with just a smaller film reel icon as the marker. The other idea is to have it slightly above (if possible) the marker with a small line coming down, used as the line marker itself, but also kind of looking like a piece of film coming off the film reel, making the marker line.

Thanks alot for trying Sharpe....But no dice? I have deleted the guisettings xml and the other lower letter drives with info on it. Still in cd wrap view everything just sits in the background. Nothing comes forward?
This is my first 1.6 xbox with the Noami 1.6_67 fc bios. This box is also brand new. My third one to the installment. If someone can help with this prob, would sure appreciate it.

First of all id like to congratulate Sharpe (and the people that have brainstormed to get the skin looking this nice) to a extremely nice looking Skin. I wanted to create my own and started gathering ideas, stumbled upon back-row and found it had basicly everything i wanted.. perfect

I just got home from my vacation and started downloading the pre-built version (since i dont own a windows-pc i can compile the skin on). However im having huge problems with the fonts, and everything looks kind of bloated. im guessing this might be because im running xbmc-linux. So my question follows: has anyone tried this skin (or any other skins, cant find much info on this) in xbmc-linux ?

Best regards // _max_

Hey cheers max - /appreciate the props pal.

Not used xbmc-linux yet (although will do eventually I reckon - it looks like the future) so can't really help you much - I take it you've tried using the different fonts in settings\appearance and so on? How does the screen resolution thing work in Linux? Does it have the same screen size options - 4:3, 16:9, 720 etc? If so have you tried different ones? - just some ideas.

Hey!

Well if you wanna use x264 material and so on its absolutely fantastic!

Yes i did try use the different fonts, however they all look alike =/ Some stuff i can just out of my head remember is that in the "Settings" menu, the black text under each icon that displays what it does is lost in the black "film" strip. So knowing what each icon does is pretty much just guessing about

The screen options are still PAL / NTSC 16:9 / 4:3, but they have also added "Desktop". So i run my pj with 1920x1080 (DESKTOP) setting to run full 1080p

If you want to mess about with it there is a vmware image ready to be run at my webserver here: (use vmware player or whatever you like best) http://fury.bsnet.se/xbmcdev-1.2.zip

br // _max_

Hey Sharpe, looks like it time to have to add the Settings Button to the scraper dialog screen. I already asked for the actual lines needed, or to PM you. So if you happen to get PM'd, that's what it's about. I substituted the "DialogContentSettings.xml" and it does work, just it has a seethrough dialog box, you just see all the text and info/pic above the curtain background.

Hey Sharpe, i PM'd you the changes for the 2 files, aligned and all, needed for the new scraper settings dialog box recently added to the XBMC SVN source builds. ("Settings" button to "Set Content" dialog box, and "Settings" scraper dialog box itself.")
Check most recent PM if you already checked once since reading this, as i redid the alignment since then, and re-up'd to you since then. Since it only ended up taking me 20 minutes or so to just do the alignment myself.

Hey thanks for that mate /it's appreciated

Hey Sharpe, looks like you’re taking a break!
Well when you get back from real-life (no rush) I have a question/request.
You know when you’re watching a video you can bring up the Play- Pause - video - audio menu bar.

Is there any way you can take out the black background and just have text?

Sometime it’s hard making changes when I can see the whole screen, mostly when making audio delay changes.
Thanks

hai fella - I'm still around.

Yeah that makes sense I suppose.

I'll do it now

Been lurking here for quite sometime. Decided it was time to sign up. First off, what a wealth of information that is provided here. I'm impressed. Secondly, Sharpe, what a wonderful skin that this has turned out to be. I am awestruck.

That being said, I was wondering if anyone could help me with a couple of issues. First, is there any way in which the view for movies could be set to jukebox, while having the view for tv shows set to wide icons. Try as I might, I can't get the 2 categories to maintain different views (i.e. if I set wide icons for tv shows, I also get wide icons for movies). I don't know what I'm doing wrong. Secondly, is there a way to set this up so that when I press the movies icon, it takes me straight to my movies library? I also need the same for tv shows. Right now when I press either, the next screen is a screen with all my hard drives that have movies and tv shows, despite the tv shows being alone on 1 drive and the movies spanned over 2 other drives. I'm trying to make this idiot-proof as my wife and mother-in-law will be using this frequently.

Any help with this would be greatly appreciated. And once again, what a marvelous job on this skin.

Thanks.

Hello mate - yeah I think I can help you there.

Your first question about XBMC "remembering" your chosen views is do-able via a setting in XBMC - go to settings and select video settings - there's an option in there to remember your chosen video views.

Your second point about making the Movies and TV home options take you directly to your Movies and TV sources in file view mode (it does this automatically in library mode) can be achieved by renaming your sources.

Name one Movies and the other TV - put all your media content bookmarks in the corresponding Source and that will do it.



Hope that helps

I do agree with removing the background inside the video/audio settings. BUT, i would not choose to have it completely clear. When you have any lighter content on, you can barely see the white text.
I would recommend to have a backdrop, but very lightly, maybe 10-15% transparent, so the user can still see the background image behind the settings (as i also use to sync some online videos also, and also find it usefull to be able to see the video when adjusting.) but yet not have to content almost not allow you to see the settings.
So, mostly transparent so keep that functionality, yet a little something to still be able to clearly see the settings options when it is onscreen. Thanks for doing that BTW, it is pretty usefull when adjustiing things.

Thanks Sharpe! Just download/install your new update and its perfect!

@DJ
You could still adjust the video\audio settings if there was no background,
because of the black border around\behind the selected text.
But dont change it!! It looks good with the transparent effect. Give it a vista Aero feel.

Are you sure your using the newest version? There is no black border around\behind the selected text. It's 100% transparent. If your watching a movie thats bright, or has a lot on screen, it's hard to be able to read the text.
Maybe your not using high def, because in 720p, where as the characters are a bit smaller, it is definitely harder to read with no background at all. I like that it's easier to see the screen when you need to sync a video, but it NEEDS at least a background that's 10-15% transparent (IE- If your not sure exactly what this means, it means it's close to all transparent, but yet JUST enough to have a slight background to diffuse being able to read something.) That's the biggest reason all skins have them behind the settings while watching a video, else it makes it hard to see when there is nothing at all but clear and text.
I can't make out anything when trying in 1080i mode.

Tru that. You need a background, or a magnifying glass?

Not sure were on the same page?
And no I’m not using a HD, just a CRT with Component input and using xbox HD cables

I like this!

The thing is I did try and add a mostly transparent background but whenever I tried it on my HD set all I got was a completely black background - when I tried it on XBMC_PC it showed as transparent just fine.

I get the same thing happening with skins like Clearity that has a slightly transparent background - on my TV the transparency shows up as black.

So I figured, as I could read the text just fine with no background at all, I might as well leave it off.

If it's really unreadable I suppose some sort of skin option could be written in?

On HDTV, the text is a bit smaller, and sitting on average 10-15 feets away, it's hard to read if any bright scene's are on. Sure, if it's dark, it's easier to read, but is someone supposed to skip to a darker scene before being able to change it. I took some screenshots to better illustrate an example of the action in play.



As you can better see, when sitting 10-15 feet away, the text is harder to read then using a SDTV with big text. And i didn't even bother taking a snapshot of 1080i mode, because the text is much smaller yet and didn't even show. I know most don't use 1080i due to the xbmc being flicker with motion due to the xbox power limitation, and 720p looking just fine.

Here is a quick mockup used just to quickly show even a 10-15% transparency added, is enough to allow text to be readable more easily. Granted i did a quick darken, so you just have to imagine all text itself being a bit brighter, since the effect was added to everything in the box area.



If you send me the proper file, i will even do it myself and test. It'll be worth it to me, and to others to include this. Please at least consider it. People won't be able to use older SDTV technology after 08 anyway, because of FCC new laws, so they need to upgrade anyway. We really need to not leave out the HDTV users.

I've uploaded an update that includes the code to add a background to the settings - and left the background out of the xpr in the media folder. (OSD Background.png) - have a mess around with the transparency yourself and see if you can get it looking how you want.

I do use an HDTV set myself - but I stick to 720p and like I say I get the transparency showing up as a solid black. Which I've just found seems to only be the case if I'm using Hardware Overlays for rendering - switched it to Pixel Shading and got this,



Oh well - see how you get on.

Ok, that will work. And thanks. I think that issue is normal with Hardware Overlay actually. But i haven't used hardware overlay for years since the 1st time i saw snapshots of Hardware Overlay and also Pixel Shading, and using hidef, it's a big difference better using Pixel Shading.
So i'll mess around with touching up a background image to fit. I'll post it for others if it is liked..

nice one fella

Hello everyone

For those keeping tabs with this skin - I suppose I should mention that I've made a few (nothing too major) updates of the skin.

I've altered the Skin Settings, File Manager and Weather screens a little. Also changed the 5 second popup music playing info thingy a bit and done some work on all the menu closing animation stuff. - Like I say nothing major but the little things pull it together just a bit more I reckon - so worth doing - just wish I was better at photoshop!

djdafreund - did you get anywhere with your video OSD background mate?

Thanks for that update. I've been at a friends for a couple days, so i haven't had a lot of time. Got my rig over here though, so i'll make some time and do that soon, and post my results.
BTW- What's the back-Row video thats now in your download's? The link is missing. Possibly a new opening video? That would be cool if so!!

Just tried editing the OSD Background.png file, and it's not showing any difference. Was the file for sure deleted from the texture pak?

Doh - no you're right - it must have slipped back in the xpr. It's been removed again.

BTW - The video thing was just a little demo of the skin in action that I'd made for a pal who was thinking of getting an xbox.

Hey bro, you might want to go back to the old style. the new skin settings just collides all my pics rtogether?
Even though I select just one directory? You need to make it use the bullets correctly. If you select something than there will be a little blue dot. If not, there will be a blank black area. This would help alot. So for now I had to delete all my pics in all the folders except the default sub folder for all my pics. I hope you fix this reaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaal soon. Off to go make some TrainWreck hashhhhhhhhhhhhhh.
ITS MY B-DAY.

Sorry mate - I'm not sure what you mean - have you got a screenie?

Happy b'day!

Hey Sharpe, for that background picture, i just simply doubled the current transparent image (ie-dragged the one down in PS to copy image tool to duplicate, making 2 images in toolbar on right.), then re-saved image, making it just a little darker, and it looks fine.
I didn't experience the total black background myself when using hardware overlay mode, it's just clear, so that seems to be a good compromise on tastes. The current image, i would guess would be about 10% transparent, which seems about 20% now after doubling the image, which is enough to read at sitting position on HDTV set from my theater chairs, but still plenty transparent enough to see behind when those times you need to adjust for syncing issues or what nots.

Righto - I've gone with that suggestion and uploaded it.

Cheers

Hey thanks Sharpe.

You need to take another look at your settings? My buddy across the street has the same problem? Your settings window is a complete mess. Even after selecting my wallpaper folders manually, everything is still thrown together. Your previous build did not do this???????? You need to make it where if u select something
you click on the blank round circle and the area is filled with blue. By buddy showed me how the other skins settings in different skins works flwlessly. But not Back-Row? Hopefully you can fix this. I had to delete all the pics in all the folders except the default wallpaper dir for my car pics to show without the interference with all the other folders. We are very surprised no one else has come forward to complain about this. I think its full of coding bugs perhaps. Maybe just to many options conflicting????

Is it in the skin settings screen?





What do you mean by "thrown together"? Like I say - show me a screencap of what you mean and I might have a chance of understanding what the problem is.

Has anyone else who's used the skin had any problems like maximusoctavious has had?