Poster oriented Skin

[super_sobbie]

Good afternoon all...

OK I am looking for a skin that is more poster oriented then background. I like the background stuff but just too much to maintain. I prefer to focus on Posters and coverart not backgrounds. Is there a good one out there that is geared to people with posters/coverart.

Thanks SoBBie

PS I am plying with creating my own using mediastreams coverflow and starks tagging but have run into a few snags (mostly it is the first time I have edited a skin)...

[RockDawg]

I agree wholeheartedly. Don't get me wrong, Stark is sweet in many ways and DJH is one hell of a talented guy, but where is a skin that is all about the media? More specifically, focussed on selecting my media. Fanart doesn't do much for me. I'd rather see more of the titles in my library. It's a pain browsing through a large library when you can only see a handful of titles at one time, while half of the screen is "wasted" with fanart. Stark's wall view is cool but would be much better IMHO if it filled more of the screen and made the covers bigger and easier to see from a distance. I would love to see a skin that's about the media in the library and not pretty wallpapers.

[smcnally75]

The problem is that everyone wants something different in a skin, but very few are talented enough to actually make one. From a user interface perspective, Stark is pretty much perfect. A properly designed graphical user interface normally should not give the end-user more than 5-8 selections to choose from and Stark follows this rule very well. What would the point be of a wall view with even more selections? You don't find it already hard to focus on what you are looking for when in wall view? Most people have ideas of how a skin should look and what it should do, but very few actually have taken a class or read about how a GUI should be laid out and operate to be best for the largest percentage of end-users. I've taken classes because I design touch panel GUIs as part of my job and Duncan did a really nice job with his skin.

[RockDawg]

I realize that you can't please everyone and I am not (nor do I think is the OP) complaining. Obviously many people love Aeon and even more will probably love Stark. While I think 5-8 selections are too few when dealing with say 1000 movies, I'm not even necessarily saying we need a much larger selection. What I would like to see, is a skin fill the screen (mostly) with those selections rather than mostly fanart or wallpaper. For example, IMO Stark's wall view would be awesome if it filled more of the screen, had a few fewer titles shown at one time, but made each cover larger. Say at least as large as it gets when the cursor is on it. My main wants are ease of navigation and make things easy to see from across the room (mine's pretty big). I would LOVE to see a skin with alphabetical tabs on the side to make it even easier to jump through your library, but maybe that's not doable.

These are just ideas, suggestions, and my personal feelings. They're not demands. I've made minor mods to a couple skins for my personal use in the past, but I couldn't even begin to create something from scratch or make wholesale changes like the ones I've mentioned so I bow to all those designers out there who have given us what we do have. At the same time, super_sobbie and myself are throwing out suggestions in case there may be a designer out there wanting to create a skin that's a bit different. Maybe someone will take the ideas and run with them. No harm saying what we'd like to see.

[smcnally75]

I didn't take your ideas as complaints. I was just saying he did a great job as far as GUI guidelines are concerned. I'm not sure whether you were aware or not, but you can edit the keymap.xml to make it so you can jump to a letter in your library. I can't find the thread right now but a search should bring it up.

[RockDawg]

Originally Posted by smcnally75

I didn't take your ideas as complaints. I was just saying he did a great job as far as GUI guidelines are concerned.

Yes, he did an excellent job. I didn't mean to use his as an example for all the things I like to see differently. I was just the freshest example in my mind.

I'm not sure whether you were aware or not, but you can edit the keymap.xml to make it so you can jump to a letter in your library. I can't find the thread right now but a search should bring it up.

No, I didn't know that. Thanks for the info. I'll look it up.

[super_sobbie]

Wow... this post went in a little different route then I was expecting... Well Thanks you both and yes I do agree with both of you. Stark is a GREAT skin and I love the info page (if I could get it to work correctly on my xbox) and I am not saying that they did a bad job by any means... I personally am a mediastream fan and going to stick with that since I really do like what they did and it runs smoothly on my xbox.

I love the showcase view and tried to mod it to enlarge th posters. I would like something like the showcase view but with a much larger zoom/more media info (MPAA pic like stark mostly) but I could not get it looking correctly. it is true you need a very talented person to develop a skin and unfortunately I must not be one.

Back to the main point of me starting this thread... I was hoping to spark some interest in Poster views (Not wall, I personally never liked the wall ones). As I mentioned I like the coverflow type of ones or the Showcase one in mediastream I just want the cover to blow up Much bigger and make the title a little larger.

I have actually edited the coverflow xml with a few of the items I found in stark and was able to change the title font and add the year, length, and imdb ratings.

OK not a graphics person... but here is something I was thinking...



Thanks,
SoBBie

[NineT9mustang]

Originally Posted by RockDawg

While I think 5-8 selections are too few when dealing with say 1000 movies, I'm not even necessarily saying we need a much larger selection. What I would like to see, is a skin fill the screen (mostly) with those selections rather than mostly fanart or wallpaper.

I'm in your shoes as well...
I have a pretty large collection of movies, music, tv shows, pictures, games, etc

So the #1 important to me in a skin is a view that shows as MANY files as possible, yet I kind of do like big pretty pictures and what not

Which is where Vision2 comes in hand


^ Personally, Thats a view that does what I want perfectly. Long list, big fanart, enough room for info, wide icon (logo), etc


^ Again, a long filelist is whats concentrated here

Vision2 was pretty much designed around filelists that are pretty big and long (thats what she said?)

The graphics aren't the prettiest in Vision2, but I think the views/layout are great... something ive yet to see in a skin except for Serenity

I think Jezz_X explains it best: "Function over form".

[djh_]

You might have to accept that users with 1,000+ movie collections are (I suspect) a distinct minority, and so skinners inclined to cater for them are similarly rare. Not to say that a list-focused skin is less valid than any other, but I'd imagine it'd have to be designed that way from the outset.

[super_sobbie]

WoW.... DJH... in a thread I started... I feel special...


Ok well I do kind of like the list based skin above but I am looking for something more like my mockup.... simply a showcase skin with a LARGE poster possibly zooming. As I have mentioned I have been playing with the mediastream coverflow (Would perfer showcase or filmstrip mod but cant get larger overlays). I just want a larger zoom with only 2 on one side and 3 or 4 on the other.

Maybe someday I will become a good skinner and make what I want... or even better someone here can help me create what I want myself. But as I have my second baby on the way my time just keep shrinking.

anyway not sure how a thread about poster orented skins fell into list skins... but I must say I do somewhat like the Vision2 skin... at least the large poster. but I was not a big fan of the home screen.

Well, have a great evening all...

SoBBie