"My Pictures" Plugin

[Stimpy]

First off, I must say this is an excellent plugin! I'll certainly be using it alot now that I have my new digital camera.

My only question is this: is there any way to adjust the aspect ratio? I'm using a PVR-350 with TV out and no matter how much I zoom in or out on a picture, everybody looks tall and skinny. I suppose for some people this might be flattering, but certainly not for me

Is this just a PVR-350 problem or does this affect everybody? I haven't actually tried it on the VGA output yet.

[reven]

it uses the background image for the dimensions, usually 720x480, if you havent set your 350 to the same ratio, it will be causing the problem.

[Stimpy]

Hmm, I tried re-sizing the background image "skin\Blue\Background.jpg" to various ratios (640X480 or 320X480) but this had no effect at all on either the VGA display or the PVR-350 TV display. Am I changing the correct file here?

I think I understand the problem a bit better though, a normal TV has an aspect ratio of 4:3 or 1.33 but the pictures are being displayed with 720 pixels across and 480 pixels down which is a ratio of 1.50 so if I take a picture of a square that is exactly 100 by 100 pixels, it will look rectangular on the TV.

[darrin75]

i thin he is saying you need to change it on your 350

[reven]

the 350 has an xpos, ypos, width and height. that alters the ratio aswell, the background dimension, specified in the skin.xml file (nothing to do with the background image) is where it gets its dimensions, which is in all likely hood 720x480, now the default 350 output is something like 630x520 which would why the aspect looks all funky (i have a 350 and i dont see any problems myself).

[MaBo]

I have this problem as well and in a previous pictures plugin, there was a setting created for adjusting the aspect ratio. But how do I alter the settings in the skin.xml without moving the screen out of my tv-picture (I'm using the pvr350 tv-out)?

Another issue with my pictures is that on the tv-monitor I get a "Video is playing back ..." message everytime I move in the my pictures menu. When I press a remote button, the screen reappears on the tv-monitor. On the tv-screen everything is fine. The same is true for my music plugin... This is quite annoying as I tend to use my htpc with only the touchscreen for many functions. Only when I'm sitting on the couch the tv is used as a display.

Greetz,
MaBo

[reven]

yeah ive noticed the "video is playing back .." message aswell, i dont know whats going on there, it could be my code, it could be subs code, i didnt see it as big issue since if your using the 350 tv out, you wont be looking at the computer monitor anyway (didnt think about touchscreen). i honestly dont know what it is, it flickers on then off every time i enter a directory in my music, theres no video playing back so, err dont have a clue.

the aspect ratio drama, well if you picture are out of whack chances are so is you tv display, ill think about adding a "picture dimension" tags in there which will be used instead of the background image, but this wont be for a while, not really working on my pictures at the moment.

[Heyt]

Hi reven!

First thing, the my-plugins are very very nice. And they are very good skinnable.
But there is one thing that is not skinnable and this is the textcolor of a selected button. So could you integrate another NamedColor for that and use it for the selected buttons. It's the same problem in all your plugins i've just posted it here cause i've just worked on the skin of the my picture one.

[reven]

do you want a different font for each selector? or just the menu buttons?

[Heyt]

a new font for the menu buttons would be allright for me at the moment ... but if i think about it different ones for all selectors would'nt be such bad (for a another skin from me or other skinners) But most important for me is the additional font in the menu