Appearance Manager

[MixMan]

Hello Fatman_do

May I suggest that you use the sub menu skins from SharperEdge skin system, since Sub might support the skinning system in future GBPVR releases. The Sharper Edge skin will always have "up to date" sub menu skin files, so you don't have to bother about XML code that might be missing.

SharperEdge right now supports
Appearance Manager
Different Skin Themes
720x480 resolution


It will support higher resolutions with improved picture quality
800x600
1024x768
1360x768

It will have a theme changer plugin (with background changing functionality)

It will support right to left languages like
Hebrew, Chinese, Japanes and Korean

[Fatman_do]

I will certainly look into it. I am a relative newbie in this skinning system.
I know the plugins will not be able to reflect the various skins out there other than background and buttons, but that is all I am after.

I am not out to copy or clone any one skin. I just thought it would be cool to adapt to utilize the images of these other skins for the overall feel. This will greatly show off the Apperance Manager's abilities.

I have read a little about your advisor project and that led me to kick this one off.

Would you mind if I included images from sharperedge in the Chameleon project?

[MixMan]

That the idea with Advisor sub menu skin.xmls
Anyne can use them as a base for their skin.
I will soon update the Advisor tutorial xmls with the latest changes for confirmation and transcode popups.
Go ahead copy and use whatever you want from Advisor

[Fatman_do]

Great. I should have downloaded the advisor stuff and dove into it more before hand. It would have saved me some work.

It looks like I will use you advisor to help me with this project!

I will open a new chameleon thread soon so this one doesn't lose focus.

[Fatman_do]

I have started a Chameleon thread here:

http://forums.nextpvr.com/showthread.php...#post96538

P.S. Old dog, I have downloaded the .psd files. Thanks alot.

[dottore]

how about letting the skin-designer choose, which buttons are active in appearance manager? so if a skin doesn't support multiple buttons, this setting could be disabled.

[MixMan]

Dottore

I reskinned the Appearence manager yesterday, so it will show the actual layout in the submenus.
It will work like a background changer for the "Blue2" baseskin
Download the BaseSkin from the BaseSkin tread in Skin, Plugin releases.


I had a look a Olbia. I am very impressed with the quality of the XML files.
Strange that text didn't look sharper in 800x600 than it did.
I'm working on a 1024x786 resolutions for the "BaseSkin".
The text sharpness is a huge difference from 720x480 compared with 1024x768, even though it is scaled down to 800x600 on my monitor.
I will go for 1024x768 resolution for the BaseSkin, it will give better quality on new LCD monitors and plasmas.
I think that it will look good on TVs also.....I guess.

[dottore]

yes, maybe thats how i will do it, too....make the plugins visible and let the main menu be reskinned "in the background"...

[MixMan]

Aha, you where online when I was editing previous post.

By the way. There is a font called Blank.ttf in a the AllFonts subdir, that is used to "shutdown" the ScreenName font. when the baseSkin is "emulating" MCE2 design. Install this font to get rid of the ScreenNames and use only "Title Logos"

[Fatman_do]

I reskinned the Appearence manager yesterday, so it will show the actual layout in the submenus.
It will work like a background changer for the "Blue2" baseskin
Download the BaseSkin from the BaseSkin tread in Skin, Plugin releases.

I have done something similar to this in my development version

in the appearance skin.xml do this:

add textstyles like

<TextStyle name="MiniButtonText" color="LightGray" typeFace="Tahoma" size="10" style="bold"/>
<TextStyle name="MiniButtonTextSelected" color="LightGray" typeFace="Tahoma" size="10" style="bold"/>

Then do this:

<CompositeImage name="PluginBackground" size="390,295">
<DrawImage filename="@PluginBackgroundImage" loc="2,2" size="390,295"/>
<DrawImage filename="@SelectedButtonImage" loc="10,15" size="80,20"/>
<DrawImage filename="@NormalButtonImage" loc="10,40" size="80,20"/>
<DrawImage filename="@NormalButtonImage" loc="10,65" size="80,20"/>
<DrawImage filename="@NormalButtonImage" loc="10,90" size="80,20"/>
<DrawText text="Play" loc="15,16" size="80,20" textStyle="MiniButtonTextSelected" align="Left"/> <DrawText text="Stop" loc="15,41" size="80,20" textStyle="MiniButtonText" align="Left"/>
<DrawText text="Pause" loc="15,67" size="80,20" textStyle="MiniButtonText" align="Left"/>
<DrawText text="MainMenu" loc="15,91" size="80,20" textStyle="MiniButtonText" align="Left"/>
<DrawImage filename="PluginSimulation.png" loc="150,40" size="190,195"/>
<!--DrawImage filename="EyeChart.png" loc="70,30" size="210,210"/-->
</CompositeImage>

When you pick backgrounds, it simulated the plugin screen. Go down, change buttons, go back up, preview. Cool effect. Use an PluginSimulation.png image to reflect a plugin screen layout window.

I will update the chameleon wiki with my current version tonight so others can check it out in action.

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