Make resolution of thumbs for filmstrip better? (1 Viewer)

[2BitSculptor]

My thumbs for the filmstrip view are rather large (115x190) , with only 5 across the screen (4X3 skin), I've noticed that the thumbs cover art is not as crisp when made large (they look fine in icon views) and when they are zoomed 130-150% they look even worse. I'm assuming they are being pulled from the thumbs directory rather than the full size directory. Is there a way to use the higher res images?

Thanks

Chuck

 

[fforde]

I think I went with the thumbnail versions for speed reasons, using the larger version tended to slow things down quite a bit for thumbnail views with a large number of movies on the screen at once. I could probably add a setting to select whether thumbnail or full covers are used for facade display, but this would require a code change.

You should also be aware that the plug-in currently uses the native .NET thumbnail generation code, which is not so hot. Sometimes it creates really ugly thumbnails. We are planning on correcting this, either by using the MediaPortal thumb generation code or by using another published method. Once this issue is complete, artwork in the facade should look significantly better though.

So knowing that, do you still thing there would be a need for a switch in the config screen to use large covers for the facade? I think (again for performance reasons) it would be turned off by default if we added the option.

 

[2BitSculptor]

Hi John,

I'm glad you are already on top of this, The native icon and filmstrip thumbs in MP are a magnitude better than those currently rendered in MotionPictures. If you can rival that quality, by whatever means, I will be happy.

For my own purposes, I will try to batch scale my full size images 33% for my thumbs. Will the fact that the thumbs are currently png's with a jpg label make a difference if I just make them them jpg's?

Thanks

Chuck

 

[fforde]

So long as the filename stays the same it shouldn't matter.

 

[2BitSculptor]

thats what i was thinking...

Thanks,

Chuck

 

[tamago_quin]

thanks for this!! just copying the image from "fullsize" to "thumbs" made a huge difference in quality!!

 

[2BitSculptor]

thanks for this!! just copying the image from "fullsize" to "thumbs" made a huge difference in quality!!

I'd heed John's remark about the size of the images for the thumbs, though.... they don't need to be much larger than the displayed size, The full size cover pics are larger than necessary and will slow down scroling quite a bit.

I copied the full size pics into a temp folder and then created an action in photoshop (I always do things the hard way) to resample them to 253 pixels high (preserving the aspect ratio) and save them back to the folder. Then I dragged a few at a time from the folder to photoshop, hit the action button for each image. Then I replaced the files in the thumbs folder (not the full-size folder)

The result was very satisfactory, but I will have to do it again when I add videos to the db.


Chuck

 

[fforde]

I am currently planning for the release after next (0.5.7) to be a bug fix release. I will try to get the change to the thumbnail generation in for that release. Pessimistically this means probably within 4-6 weeks. Could be sooner if no new major issues come up and everything goes smoothly with currently planed fixes/enhancements.

 

[tamago_quin]

I'm using custom images with resolutions of 550x150 with an avg size of 8kb so its no problem but I understand how the size could considerably slow down the menu.

fforde: I like the way moving pictures handles images. In Media Portal if you want to use a transparent png file for filmstrip view you have to go through hoops to get it to display. Moving pictures accepts png files with ease

just my 2cents

 

[fforde]

Actually, the image handling, with the exception of thumbnail generation, should be stock. It should behave the same here as everywhere else. Unless you mean the image loading functionality of the movie manager?