New Community Theme: BackVision2 (1 Viewer)

[Lehmden]

Hi.
As started in the Post about Bamboo theme I like to introduce my new MP2 Skin project BackVision2. This is based on MP2's main Skin Titanium by @morpheus_xx and benefits a lot from the nice work @ge2301 has done to Bamboo theme. The goal of this theme is to give the user as much fanart as possible. It's inspired by the beautiful but dead Backdrop Skin for MP1 and my recent favourite MP1 Skin PureVisionHD. And that's where the name of the theme came from too.

Instead of showing the same background over and over again BackVision2 changes the background of the screen to fit to the recent action. For this there are no button gfx, only text. But you can see at first glance which item has focus as the background really is visible from any viewing position.

To give you some impressions here are some screenshots:

Those are all views from home screen.

This is the series overview:

And here is a first look to movies section.

A pre- release version can be found inside the Bamboo thread. But expect some major glitches on that version.

I will need some days to sort out some remaining glitches before I can release a first "working" version...

 

[Ericjuh]

This looks great! Hope a good beta will come out soon. REally looking forward to check this out.

 

[Lehmden]

Hi.
Thank you.
I'm stuck with two issues atm. First is I can't focus the hidden menu (not with remote and also not with mouse) and I don't know why. I've done something wrong and need to find what.

The other seems to be a bug in a plugin needed for this skin (background manager plugin). This is working flawlessly as long as I haven't played any Video. After I played a video only the "fall-back" background is shown until MP2 is restarted.
Those are the two remaining serious issues need to be fixed before this is ready for release.

 

[morpheus_xx]

You can attach your version here and I try to help

 

[Lehmden]

Hi.
Here it is.
There are also some more minor glitches I need to fix before it's ready but on those two I'm stuck atm...

 

[Lehmden]

Hi.
Little update. The issue with the not reachable hidden menu is on series only. As I don't change anything there up to now this really is weird. Movies, music, pictures, news,... all is working normal...

 

[Ericjuh]

Hey Lehmden,

Anymore progress on this skin? Figured out the bugs? This thread really needs more reply's.

 

[Lehmden]

Hi.
Thanks for asking.
Atm there is no progress. This is for three reasons.

First. I'm busy writing a MediaLibrary Migration and Editing tool. This is desperately needed and there is no one who has time to do it excerpt me.

Second. I want to rebase the Skin on Apollo One as there are lot more options available than with Titanium as base. Apollo One is under heavy construction right now but not jet ready, so it will take another month or so until I can continue.

Third. I need a dev to fix the issues with the "background manager plugin" but we're really short on manpower in this area. The plugin is needed for changing background pictures depending on selected menu items. It's working as long as you don't play any video. After playing it simply does nothing any more until you restart MP2-Client....

I'm not smart enough to understand "modern" programming languages like C#. Maybe I'm too old for those. I need to use "old fashioned" languages like AutoIt as I learned programming in the early 1980th (Basic on Commodore C64 and later on Amiga). But with those I can't write MediaPortal plugins, only stand-alone tools as MKV Buddy is...

This do not mean the project is dead. I definitely want this skin to be usable for myself, so one day it will be finished. But I can't tell you when atm, sorry.

 

[dfraga]

Did you ever get back to this? It looks fantastic! I really hope if you haven't that you will at some point. I'd really like to try it out.

 

[Lehmden]

Hi.
I will come back to this, also I don't know when. But before I can continue I need a dev fixing the "BackgroundManagerPlugin" as without this skin is not working...