[ronie]

what it is:
this addon will download images of the currently playing artist from the last.fm and/or htbackdrops.com websites.
the skin you're using can use these images to create a slideshow on the visualization screen (or anywhere else in the skin).


why:
i've seen many requests on the forum lately from users who'd like to have a slideshow in the music visualization screen.

divingmule created the excellent Last.FM-SlideShow which runs as a picture-plugin and can't be used in the visualization window.

so i did a re-write of his script in a way that it allows for easy skin integration and can be started automatically when entering the visualization screen.
i've combined it with the ImageCacher script from grajen3, that will cache all the images downloaded from last.fm to your harddrive.
(benefit: if you play a song by the same artist again, the images won't have to be re-downloaded, so no more waiting for the download to finish)


addon settings:
since not all images on last.fm are of equal quality, there's a chance some low-res ones will show up in your slideshow.
if this bothers you, go to the addon settings and specify a min. width and/or height for the images the script should download.


info for skinners:

In MusicVisualisation.xml:

- 1) Run the script:

Code:

<onload>RunScript(script.artistslideshow)</onload>

- 2) Add a multiimage conrol:

Code:

<control type="multiimage">
    <posx>0</posx>
    <posy>0</posy>
    <width>1280</width>
    <height>720</height>
    <imagepath background="true">$INFO[Window(Visualisation).Property(ArtistSlideshow)]</imagepath>
    <aspectratio>keep</aspectratio>
    <timeperimage>5000</timeperimage>
    <fadetime>2000</fadetime>
    <randomize>true</randomize>
</control>

that's it. see the included readme for more info.


download:
the addon is available in the official addon repo, for both dharma and eden