2017-10-10, 13:15
Artwork Beef is not a requirement, and the author of the add-on explicitly stated that it not be included in any skin's dependency lists, so I complied. It's an alternative to Artwork Downloader, and if you switch to it, you'll have to change the way in which you handle artworks. The code that I've made for Artwork Beef is separate from Skin Helper, due to the fact that Artwork Beef does not download any artwork in a physical form. That's also why I've made it so that it will only activate if the add-on is present.
I personally prefer Artwork Beef because it has automatic management of movie set artwork, but it is different in both implementation and behaviour, so I'd advise being careful when reading the documentation, so as not to cause massive problems with your own artwork setup. There is Artwork Downloader compatibility mode within Artwork Beef, but there's still a chance of things going wrong with the database.
You might say that the add-on is supported, insofar as it will work once used, but it's in no way required, as Skin Helper + Artwork Downloader is the way 90% of Kodi users prefer to manage their artwork. Skin Helper's behaviour does not change based on whether Artwork Beef is there or not. In fact, Skin Helper's fanart functionality is switched off when it is present, but on the surface, there should be little to no difference with regards to actual performance (image rotation on all levels, etc).
While I suspect that Artwork Beef would generally be more suitable to your requirements, as I've found it to be more flexible, you'll lose features like automatic extrafanart folders, as Artwork Beef simply decided not to download artwork into the library as a design point. That feature exists only in Artwork Downloader. Of course, Artwork Beef can piggyback on existing local extrafanart if it is present, it will not place it in those folders in future artwork updates. You can find most such details in the dedicated thread.
I personally prefer Artwork Beef because it has automatic management of movie set artwork, but it is different in both implementation and behaviour, so I'd advise being careful when reading the documentation, so as not to cause massive problems with your own artwork setup. There is Artwork Downloader compatibility mode within Artwork Beef, but there's still a chance of things going wrong with the database.
You might say that the add-on is supported, insofar as it will work once used, but it's in no way required, as Skin Helper + Artwork Downloader is the way 90% of Kodi users prefer to manage their artwork. Skin Helper's behaviour does not change based on whether Artwork Beef is there or not. In fact, Skin Helper's fanart functionality is switched off when it is present, but on the surface, there should be little to no difference with regards to actual performance (image rotation on all levels, etc).
While I suspect that Artwork Beef would generally be more suitable to your requirements, as I've found it to be more flexible, you'll lose features like automatic extrafanart folders, as Artwork Beef simply decided not to download artwork into the library as a design point. That feature exists only in Artwork Downloader. Of course, Artwork Beef can piggyback on existing local extrafanart if it is present, it will not place it in those folders in future artwork updates. You can find most such details in the dedicated thread.