Just a heads up, I'm reworking all the images used for CD and Record art, they weren't realistic enough for me, so I'm making them a part of the overhaul I'm doing. The next tweak I turn out will conform much closer to the existing confluence skin, modifying the original music vis screen with the enhancements posted by dfmos.
regarding the artwork changes, the CD is being altered to show the proper blurring effect of spinning radians. Look at a ceiling fan. If you focus on the spinning blades, they're just a blurry circle. If you focus your eyes past them, you'll see individual, very blurry blades rotating seemingly much slower, or even stationary. A CD should have the same effect as it refracts light in radians. I'm also making a reflection (we really need apng support), it should scatter light in the reflection, but I can't figure it out using the current tools (without creating 2 dozen images). I'll keep working on that. As usual, the still screenshot does it no justice, but the next submission will be significantly more aesthetic.
The record art will also be changing, as the previous used a label that was cut & pasted from a deviant art image. I figured if there was to be any change of an official release, it would require unique artwork with no possible contention from the creator. Everything I post from here on out will be original and free for use by XBMC.
The biggest issue will be integrating the different features in a way that fits with the general look of the confluence skin.
Here's what I have so far:
Basically, it's just the default with the animation added so far. I've removed the auto-hide from the bottom bar so that info will stay up.
Weather, Clock and RSS will be added back, but much more discretely. I'm ditch the mini-visualization all together, I could never get it to look good and still size correctly. Full screen visualization can be toggled in the OSD, selecting "None" will display fan art.
I was thinking about grouping everything in the bar below, and fading it out after 10 seconds, while fading in weather, time and date etc in the same area. That would fade back to track info after another 10 seconds. Track time elapsed and the progress bar will stay visible. What do you think? Good? Bad?
Any suggestions, comments, things I've screwed up... Let me know. Since I'm starting over from the ground up, now is the time to mention anything you want included. I'll drop a package with the code and images in a couple of days when all the kinks are ironed out.
