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The Arctic Skin
junk - 6-3-2004 at 08:04 PM

The Arctic skin by Fishy and me can be downloaded below:
(Save the zip file to eJukebox' skins folder - usually C:Program FileseJukeboxSkinsArctic.zip)

http://audiosoft.net/Arctic.zip

19.07.2005:
During the lasts couple of months, Fishy has done a lot of adjusting to the skin to fit eJ's new features, including:

*Now playing images now scales better on a resized now playing panel
* Changed colors on images in artistlist and songlist
* Better looking playlist with use of gradients.

Last update:
27.06.2004 - Added albumlist colors and background files


Fishy - 6-3-2004 at 10:48 PM

For those who didn't know. The green 'marsian' at the left side on that crazy coverimage is Junk. Glad I am not represented :D
*teasing*


Audiosoft - 6-3-2004 at 11:14 PM

Really nice work guys!! :D

Couple of things you may want to fix....
In homeview.ini you should probally change:
[Main]
BorderColor=#242DB6
to
[Main]
BorderColor=#001123

Also why not update the timeelapsed.jpg image (like the attached file) so it is not the same as timeempty.jpg and change the Border color in colors.ini like this:

[PlayTime ProgressBar]
Background=3024155
Border=3024155
nonElapsedBG=6178346


Fishy - 6-4-2004 at 12:00 AM

Nice suggestions! Already tried them out and they look great. Can't belive I have overseen that it's possible to change that background in the homeview all the time.. For some reason I had decided that it was not possible :D

Thanks for pointing these out for us!


junk - 6-4-2004 at 05:32 AM

Thanks for the info, i've updated the archive so it contains these changes.

And Fishy, you had to tell, didn't you? ;P You know i got some albums by you with some mighty fine pictures of yourself as coverart... so for the next screenshot, we'll get everything out in the open. ;)


Pirk - 6-4-2004 at 05:01 PM

Congratulations! Junk and Fishy for your excellent work... Your skin look really great!


Junk, as i've read on your site that you like to redesign all the original interfaces of your computers... Have you ever tried to design a complete new theme for Windows XP? You could also apply to Windows your good "Nordic touch" than you have the secret!
If you have already made something like that on a PC i would be very interested... :)

Thanks again for your skin!


junk - 6-4-2004 at 06:31 PM

Aha, you must be referring to the old site at http://www.skarv.net/desk/

Actually, in 1998, me and Fishy nearly completed in a giant project for a complete graphical setup for Windows, Linux, Amiga OS - much in the style of the Arctic skin - but we gave up more or less because neither of us could handle the html coding enough to get the site the way we wanted. But we had some beautiful desktops back then. :)


Pirk - 6-4-2004 at 07:04 PM

Ah ok... so you have already tried that with Fishy!! :) It's a shame that you give up because of the html coding... and yes, your desktops was beautiful on your Amiga!

I would like to found a "night" theme for XP with very dark menus and backgrounds, but those i've already tried only concern the desktop and its icons, not the entire windows and frames, or they are in the windows 98 style...


Fishy - 6-4-2004 at 08:10 PM

Pirk: Tried any shell replacements? I think they can do a few interesting things, if one configures them properly. Things like windowblinds tend to be very system heavy and bloated compared to shell replacements. Litestep is a good example of a nice shell replacement. Actually feels a bit faster than the explorer.exe shell. And there are some very clever skindevelopers in the litestep community.

Since you are talking about desktops and such I though I might bring us further off topic. This is my old Linux desktop. Not as "homemade" and stylish as Junks, but I was pretty proud of it back then :D. I actually used this thing for half a year or so. Wonder how much damage I took from it ;)

link

I used a windowmanger named enlightenment, really cool. Possible to change just about everything in the gui through configurationfiles simular to .dis files.


Pirk - 6-4-2004 at 09:23 PM

I've already played with windowsblind on windows 98, and linux installations too, with several harddrive partitions and a multiboot loader, and some big crashs too! But since i use win xp i've never tried something else! I've stopped my risky shell experimentations...

I don't know Litestep, i'll have a look!

Nice, your linux desktop... ;)


Fishy - 6-4-2004 at 09:40 PM

heh, just remember that one learns more when encountering painful problems :D


jhlurie - 6-11-2004 at 03:33 PM

Great skin, guys. I've been wanting a "dark" skin for a while--too much brightness is bad for you. :-)

One really minor weakness. The collapse/expand point on the side doesn't noticeably change color when you rest your cursor on it. It only does so when you actually click on it. The default skin changes color at that point (when your cursor is simply resting on it)--making it much easier to see.

Oddly enough the collapse/expand point on the bottom DOES change color on your skin. Only the one on the side doesn't work.


Fishy - 6-11-2004 at 04:00 PM

Assuming that you meant the collapseborder at the right in the now playing panel: Yes there was something Fishy about that one :D

Totally my fault. Not using that function a lot therefore I (egocentrically) "forgot" to change its respective colors in the colors.ini file. I've done it now though and will upload it to Junk who will include it in the skin. (The skin is hosted at his site)

Thanks a lot! Please feel free to notify us if you see other artifacts.. I am quite sure there are more of those ;)


junk - 6-11-2004 at 04:52 PM

Thanks for the feedback; just recieved the appropriate files from Fishy, and the skin is now updated with these changes:

* Vertical contractborder highlights on mouseover.
* Larger threshold and a smaller area dedicated for scrolling..


jhlurie - 6-11-2004 at 05:08 PM

Where's that collapseborder color set? I've re-downloaded the skin, but the behavior doesn't seem to have changed.


Fishy - 6-11-2004 at 05:18 PM

In colors.ini

:Interactive

[NowPlayingRight]
Background=2035712
HiBackground=6770483
Style=4

In my ej the bar lights up in light blue on mouse over. Sure that your arctic directory has become properly updated? Try to delete the /images/artic and import the skin from the tools menu. The shot shows the bar on mouse over:




http://home.online.no/~tr-nord/shotej.jpg


I start to suspect that we are talking about different collapse points here. Do you mean the image in the bottom right corner in the now playing panel? Or that long vertical bar beside the nowplaying and playlist? I changed the latter.

If you mean the black bottom right image in the now playing Junk has to take affair. He is responsible for the graphical properities of the skin.


jhlurie - 6-11-2004 at 05:44 PM

I definintely mean the long vertical bar beside the nowplaying and playlist.

I don't know. It's strange. I've just checked my colors.ini, inside that zip, and the values match your new ones. The file's timestamp is updated too--I'm not using some old copy. It just plain doesn't work. It's bizarre.

I had my tansparency set to about 50%, but turning it off didn't fix the problem either. And yet, like before, the bar DOES light up when you actually click on it. But during a mouseover? Nothing. It stays black as pitch (well actually dark blue).

Nobody else here has posted about the skin, so I can't comment if its just my lone bizarre problem.


Fishy - 6-11-2004 at 06:12 PM

hmm I have experienced in some weird cases that I had to delete everything inside the /images/arctic/ folder and extract the files manually from the zip-file into images/arctic/ to get the skin to update correctly. Don't know if you've tried that.

However it's rather odd since your file actually matches the one in the zip. Really don't know what's going on here...


jhlurie - 6-11-2004 at 06:36 PM

Wait, I misunderstood you earlier. I was looking inside the copy of the zip sitting inside the Skins folder, not the unextracted "copy" made in "images" when you first load the skin.

Yes, deleting THAT version and reloading the skin works. Alll better now.


Fishy - 6-12-2004 at 05:02 AM

Jhlurie: Great! Glad it worked in the end :)

Junk: How are your gif animation skills? Realize that the animated cd in now playing (cd1.gif and cd2.gif) could need some altering to correspond with the dark colors of the skin... Maybe also follow that tip from audiosoft in another post to change the header and top image more radically.. It's also possible to have separate background images under the title, album and songname in now playing.

Maybe, if you have some time on your hands, you could play a little with those?


Pirk - 6-12-2004 at 01:48 PM

Quote:
Maybe, if you have some time on your hands, you could play a little with those?

Read! ;) :D


Fishy - 6-12-2004 at 02:12 PM

Pirk: Read yourself :b I am still eagerly awaiting the htpc version of this skin.. :D


Pirk - 6-12-2004 at 02:28 PM

Currently i'm "working" one another completely new songlist skin... (I don't know yet if it will be good for htpcs, or not!)
Otherwise your present Arctic skin proved to be already quite good for a TV!
If a have some time... :( Sorry if i'm not always very persistent.


junk - 6-13-2004 at 12:38 PM

Hm, when it comes to making animgifs, i come to short, i am afraid. But the background for the text in Now playing is possible ofcourse, but what do you have in mind? Because i guess it might be even better to implement these effects directly in the now playing background, since the text positions are becoming more and more fixed (due to scrolling).


jhlurie - 6-14-2004 at 05:01 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by junk
Hm, when it comes to making animgifs, i come to short, i am afraid. But the background for the text in Now playing is possible ofcourse, but what do you have in mind? Because i guess it might be even better to implement these effects directly in the now playing background, since the text positions are becoming more and more fixed (due to scrolling).

Get a program like "GIF Construction Set" to help out, or "Animation Shop" from JASC.

The Playlist area seems like a good location for an Animated GIF--it works well there as a background, although it's got to be an image that can gradually have it's top cut off as you add songs and still look good.


junk - 6-14-2004 at 06:46 AM

Well, i'd hate eJukebox to become annoying in any way... so i am sceptical towards any movement, animation or otherwise, that does not attract your attention without a purpose. At the moment, i am not very happy with the scrolling the "now playing" panel, because it is distracting - but it is the only way to have big enough fonts at the moment. But i am looking forward to when Audiosoft makes a version where you can have a wider "now playing" panel. On that joyous day, we can all enjoy big fonts without having to scroll or break the lines, a large album image (300x300 would suffice), bigger buttons for the panel etc... But this is a big step and would demand a redesign from Audiosoft, so i guess it might take some time, if we get it at all.


Fishy - 6-14-2004 at 02:09 PM

Agree with this one. Horizontal resizing would take care of many problems. The lack of space in the playlist, possible to have larger coverimages in now playing, larger fonts etc etc... This could be a thing for 4.0 maybe? It sure would open up for a lot of possibilites...


Pirk - 6-14-2004 at 04:45 PM

I also would appreciate a lot to see images in 300x300 in the now playing panel!
That would make the difference in comparison to the songlist and the albumlist images... Now that album images are displayed everywhere at the same time, the now playing album needs to be better distinguished!

I also hope this development will be included from v4.0, even if i know that require a major restructuring of the layout! But as with the version 4 we will start a new version number, i also think that would be a GOOD BASIS for the futur developments of eJukebox... :)


jhlurie - 6-14-2004 at 05:39 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by junk
Well, i'd hate eJukebox to become annoying in any way... so i am sceptical towards any movement, animation or otherwise, that does not attract your attention without a purpose.

Yes, but you have to recall that many people use eJ in "party mode" (be it on a large monitor or TV screen) and a flashy interface is good for those occasions.

That's the good thing about skins--you can change them for different circumstances.


junk - 6-14-2004 at 10:50 PM

Hehe, yes, this is true as well... when in "party mode", it is nice with some action on the screen. I guess that if we get a great idea or a suggestion, we could even make two versions of the skin - one more "active", for party modes, and one more laidback, for desktop usage.


Audiosoft - 6-24-2004 at 01:53 AM

v3.85, will automatically detected changes to SkinName.zip files in the Skins folder (i.e. new version of the same skin) and reload the skinname.zip contents to its images folder. That way you can update your skin and when users replace the old SkinName.zip it will use the updated Skin in eJukebox. So you will no longer need to delete the associated folder under images/ to get it to reload.


Fishy - 6-24-2004 at 04:06 PM

Ah.. great that you keep improving the skin engine :).

Have you also added the possibility to change the color of the scrollbar in the albumlist? Think I saw it mentioned in a post a while ago, but I am not sure..
it would also be terrific if one could change the size of the fonts under [ArtistBarLetters] in colors.ini..


Audiosoft - 6-24-2004 at 06:44 PM

Yes, in v3.85, if you want to change the album list scrollbars you can now add a file named albumlistscroll.dis with the following contents to your skin:


body {
scrollbar-face-color: #87B8EA;
scrollbar-shadow-color: #87B8EA;
scrollbar-highlight-color: #FFFFFF;
scrollbar-3dlight-color: #87B8EA;
scrollbar-darkshadow-color: #87B8EA;
scrollbar-track-color: #D6D6D6;
scrollbar-arrow-color: #FFFFFF;
}

*After changing or reloading Skins inside eJukebox...you must manually refresh the album list to see any skin changes (albumlistscroll.dis and savedalbumlist.ini) on it.


Fishy - 6-25-2004 at 12:06 AM

;) Sounds exellent..

Noticed the scrollbar-3dlight "tag", that's a new one. Can it be used in ie the songlist scrollbar as well, from 3.85 and beyond?


Audiosoft - 6-25-2004 at 12:41 AM

Actually, you could already use "scrollbar-3dlight" in the songlist.dis before v3.85.


Fishy - 6-25-2004 at 09:20 PM

hmm there is something in arctic that is not compatible with the new fixes in the now playing panel. As you can see from this screenshot the albumtitle is cut and it shows only the half of it vertically. This happens both when scrolling/not scrolling. And seems undependent of the fontsizes of songtitle and artisttitle. It did not happen in versions prior to 3.86, with the same settings in the nowplaying.dis.
Any suggestions for fixes?






http://home.no.net/fishyno/arcticbugged.jpg


Audiosoft - 6-25-2004 at 10:00 PM

You will need to add the following under .albumtitle in the nowplaying.dis to fix this:

line-height: 12px;


Fishy - 6-25-2004 at 10:04 PM

Ah thanks! :)


junk - 6-26-2004 at 11:48 AM

The Arctic skin is again updated.

* New colors in the albumlist scrollbar, the same with the home view.
* Changes in the progressbars


Fishy - 6-26-2004 at 04:16 PM

Also the buttons in the mainview now look more like "buttons", instead of the flat style used in earlier revisions..


Audiosoft - 6-26-2004 at 04:27 PM

If anyone is having a problem with the Tools menu or the right click songlist menu ALWAYS taking a long time to show up after installing an updated skin.zip to the Skins folder...you can redownload the v3.86 upgrade to fix this problem.

There is a bug in the initial release of v3.86 that caused updated skin.zip files to be reload EVERY time the Tools or right click songlist menu was opened....instead of recognizing that the updated skin data no longer needs to be reinstalled again.

This could also cause more problems for skin developers as everytime you go to view the updates to your /images/skinname folder by reloading the skin in eJukebox your last skinname.zip in the Skins folder will reload over your changes in the same skinname folder under /images. Please re-upgrade to v3.86 to fix this. The ejukebox.exe file version on the final/fixed version of v3.86 is 3.86.0.2.


BTW the latest Artic skin looks great! Any plans to include a "savedalbumlist.ini" in the skin to change the albumlist colors/background?


Fishy - 6-26-2004 at 05:45 PM

You mean the ejukebox.ini where the (path to) plastic bag, font colors of albums etc. are stored? I thought it was included in the zip already. I will send it to Junk right away..


Audiosoft - 6-26-2004 at 06:03 PM

Actually, you are not supposed to include ejukebox.ini in your skin.zip as it won't do anything....

If you wish to include your albumlist colors and background image in your skin...you need to go into the album list options and click the "Color Sets" button and Select "Save". Then copy "C:Program FileseJukeboximagessavedalbumlist.ini" and "C:Program FileseJukeboximagessavedalbumlistbac.xxx" to your Skin's images folder and "Your Skin Name.zip"


Fishy - 6-27-2004 at 01:08 AM

Aha I see! I bet Junk wil add the file shortly.

Junk: I took the freedom to fool a little around with gele.jpg.. The songlist background.. I now this is your domain, but I think the colors of the orginal was a little intense (or maybe I just felt for a change...) So I tried to tone it down a little.. The result isn't that good though, since I don't have these huges skills in this area.. But I think the contrast between the nowplaying/playlist vs albumlist/songlist is interesting..

Fullscreen screenshot:


http://home.no.net/fishyno/ej.jpg


junk - 6-27-2004 at 01:12 PM

Nice! :) I've updated the archive now to include the savedalbumlist .ini and background picture. I'll look into the songlist background... i agree that it can be intense in especially one area, maybe something should be done... I can see that the red/burgundy color makes it stand out a bit in contrast to the dark blue. So although i like it, maybe it becomes too strange for others?


Fishy - 6-27-2004 at 01:21 PM

The background is very nice :)

But I maybe think some small color enhancements could be done with the plastic bag and songlist background to make them integrate better with the color of buttons and bars in the main view?


junk - 7-3-2004 at 11:11 PM

Yep, i agree. Right now i am sitting at my friends' house, who uses a bright LCD monitor, as well a bigger resolution than i. And i can see that the backgrounds could use some alterations... i'll look into this when i get the time. Right now the summer vacation is dead ahead. :)


Fishy - 7-4-2004 at 02:28 AM

:D Same problem here... Dead ahead here too and I hope audiosoft will take a well deserved vacation themselves :)

The problems with our skin are more easily discovered at higher resolutions.. 1280x1024 and above..

You know, we got some tropical heat up here these days, you should look forward to check it out :D


junk - 7-4-2004 at 09:14 AM

Yes, it took a higher resolution for me to see it as well. I am still running on 1024*768 (or actually, 3072*768). By the way, you can delete your double post by editing it and checking "delete this message".


Fishy - 7-4-2004 at 02:21 PM

huh! Didn't know that. Thanks a lot! It works too :)


Fishy - 6-3-2005 at 06:08 PM

I've done a few small twitches to make the skin appear a little better with a larger Now Playing area. Please feel free to try it out.

Arctic.zip


Fishy - 6-3-2005 at 06:09 PM

And a shot (and maybe some recommended albums and films.):


http://home.no.net/fishyno/arctic.jpg


Pirk - 6-3-2005 at 08:31 PM

Good! Thank you Fishy :)


Fishy - 6-3-2005 at 08:36 PM

Just a pleasure :). This needs more work though. The Now playing header doesn't look so good when scaled etc. hmm I don't have photoshop available, so I can't test your bicubic resize trick either.. Guess I have to wake up Junk from his rest in the grave :)


Pirk - 6-3-2005 at 08:42 PM

Ok, it's a good idea...

Come on, wake up Junk! There is life again here... :P


Audiosoft - 6-3-2005 at 08:44 PM

Here's another tip on making graphics files for the images that get horizontally streched by eJukebox: Change the dimensions (width only) of the graphic file in your image editor so that it is as wide as it would be when stretched inside eJukebox. That way the image has enough pixels to look good at all widths.


Pirk - 6-3-2005 at 08:59 PM

I think it's the same Tip Audiosoft! ;) as "Bicubic resizing" is the default option in Photoshop when you save a image...


Pirk - 6-3-2005 at 09:21 PM

Fishy, glad to learn that I support a "Stor Saftig Biff production"!! :cool:

But... what does it means?? :D
It's safe at least I hope?! :o

;)


Fishy - 6-3-2005 at 09:40 PM

Thanks for the tip guys!

LOL! It means "huge juicy steak productions" ;) Ah! hehe, some jargon that Junk added to the info file? :)

The truth is that is something I said to a girl at high school many years ago. We had an argue and I told her to put her teeth into a huge juicy steak (she had kindof huge teeth). Stupid but true :D


Pirk - 6-3-2005 at 09:54 PM

Yes, I've just seen the readme file in your skin... :)
It's better late than never! :D

Ah ah, ok! lol You haved strange ideas... :D


Fishy - 6-3-2005 at 10:14 PM

Ok. I have done some small changes to the skin (link earlier in the thread). There are still issues, but it's a start.


Pirk - 6-3-2005 at 10:43 PM

A start on good basis! :)

Thanks.


Fishy - 6-3-2005 at 10:51 PM

hmm.. Long album texts tends to go underneith the visual field in the now playing panel. Either I have to reduce the fontsizes or maybe ejukebox only should scale the image to a specified size and after this give more room to the text information in the panel. A third, and maybe the best sollution, could be to make it so ejukebox doesn't break textlines when one resizes the now playing panel horizontally. Do you think this makes sense? :)


Audiosoft - 6-4-2005 at 12:11 AM

Fishy,

Here is a new playlist.dis that I made that uses gradients...thought you might want to see how it is coded to get an idea of the possibilities for using gradients in the other dis files. If you want to test it out you can just save the dis file to the eJukebox/images folder and switch to the default skin. Make a backup of the original playlist.dis first if you want.


Audiosoft - 6-4-2005 at 12:16 AM

Here is a screenshot:


Fishy - 6-4-2005 at 01:33 AM

Thanks a lot! I've updated the skin with some gradient effects in the playlist and Now Playing panel. Definately room for improvement though :b


Audiosoft - 6-4-2005 at 01:58 AM

Your skin is looking good!

Also, wanted to let you know that when you specify the colors of the gradient you can add 2 digits to the start of the HEX color to set how much the gradient fades with the background.

#FF0000 = normal red
#00FF0000 = all background shown
#55FF0000 = faded 1/2 background - 1/2 red
#99FF0000 = all red gradient shown

Just be carefull as using this technique can effect performance when allot of elements in the display get the effect applied. See that the.dis file doesn't make the display respond too slowly.

For the most part only use it in the body{} section of the dis file to set a background and gradient.


junk - 6-4-2005 at 02:51 AM

Haha! :D The big, juicy steak indeed! The girl mentioned certainly deserved that eloquently put comment from our dear fishy.

But! Great to see eJ is renewing itself. I had begun to lose hope of any real development, and at the same time, eJ served its purpose. It has been running 24/7 at my system the last two years or so, and served its purpose. But there are still so many features i want, and big album covers has been there for a long time. If one were to search the "requested features" thread, one would see me nagging about all sorts of things, the covers included.

As in the old days, i am posting at night, this time in an only slightly intoxicated state. I know me and Fishy have spent many drunken nights at this forum, and it has been nice to see that he has kept up the habit.

The future is bright once again! :)


Pirk - 6-4-2005 at 01:23 PM

Really? :D Bloody Fishy! lol

Glad to see you here again Junk! ;)


Pirk - 6-4-2005 at 01:50 PM

Quote:
Message original : Fishy
hmm.. Long album texts tends to go underneith the visual field in the now playing panel. Either I have to reduce the fontsizes or maybe ejukebox only should scale the image to a specified size and after this give more room to the text information in the panel. A third, and maybe the best sollution, could be to make it so ejukebox doesn't break textlines when one resizes the now playing panel horizontally. Do you think this makes sense? :)


Yes I agree, I also think there is a problem with the Album names. They are often hidden by the player buttons when text is long and you use big fonts, because it turn in 2 lines and the second line is hidden. Or it's necessary to put an abnormally low value to the scroll width in order to scroll even the short album names...


Fishy - 6-5-2005 at 02:54 AM

Junk:

As Pirk stated, nice to hear from you at the forum again!
This forums needs your crazy wishes and rationale behind those. So please keep it up!

What Can I say? Thank you for recommending this brilliant and ever developing software. I sure will not apologize for anything just yet and I will not stop supporting it.
By the way: Are you going to look at me messing up our skin or would you like to take a part in the process? ;)

And we sure would love to hear the continously voices from other people who uses the arctic skin with ejukebox for possible improvements we could make! Due to screenshots around the forum I got reasons to believe that someone actually uses this thing, which I'm sure we both enjoy a lot.


rlailey - 6-5-2005 at 10:24 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Fishy
And we sure would love to hear the continously voices from other people who uses the arctic skin with ejukebox for possible improvements we could make!

Yeah I use the Artic skin - it seems about the best.

I run a widescreen screen and the repeating background pattern in the Now Playing area on Artic looks a bit wierd when it flicks from one track to the next as this pattern joins-up in the middle somewhere as opposed to at the edge on a 4:3 screen. Perhaps a more grainy pattern to disguise this join or one of Audiosofts new gradients as a background solution may help us 16:9 users?


Pirk - 6-5-2005 at 10:57 AM

Quote:
Message original : Fishy
Junk:
... By the way: Are you going to look at me messing up our skin or would you like to take a part in the process? ;) ...

The threat is terrific Junk... Sure, you can't let Fishy make that! :D
;)


Fishy - 6-8-2005 at 11:45 AM

rlailey;

Are you using the latest edition (link at top of this thread)?
In this edit I've scaled the images so they don't tile when you increase/decrease the size of the panels. Is this what you meant, or have I misunderstood? Could you provide an illustrating screenshot?


junk - 6-9-2005 at 10:47 AM

I might know what he is referring to, if it is a mismatch with the background pattern in the "now playing" when you play songs without covers. I designed it before we changed the font sizes, and that is why it looks askew all the time. I have been meaning to change it , allthough i have to admit that i haven't really had time to experiment a lot with eJukebox the last four months or so. The new resizing feature of the "now playing", along with the bigger covers is really interesting, i should look into that before i figure out what would be the optimal solution... but now it just sounds like i am postponing it, haha. Perhaps it is better if Fishy and the rest of you Arctic skin users specify the most important graphical issues, and then i will do the fixes once in a while. It can be quite cosy to work with such things for hungover sundays once in a while. :)


rlailey - 6-9-2005 at 06:29 PM

Yeah I am using the latest version and Yes I think you're right Pirk it's what you say. Here's an image taken between tracks, see how the image has a line down it in the middle(ish)

http://www.lailey.co.uk/unequal.jpg


Pirk - 6-9-2005 at 07:24 PM

rlailey,

You mean me Pirk? or rather Fishy no? ;)


rlailey - 6-10-2005 at 07:08 AM

Ha! No I acutally meant Junk


Pirk - 6-10-2005 at 08:31 AM

Ah OK! :D


junk - 6-10-2005 at 10:12 AM

I see what you mean! Sure, this can be easily fixed by extending the background.. i would not resize it, but expand the canvas to the bottom and the right, and add more texture and shades to the right and bottom areas.


rlailey - 6-10-2005 at 11:03 PM

Yeah it all sounds too graphicalitusilly complicated to me - guess I'll have to wait till your Sunday hangover kicks in for this to be fixed.

Is the quality of your work directly proportional to the extent of the hangover? If so, drink loads!


Pirk - 6-11-2005 at 09:58 AM

Well, OK you are right rlailey! :D So now we know how our Norvegian friends can make their famous "Arctic" backgrounds:
Probably -the morning after- they just take photos of the floor at the end of the night... :o

Quote:
http://www.lailey.co.uk/unequal.jpg

;)

A Stor Saftig Biff production... :D :D :D


Fishy - 6-23-2005 at 10:41 PM

rlailey: hmm.. that does not look like the latest version, where the images in the now playing are made more suitable for a wider now playing area. 700 is the width of the images in that version and it never tiles, at least not on the 1600x1200 display I've tested it on. What is your resolution?

Go to the top of page 3 in this thread and get the arctic.zip file in the bottom of my post, unless you've already done that.

Junk: Could you add this lateste version to the first post in the thread and credit the changes please? Even if your not satisfied with the artwork in it's current state, it still looks better than when the images get tiled all over the place. The version at the top of page 2 can serve as a temporary sollution until you get to fix the images more directly. I know, from experience, that it often can take a while ;)


Pirk - 6-23-2005 at 10:50 PM

Hi Fishy!
Have you tried the famous new 3.98 version? It's OK for you, or not??

Thanks for your skin maintenance! ;)


Fishy - 6-23-2005 at 10:58 PM

hmm.. no it does not work on this computer (a borrowed portable computer with a fresh winxp /w sp2 localized version installed). I did a clean installation of it on this computer. I do not get further than the splashscreen. Weird.

I don't know if it works through an upgrade at my regular pc as I am on a summer vacation.

hehe.. thanks for being a posting freak! VIVA! :D


Pirk - 6-23-2005 at 11:15 PM

Ok... thanks Fishy ;)

Have a good holiday! :cool:


Fishy - 6-23-2005 at 11:55 PM

Right back at you :)


Fishy - 6-24-2005 at 01:41 AM

rlailey : Sorry. I should have read the whole thread before I responded. The image tiles only when ejukebox switches tracks right?

Hmm.. have you tried to scale this image yourself to see if you get better results on your 16:9 display? Thought that I had scaled all the images up to a width at around '700', but I might have missed this one..


junk - 7-19-2005 at 07:21 PM

Hi! I also recently installed eJ with Fishy's currently newest skin editions, and it worked fine. Fishy, The adjustments you've made made it look good on a big screen indeed!

But for some strange reason, the animgif Audiosoft used to use in the forum, the bouncing note with the sunglasses, was displayed for the songs without album art. Drove me quite mental after 10 seconds... :o


Pirk - 7-19-2005 at 08:11 PM

Hi junk! :)

;)


junk - 7-20-2005 at 12:44 AM

Great to see that you're still out there (or would that be in here?), Pirk! :)


Fishy - 5-7-2006 at 02:47 PM

Arctic is updated. The filters in the now playing panel is removed and replaced with a background that uses these filters (ty Pirk)


Pirk - 5-7-2006 at 04:23 PM

Thank you! ;)


Fishy - 5-10-2006 at 01:31 AM

Arctic is updated again.

*New transparent playlist. Looks better I think.

*New more matching background in the songlist.

Having a hard time making the play progressbar looking good. Since I don't have photoshop available, it's kindof difficult to get it right :(

Suggestions for improvement are welcomed!


Audiosoft - 5-10-2006 at 02:19 AM

Looks great Fishy!

One suggestion. When the song changes and the now playing panel is animated there is white flickering on the left hand side. If you use Pirk's nowplay2.jpg instead of the filter it will fix that and look the same.

See http://www.audiosoft.net/forums/viewthread.php?tid=1465#pid73811


Fishy - 5-10-2006 at 03:43 PM

Hmm I thought I already used nowplay2.jpg in the skin? I don't get any flickering. Have to look into that later.


Pirk - 5-10-2006 at 07:09 PM

Fishy,

Are you sure you have updated the zip file on your site? Because I've downloaded your skin several times and I don't see any change when I use it!
And like says Audiosoft, I can't see the updated nowplay image.


Fishy - 5-11-2006 at 09:23 AM

hmm there seems to be a problem related to that site. I attach the update in this post then.

Audiosoft: Is there a possibility that you could give me access to edit the first post in this thread (junk's post). Since he don't hang so much around the forums anymore, it would be nice if I could edit that post so updates and credits end up in the first post in this thread.


Audiosoft - 5-11-2006 at 10:17 AM

Fishy,

Just let me know what link you want in the first post and I will change it. Or you could ask junk for his password if you want to also be able to edit the post text.


Fishy - 5-11-2006 at 04:55 PM

Got it to work now :) No problem!


rlailey - 5-11-2006 at 06:19 PM

I don't see any difference between this latest Artic and what I had before - perhaps it's because I manually edited the filters and stuff anyway?


Fishy - 5-11-2006 at 06:20 PM

hmm the playlist should look different. As well as the background in the songlist. If it doesn't there is still something wrong? grrr..


Pirk - 5-11-2006 at 07:33 PM

It seems to me that it's still not good.


Fishy - 5-11-2006 at 07:46 PM

hmm it should be. I just took a look in the Arctic.zip linked to at the first page in this thread, the updates I've done are included.

Try to extract the files in the new Arctic.zip archive to /images/Arctic and overwrite all the old files located there.


Pirk - 5-11-2006 at 08:16 PM

Ok, on your site this time that is good! :D

Thanks. ;)


Audiosoft - 8-19-2006 at 09:25 PM

I noticed a problem with the arctic.zip in the first post when installing the skin on a computer that did not already have an older version of the skin. The default artistlist is showing up instead of the arctic artistlist. The file 'artistlistX.dis' inside the arctic.zip needs to be renamed to 'artistlist.dis' otherwise eJukebox will put the default artistlist.dis in the images/arctic folder when arctic.zip is installed.

eJukebox renames the artistlist.dis to artistlistX.dis when only the a-z bar is visible so that less drawing resources are used. When making a skinname.zip make sure to rename it back to artistlist.dis if the X is in the file name.

While you are at it please drop in the bmp images that make up the large play controls so that my favorite skin will look good with v4.0!


Fishy - 8-20-2006 at 02:30 PM

Hi, I think I've fixed it now. Please notify me if I haven't :)


Audiosoft - 8-20-2006 at 11:07 PM

Not fixed yet...the zip in the first post is still the same with the artistlistX.dis instead of artistlist.dis


Fishy - 8-21-2006 at 05:59 PM

Hmm that is weird. When I download the zip from the first post I do not find a artistlistX file when browsing the archive. In addition, the new play controls are found in the archive. I've on several occations experienced that ejukebox doesn't extract the stuff from the zip file correctly after an update. I have used to solve this problem by manually extracting the images from the zip file to /images/skinname


Pirk - 8-21-2006 at 07:42 PM

I'm with you Fishy! No "X" in your archive.. ;)


Audiosoft - 8-21-2006 at 08:02 PM

ah ha my firefox was not downloading the updated zip...thanks it works good now except one problem:

The top of the songlist.dis is missing:


table {
background-color: transparent;
}

Right now all there is there is a lonely "}" at the top of songlist.dis which is making the songlist background white when using the normal font/skin size. songlist-large.dis and songlist-Xlarge.dis are good and do not have this problem.


Pirk - 8-21-2006 at 08:14 PM

This time I'm with Audiosoft! :D


Fishy - 8-21-2006 at 11:23 PM

Aha, never used songlist.dis for else than testing. Good eye! Fixed, I hope :) Don't hesitate if there are other things that need fixing. I will do my best.


CiXel - 9-11-2006 at 01:07 PM

Just an observation:
The artic skin is featured on the front page, however when you click on it and look in the first post there is a URL that points to a 404 error page.

Perhaps we should remedy this so people don't get frustrated when just starting out...


dinodino - 9-29-2006 at 11:04 PM

A litttle modifications

ect. text size/color, backgrounds, The background behind `play now cover`is change to black to prevent the wird action of the old blue background ´hang by the cover then flipping`,feels more seemless...


Fishy - 9-29-2006 at 11:25 PM

Cool, could you post your edit? I might just as well throw somr of them into the official version :)


dinodino - 9-29-2006 at 11:44 PM

Here is the edit from the image folder in ejukebox

It would be cool to make the small blue play bottons in playlist complete round without that Square edge aroundt it.


Fishy - 9-30-2006 at 12:12 AM

I will have a look at it tomorrow. I like the image you use in the playlist, it makes the area between upnext and the playlist a lot smoother. It needs to be scaled to fit the windows properly though. As it is now there is a black vertical line at the right side of the playlist. I don't know if I like a completely black background in the now playing area. But something has to be done with the progressbar. Personally, I am a fan of the play buttons, which are used in the original Arctic skin. I agree to your adjustments of fonts in the artistlist. By the way, Audiosoft has posted large playbuttons that are more suitable for dark skins. They are around in the forums somewhere. Please edit whatever you feel like, and please post if you do more edits :)


Audiosoft - 9-30-2006 at 12:15 AM

dinodino,

Here...you can save this gif over the old one in your 'images/Mit skins' folder to make the play icons in the playlist get rid of the square edges.


dinodino - 9-30-2006 at 10:59 AM

thanks very much Audiosoft for the gif. I agree that some of the backgrounds could be scald to fit even better to eachother and about the original background behind the `play now cover` I like it better than the black one but It should stay fixt and don`t "follow" the cover when flipping. :)


Fishy - 9-30-2006 at 12:17 PM

Ah, I see the problem now. I've never used that animation with the Arctic skin. I don't know if I can do anything to fix this or if something must be done behind the scenes (code)?
That animation can be easily disabled from options-->display, if you are willing to live without it :)


Fishy - 11-7-2006 at 01:51 AM

hmm I am wondering if my ISP has removed the Arctic.zip? The link doesn't work anymore, and I have not touched it. Maybe it generated more traffic than appreaciated? :b

I see that an alternative link is posted on the frontpage and it works fine!


crlove - 11-13-2006 at 01:57 AM

Is there a way to change the text color on the box that drops down when you choose an album. The song titles are gray or some other light color on white. I would like to use a darker text color.


Fishy - 11-13-2006 at 11:26 AM

Hmm.. I am not sure which box you are referring to. The songlist? I may make it a little darker, but for the sake of readability it can not be too dark either, since the background is almost black :)


crlove - 11-14-2006 at 01:05 AM

Yes I would call it the song list. When I click on an album in the album list a box drops down in the album area with the songs that are on the album. On my system the background for that area is white with gray or light letters for text and yellow for the highlighted song. Seems to be that way for the song list for the artist also.


Audiosoft - 11-14-2006 at 03:20 AM

lt looks like something is wrong with the Arctic.zip. I am looking into it. It is supposed to be a dark background but it is showing up white with the normal songlist size.

crlove,

To get it to look correct...right click on the songlist area and select 'Large' on the Skin/Font Size right click menu.


Audiosoft - 11-14-2006 at 03:29 AM

OK, I figured out the problem and have updated the Arctic.zip. The songlist.dis was somehow missing table { background-color: transparent;} at the top.

To install the updated skin save the following link as C:Program FileseJukeboxSkinsArctic.zip.
http://audiosoft.net/Arctic.zip


Fishy,

Should I just get rid of the http://home.no.net/fishyno/Arctic.zip link in the first post since it no longer seems to work?


crlove - 11-14-2006 at 05:08 AM

The songlist box looks great now. Thanks for such a quick fix.


Fishy - 11-14-2006 at 02:06 PM

Ah thanks Audiosoft :) Yes just get rid of it, my host is everything else than reliable. You can also drop the old screenshot if you want to. I can post updates through U2U or something.