Allow original artwork in "Playing" Background [#16570]

[MikeGahrns]

In MM5 I really like that you can now get large artwork appearing in the main window when you click on Playing in the media tree. Nice job!

It took me a while to discover this, and also that by right clicking on it that I can configure it. I love that you can chose to go full screen, decide whether you want lyrics, etc.
I was getting a little nauseated with the artwork scrolling around, but found that that you can turn off the animation. Whew!

However, I was surprised that you only had two options for the artwork:

1) blur the background
2) darken the background

What happened to just display the original artwork that the artist intended, and have it fit the available screen space?

Blurred just doesn't work for me, but I suppose it would be good if you wanted to overlay the lyrics onto the background.

Darken background is OK, and seems like it might be good for low resolution artwork. But to me, with all the dots it looks quite ugly compared to higher resolution artwork. But the bigger problem is that since it not fit to screen space, a lot of stuff is cut off. A lot of album artwork has things like artist name, album name, and they are off from the center of the artwork so they truncated and aren't shown.

I added links to show what I mean with a couple of albums. First one has Darken Background and then I added a screen shot of what they might look like if the artwork was just the artwork taken from the .mp3 tag and expanded to fit the available space. (I just clicked on the artwork window in the right playing area, and then dragged and expanded the artwork window that came up to the main section of the screen.

See the examples here:
https://onedrive.live.com/?id=9ADEBEA6D ... A6D9A424D2

You can see that with Darken background, not only is the image really grainy, but a lot of the info about the album is cut off (Like album name). This happens quite frequently.

I don't think I have particularly exotic artwork tags. I think most of my artwork now is about 500x500 pixels. But I know that there are some "artwork connoisseurs" who are meticulous with their artwork and use super high resolution images. I think they would barf if they saw the pix-elated darken artwork option!

I realize that when it comes to aesthetics, everyone is going to have difference preferences. But this seems like original artwork would be the default option... Then some people might want it want it blurred, some darkened and pix-elated, some moving, etc.

Thanks for your consideration

[Duke999R]

+1 vote for "Playing > Right Click > Background Image > Artwork (Original)"

[Peke]

Hi,
For me even 500x500 looks grainy and bad unless blurred or darken, I prefer Cycle Artist image option.

Anyway I added it as https://www.ventismedia.com/mantis/view.php?id=16570

[MikeGahrns]

Nice to see the quick turn around and in the latest build.

Is there a reason why you don't "fit to page" and instead show the artwork clipped?

I realize that there may be a letter box effect with blank space on either side of the artwork, but at least you could see the entire album cover. So many album covers have text/info that is clipped with the way it is currently scaled.

Best Fit vs the Currently Clipped:
https://imgur.com/gallery/BRZU4hS

I'd suggest that if you select original artwork, you try to best fit. Only if you select animate background would you have the artwork extend beyond the screen size.

[Peke]

Hi,
I posted the same question at https://www.ventismedia.com/mantis/view ... 570#c57898 but as you see further in replies I was wrong Image is set as Fit width/height depending which needs to be resized and then it scrolls to show rest of image.

This is for now further improvements in next episode (pardon meant version) under https://www.ventismedia.com/mantis/view.php?id=16586

[MikeGahrns]

Totally understand that you can't do everything in V1. Shipping is a feature as well!

But just to make sure that nothing gets missed, when I looked at the new tracking bugs they seem to be talking about blurring of the image as opposed to correcting the size or fit of the image. But certainly I might be missing something as well. Anyways sounds like you guys are on it. Thx

[Peke]

Hi,
MM5 needs to be stable and as we already started to work on 5.0.1 features and 5.1 as next version, there ill be plenty of space to improve. Including Playing mode which is new to MM 5.0

If we forget or get overwhelmed fell free to give us a nudge, but maybe we will again surprise you.

Take care and stay safe, Happy Monkeying!

[MikeGahrns]

I just noticed that when Chrome casting, the full album art is displayed properly, instead of the clipped view when viewed in "Playing" on the computer.

The layout when casting is beautiful and what I was expecting when selecting display "original artwork".

See image when casting: https://imgur.com/gallery/O9fgRly

It'd be awesome to have this same layout available on your computer, where arguably it'd be used more than just casting. Potentially could be an easy addition if the logic behind the layout is already done for when Chrome casting.