Duimon - HSM Mega Bezel Graphics and Presets - Feedback and Updates

I use Aeon MQ7 as my Kodi skin ATM. My R&D box uses Aeon MQ8.

I am currently fighting my way through creating a BigBox theme that looks as close to MQ8 as possible. I have the settings page complete.

MQ8…

WIP BigBox theme.

5 Likes

I struggled through some more on my BigBox theme. Here is a new settings page WIP.

And a Platform view.

And finally a Games view.

It is functional the way it is. I think I will stop work on it until the next Community Them Creator version is released. Some of the thing I want to do aren’t possible right now.

5 Likes

Here’s a new idea for the Games view to give it more in common with the other pages.

3 Likes

Here is the most recent WIP on this theme.

Platform Horizontal Wheel View…

I rendered this background in C4D using a modern home scene I purchased. I changed the lighting and cloned/placed the objects and moved the camera until I had what I wanted.

I was unsatisfied with the blue-ish tint to the rendering so I de-saturated it in Photoshop. Then I rendered just the plants and composited them onto the first.


Game Horizontal Wheel View…

I did a lot of work on this. I created the frames and overlays for the image boxes in Illustrator, (The top-right image box is a video.) along with the background/grid overlay. Then I did my best to leverage the features of the Theme Creator by adding some drop shadows etc.


System Settings View…

Not a lot of changes here. I tweaked the menu font size/layout and added the “Improve Your Experience” text box to make it look more like the Aeon MQ 8 original.


The previews I have seen for the next version of the Theme Creator show it will definitely be able to do what I need. I am putting this on the shelf until it is released.

I am very happy with what I have been able to do with this version.

3 Likes

I am a fan of the Arctic: Zephyr - Reloaded skin myself.

4 Likes

I use only local assets for metadata. (I use MediaElch to collect it.) I have tweaked the skin and created custom covers for all my media, along with custom genre icons.

I have put as many hours into my HTPC as I have into this graphics project. My HTPC was my first “Never Ending Project” (According to my lovely wife. :grin:) The Mega Bezel graphics are my second. :wink:

5 Likes

The shots above are from my R&D box. I just noticed that the aspect of my movie case was wrong so I tweaked the code to fix it.

If I hadn’t posted this shot I may have not noticed it for a long while. :slightly_smiling_face:

4 Likes

Personally, I would blur the backgrounds a bit in order to help readability of text.

2 Likes

Nope… they are too essential to the general feeling. I did add a drop shadow to the text and it helps.

I could adjust the gradient in the settings screen and the opacity of the rectangle behind the text in the Games view.

3 Likes

I also adjusted the background gradient on the platform view.

3 Likes

I modified the settings logo and created a startup splash screen. (A PNG renamed to *.MP4 and used as a startup video.)

3 Likes

OCD can be a curse or a blessing.

I was not happy with the settings screen. The image from the Kodi skin had all sorts of issues. (Specifically the perforated Metal.)

It was off center, had horrible banding, the clear space in the middle was asymmetrical, and there were many image conversion artifacts. :frowning_face:

So I spent a large part of the day recreating the perforated metal from scratch in Illustrator.

While I was at it I also recreated the Aeon MQ 8 logo. (The LB logo was already vector.)

Any banding or artifacts in the screenshot are from JPG conversion for posting to the forum.

Oh… and “Experience” was spelled wrong. (My Mistake. :wink:)

3 Likes

This is looking really sweet @Duimon!

2 Likes

@Duimon have you thought about doing the PAL Super Nintendo as an alt version of the SNES bezel? I just thought of the possibility myself.

1 Like

I already have the PAL, they are the “Super_Famicom_Alt” presets. :wink:

1 Like

I didn’t think of looking in the Super Famicom folder for it. :man_facepalming:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3f/Sega_astro_city_candy_cab.jpg/1200px-Sega_astro_city_candy_cab.jpg

could someone make a 4k vertical candy overlay? thanks

1 Like

There is this…

In my presets.

And this from @Orionsangel.

That could be used in the Mega Bezel as a background.

3 Likes

I missed this. That would certainly look nice…

I don’t have any plans for one but it might be fun. :grin:

2 Likes

a default vertical to match the 4k-vertical-overlay-community

[image]

4 Likes