| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
  | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Making Themes Contents Introduction In Short Tools Button States General Styles Main Controls Secondary Controls Playlist Controls Add/Remove Move Up/Down Loop List Active Toolbar Icon List Releasing Credits Licenses |
Chapter 8. Playlist Controls
The playlist controls, add, remove, move file up, move file down, loop list, unloop list, and the active file icon, are fairly easy icons to make. Add and Remove
I usually just use a plus sign to represent add. It is fairly simple to make and the most logical symbol for the action. Some programs have the entire word 'add', which would also work fine, as the add button is only beside remove, so it is isolated from any buttons done in a different style. Likewise, I use a minus sign for remove, although lettering would also work. It's usually a good idea to put the minus sign on a transparent background, so it has the same height as the plus sign and is aligned with the middle bar of the plus sign, rather than ending up out of alignment when it is displayed. Also, it can look funny if the minus sign is thicker than either of the bars of the plus sign, as they will be beside each other and aligned. The add icon is named 'add' and the remove icon is named 'remove'.
Move File Up or Down
These buttons control motion of objects in the playlist. I usually represent them with an up arrow and a down arrow, so that they reflect the action they cause. This is a fairly easy to understand icon. I usually give the arrows tails, so that their heights are more balanced and they are differentiated from the play button, and other such arrows. These icons should be gone in version III, when the playlist is hoped to have drag-and-drop support, removing the need for this added complexity. The move file up icon is named 'playlistup' and the move file down icon is named 'playlistdown'.
Loop and Unloop Playlist
This buttons are not yet implemented, but should be shortly. The usual icons for this are circles of a sort. For loop playlist, the icon is usually a circle broken twice, with an arrow at the end of each half circle, so it points into a continued circuit. Having a circle broken once with an arrow pointing across the gap is used to denote looping only the current item in the list, not looping the entire playlist. For a non-looped playlist, the symbol is either a straight line with an arrow or, as I prefer to use, a circle broken, but without an arrow. I prefer the broken circle because it changes less from the other when state is changed. These icons are state, not action, icons, meaning that they denote the current state, not what will occur when they are clicked. As such, the icon will be 'loop' when the playlist is set to repeat at the end, and 'no loop' when the playlist is not set to repeat at the end. The loop icon is named 'loop' and the no loop icon is named 'unloop'.
Active
The active icon is the only icon in eMotion which is not a button. The active icon merely appears beside whichever item in the playlist is currently being played. I usually use a play icon, as the icon usually denotes what is playing and it looks fairly good, but it doesn't really matter what you use. It is Very important to properly size the active icon. If it is too big, and the text in the playlist is normal sized, it won't fit properly in the bar. The proper size is 12 pixels tall, as best I can determine. Now, it is important to note the limitations of some of the Tools. I recommended using SodiPodi. SodiPodi cannot create a PNG image less than 16x16 pixels in size. As such, you are left with a couple options. If you want to, you can make the icon only a small portion of the field you will export from SodiPodi, so it is actually the proper size, then crop the image later. To do this precisely, I would recommend making the page twice the height of the icon, and then exporting the page to something 24 pixels tall. That way, the image will actually be the right size. Alternatively, you can just make the icon the normal size, the scale it down. This is fine, but do not use ImageMagick to scale it. Unless there is a scaling option in ImageMagick besides 'scale' or 'sample', ImageMagick does not do very good scaling. And, if the option is there, it is too hard to find. I The GIMP, you need merely open the icon image, go to the 'image' menu, and select the 'scale image' option. Do not select the icon and manually scale it down. The 'scale' and 'scale image' algorithms are different. The 'scale image' algrorithm is always better, by far. Whatever the case, that can get the active icon to the proper size. Before too long, some states may be added to the active icon, to denote what is happening with the current file. Those states would be the same as the main control panel: play, pause, stop, fast forward, and rewind. Currently, the active icon does not have states. The active icon is named 'active' and does not currently have state, so it will only be 'active.png'.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
  | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Home   Downloads   F.A.Q.   Documentation   Report Bugs Email the Site Administrator |