A revamp of the "Now Playing".

[Analien]

I think the Now Playing-tab should be revamped into something more "useful" and more nice-looking. Maybe to somehow make it a plugin or something like that or to have it's layout editable, so that users could make their own layouts as with the theathermode and such.

I think it would be more appropriate to have the playlist at the bottom and stuff like album cover(s), lyrics & info above that.
In J.River Media Center it is possible to have vizualisations, lyrics, trackinfo, 3Dstuff in various forms at the top. It's very nice I'd say. As it is now the now playing just looks like the other modes (Inbox, Library and so on.)

And if this would become editable for users, the possibilities for nice and modern layouts are endless ...

Surely, someone must agree? 

My Now Playing in MusicBee:


Some examples from J.River Media Center:

[Alexis]

+1
I am really trying to hold back suggestions to Steven at this moment as it seems the forum have gotten quite busy from my perspective.. plus I gather that he is not likely to implement any major change until after the 2.0 release.... but man, I have to support this .

[SimonBRT]

I have to admit that this does look good.  But the more I think about it the more I'm not sure if I'd use it.  Theatre mode can already be used to create custom slide slows and much more besides that can look fantastic.  Yes, functionality is reduced in theatre mode, but if I am setting up a mode primarily for its visual appeal, then the chances are I will not be doing much actual work or interaction with the program anyway.  I can still manage the now playing list from theatre mode via the now playing assistant.   These screens are very attractive but I'm not sure it really gains us anything...

[EdBrady]

I would like to see some improvements in Now Playing, especially since I only recently discovered it could be displayed in the main panel, a la JRiver.

I'd like to be able to change the size of the artwork displayed, and to configure the layout a little bit more... get rid of the lyrics portion, for example, if you don't want it there.  I've always liked the clean look of your fist JRiver example, and would like to replicate that in MusicBee.

[SimonBRT]

Ed Brady, you can already customise to a good extent.  You can't get the artwork like in the first pic.  But you can remove the right panel (with the lyrics etc.) using the collapse panel button in the button right of the screen.  You can also right-click on the right panel and customise it a large amount.  If you then open the bottom panel and set it to 'Playing track' you can get a comparable set-up to the top pic.

[EdBrady]

What I have been doing is displaying 'now playing' in the main panel, by clicking on it in the left panel, under playlists.  I think that's what Analien has done in the first picture.  With this view, I see no way to remove the lyrics portion (see where it says "no lyrics found" in the picture).  I also can't get the artwork bigger than 250 pixels or so, even though I have it set much larger in the 'track and artist view' panel settings.

[SimonBRT]

sorry my bad.  i hadn't looked at his MB set-up properly to see it was already much like i was suggesting.  i don't believe you can currently create the look you want.  that said, i still stand by my comments in my previous post in this topic.  perhaps you could try to create a theatre mode view that suits you better or perhaps put a request out to another forum member... 

[Steven]

I do agree that the MB Now Playing (main panel) can be improved.
I had a look at how J River does the Now Playing panel but to me it was just gimmicky and trying to entertain with flashly movements of the album images which i found distracting and tiring quite quickly.
What do others who have used this feature in J River think?

[lnminente]

I feel it more like a visualizer than a Now playing tab. My proposal is the following:

2) Its very difficult finding how to enable "Playing track" tab and its very related with "Now playing", so why not joining them in something like this

[Thorbjorn]

In my opinion moving images around in 3D etc. is just tacky.
lnminente's idea is good.

[EdBrady]

I do agree that the MB Now Playing (main panel) can be improved.
I had a look at how J River does the Now Playing panel but to me it was just gimmicky and trying to entertain with flashly movements of the album images which i found distracting and tiring quite quickly.
What do others who have used this feature in J River think?

I've used it for years and never saw any moving images... I think JRiver's basic now playing format, which is shown in Analien's first screenshot, is very nice though.  All MusicBee needs is to allow you to change the size of the artwork, center it if you want, and offer more control over what is displayed.

[Steven]

i've made some changes for the Now Playing panel - not too ambitious though but i think it is better
The Playing Track tab is gone, and in its place is a tab called Theater (although a better name might be needed).
When clicked it switches the Now Playing list into the tab ie. down the bottom of the main panel, and at the top of the main panel a high quality artist picture displays.
If enabled in the layout settings, the panel can also show
- a wave bar that can be clicked to set the track position
- and a spectrum visualiser

http://musicbee.niblseed.com/V2_1/MusicBee_Exe_Patched.zip

[Bee-liever]

ummm... is this how it's supposed to look?



from your description it sounded like it would swap the panels around.

[paq]

My thoughts about the recent changes:
I actually liked the "Playing track" since it let me view track information and lyrics along with some nice related pictures.
The change made feels like it could instead have been two settings to the Photos tab, so one could see the wave bar and spectrum visualizer above them instead.

However, I really like the wave bar and I think it should be more independent than just a setting in "Theater". How about an option in the View menu to make it available at any time? So, when activated it would display just stacked above the status bar - either overlaying the content behind it with some transparency (as now) or simply being stacked under the tabs or any content shown in the main window but still just above the status bar as now.

Also, want to remind you Steven how great you are providing this great piece of software! If you're sticking with this idea, maybe "Showcase" is a better name than "Theater"?

[Steven]

ummm... is this how it's supposed to look?

it only swaps the panels for the Now Playing list but now i am wondering whether it makes sense to do the same for other nodes, especially as there is more chance with with chopped off pictures if its down the bottom

edit:
actually i probably am against that because i think when you have the music library panel open the main activity is searching and finding files, so it should remain the larger panel. I might just get rid of the "Theater" panel for all nodes except the Now Playing panel - its too hard to get it working well with a single artist picture on such a narrow strip