PinPNG makes WP amazing!!

anon(5445874)

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I guess this app is still in Alpha, found out about it today when I saw nokia posting on FB about this blogger: Tile Art Guy

Then I saw him posting about this app. I managed to make this on my phone without too much effort.
MVI_0147bb.gif

Of course you need photoshop or something like it to prepare the files. The guy who makes the app was saying something about adding more features to require less file prep in the future. But for now, it's still nice to use.

Note that you NEED to make your files the proper size first. Just plopping in a png of any size won't work at all. The blog has a tutorial. Hellboy home screen using transparent PNG images | Tile Art Guy

By the way, check out his Hellboy start screen.
 
Oct 23, 2013
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Pretty cool. App is ight, I say this because I am almost finished with my own app that is similar but has a ton more features ( I know, shame on me self praising) but, what I'm more interested in is the skill of the guy that's created all those themes. Pretty badass.
 

Christopher Lindsay

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I guess this app is still in Alpha, found out about it today when I saw nokia posting on FB about this blogger: Tile Art Guy

Then I saw him posting about this app. I managed to make this on my phone without too much effort.
View attachment 68048

Of course you need photoshop or something like it to prepare the files. The guy who makes the app was saying something about adding more features to require less file prep in the future. But for now, it's still nice to use.

Note that you NEED to make your files the proper size first. Just plopping in a png of any size won't work at all. The blog has a tutorial. Hellboy home screen using transparent PNG images | Tile Art Guy

By the way, check out his Hellboy start screen.
Pretty dope
 

anon(5445874)

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Pretty cool. App is ight, I say this because I am almost finished with my own app that is similar but has a ton more features ( I know, shame on me self praising) but, what I'm more interested in is the skill of the guy that's created all those themes. Pretty badass.
I'm always looking for an excuse to cash in my Bing points! I don't mind this current app because photoshop for me is easy. But still, I shouldn't have to go to photoshop just to change my start screen.

Just some notes for you or other developers.
I do not want to have to resize tiles.
I also would like a multiple tile layout to be automatically placed. That other tiles app makes me pin each tile.

These things just slow me down and it adds a lot to the amount of time to redo a start screen.

Also, a note to Microsoft!! I would like a theme manager. It would be really cool if I could save and load tile setups. Setting this stuff takes time, it would be cool if I could switch between themes with ease. (not sure if this is something a developer could ever accomplish... is it?)
 

anon(5445874)

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On a side note, I just took some fresh paint paintings I had done and cut them out in photoshop. Only spent about 30 minutes total on my sample. I'll be playing with it more later this week. :)
 
Oct 23, 2013
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On a side note, I just took some fresh paint paintings I had done and cut them out in photoshop. Only spent about 30 minutes total on my sample. I'll be playing with it more later this week. :)


Do you try to create the Start Wallpaper to perfectly fit the viewable area or just take your resolution and go with that and let WP crop it? I spent awhile last creating a wallpaper to use and noticed it crops to about 26-27 pixels on left and 23-24 on right on my L521. I'm wondering because I'm creating preconfigured themes and trying to figure out the best way to go about it to make it easy for users.
 

anon(5445874)

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Do you try to create the Start Wallpaper to perfectly fit the viewable area or just take your resolution and go with that and let WP crop it? I spent awhile last creating a wallpaper to use and noticed it crops to about 26-27 pixels on left and 23-24 on right on my L521. I'm wondering because I'm creating preconfigured themes and trying to figure out the best way to go about it to make it easy for users.
That app is very specific, you need to export each tile individually. So for example if I wanted to have 3 rows in a 3 column layout, I would need for example 3 images that are large (691x336) and 3 that are medium (336x336). Note that that's for 720p and wxvga res screens. The gap in-between tiles is 10 pixels. So I create a photoshop template that's got the correct sizes and lay image on top of that (after I cut out my image of course). Then, I would either setup guides and make slices, then export slices. Or you can just crop and save, then undo, then crop and save the next tile, then keep going till all tiles have been saved. This is all necessary because that program can only do the one tile at a time. I was lead to believe somewhere by the developer that this will change. That's why it's a pain for anyone who doesn't have the ability to use photoshop.

Now let's discuss what I would like an app to do. I would like to just load up an image and pick from a variety of tile sizes and layouts. Then on top of a preview of the tiles, be able to pinch to scale the image up or down in size while adjusting the rotation. The next step would to save & pin. Other such apps like Custom Tiles Maker, makes you pin each tile individually. They also plop onto your start screen at a standard medium size. This means if your grid is 2 large and 2 medium, you'll have to resize the 2 large before continuing. So basically it would be easier for all (excluding the developer) to give the user the ability to just have all slices appear on the start screen at the proper layout/size.

Hopefully that makes sense. I tend to not go back and proof read what I wrote. If only there was more time in the day! If anything doesn't add up on what I wrote, let me know and i'll try to correct myself.

Thanks!
 
Oct 23, 2013
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If you're interested, here's what start screen looks like now. It's still pretty basic, but it'll have to do for now. Just threw together a quick little video.

And incase anyone is wondering, the start screen is just as snappy with or without the PNG's being pinned.

I like that. to answer your post above. I have been playing with options to create multiple tiles but unfortunately Microsoft has saw fit to remove the ability to create more than one tile at a time. The ways tiles are created is you pin a tile, moves you to Start Screen, then you can go back to app. That going to the Start Screen is what kills any possibility of creating more than one as its a security feature to give users more control over what gets pinned so rogue apps can't attack them.

Think of it as stopping a malicious dev from creating a thousand tiles at once and crashing the users phone.

Another wonderful option that Microsoft has given us for WP8.1 is the ability to ONLY pin Medium Tiles and only allowing user to enlarge it manually after it is pinned.
 

anon(5445874)

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I like that. to answer your post above. I have been playing with options to create multiple tiles but unfortunately Microsoft has saw fit to remove the ability to create more than one tile at a time. The ways tiles are created is you pin a tile, moves you to Start Screen, then you can go back to app. That going to the Start Screen is what kills any possibility of creating more than one as its a security feature to give users more control over what gets pinned so rogue apps can't attack them.

Think of it as stopping a malicious dev from creating a thousand tiles at once and crashing the users phone.

Another wonderful option that Microsoft has given us for WP8.1 is the ability to ONLY pin Medium Tiles and only allowing user to enlarge it manually after it is pinned.
Cool, and interesting. Perhaps we could persuade Microsoft to maybe set a limit to pinning something like 10 tiles. That would stop malicious developers and still make life easier for people. Considering how far wp has come, I wouldn't doubt the possibilities.
 

TileArtGuy

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Just saw this conversation, great work @kevC4D :)

The app is fairly basic, but the results are perfect if you can get the sizing sorted out before copying the image across to your phone. To make life a little easier if you're trying to test out PinPNG, this blog post contains some handy PSD templates which will cut up an image to the right tile sizes so you can simply pin them using the app. 2 tile art tips to make your life a lot easier | Tile Art Guy
Gambit_Size.png
Also some handy tile sizes in case you want to stuff around with your own tile designs.
 

anon(5445874)

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Just saw this conversation, great work @kevC4D :)

The app is fairly basic, but the results are perfect if you can get the sizing sorted out before copying the image across to your phone. To make life a little easier if you're trying to test out PinPNG, this blog post contains some handy PSD templates which will cut up an image to the right tile sizes so you can simply pin them using the app. 2 tile art tips to make your life a lot easier | Tile Art Guy
View attachment 69350
Also some handy tile sizes in case you want to stuff around with your own tile designs.
I was thinking about making a template for the masses but never had the time, glad you're on the case! Hopefully they will update this app (or someone else will make an app) so that this stuff will be all automatic.

Someone was asking me to make a tutorial, not sure i'll be able to get to that anytime soon. Perhaps you can do it.
 

melvintwj

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Anyone help me on this? I can never get this to work. I created a bunch of tiles, but the transparent parts of the tiles are white or have some weird distortions. There's complete no transparency on any part of the tiles. I'm pretty sure I've done the Photoshop correctly. Also, I tried using the PNG that the tileartguy shared, and they don't work either! Still having the same white patch problem.. Geeez.
 

anon(5445874)

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Anyone help me on this? I can never get this to work. I created a bunch of tiles, but the transparent parts of the tiles are white or have some weird distortions. There's complete no transparency on any part of the tiles. I'm pretty sure I've done the Photoshop correctly. Also, I tried using the PNG that the tileartguy shared, and they don't work either! Still having the same white patch problem.. Geeez.
I got distortions the first time too. You need to make each tile exactly the size of the tile.
 

melvintwj

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I got distortions the first time too. You need to make each tile exactly the size of the tile.

I got it to work. The size doesn't really matter, actually. I was transferring my PNGs using OneDrive. Using USB transfer, it didn't affect the transparency.
 

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