Nook Color: Proper Wallpaper Sizing

rico2001

rico2001

Senior Member
Dec 8, 2010
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Tip: Many people have been complaining about wallpaper sizing when using a launcher. What they are talking about is, when picking a wallpaper the NC will sometimes not properly size your image and your wallpaper will turn out over stretched and pixelated.

Here is a way to avoid this problem.

-Lay your NC on a flat surface.
-Go back to stock launcher (NC stock home).
-Press and hold anywhere on home screen to pull up a menu (change wallpaper or clean up this panel).
-Press “change wallpaper”.
-Pick an image from your gallery (preferably larger than 1800 x 1024, will explain below).
-Now you will be asked to crop your image. You should notice the crop preview is in landscape mode, width will be more than the height. This is key to properly sizing the image.
-When satisfied with your crop, hit save.
-Done.
-Go back to your home screen and you should have properly sized wallpaper.
-Now you can go back to using the launcher of your choice.


Here is why people have a problem. They are typically picking a photo that is too small and only thinking of one screen.

The NC has a resolution of 1024 x 600.
The home screen workspace is made up of (3) 1024 x 600, giving you a total workspace of 1800 x 1024.


Picking image in portrait
90896bbf.png



Image not properly resized.
588a6b80.png



Picking image in landscape
b629c32f.png


Image properly cropped and resized
ec61d94f.png
 
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Found another nice tip for wallpapers:

Post your Nook Color screens! - Page 4 - xda-developers

Another thing you could try try instead of wall paper set and save is:

With Dolphin HD go to http://www.interfacelift.com (in landscape mode so it gets the device resolution correct) it will automatically make all links to wallpapers the correct resolutions.

Click the download link for any wp you like. Select to load the image in a new window (if dolphin asks) not background. Long press the image and select set as wallpaper.

Hope this helps.
Click to expand...
I noticed a few things while trying:

- interfacelift.com detected the NC resolution at 1-screen (1024x600)
- to get near 1800x1024, I manually selected 1680x1050 (pick your favorite!)
- as noted above, long press -> set as wallpaper works!
- but: I couldn't find where the image was stored :( so switching to a new one seemed to eliminate the previous one

Instead of "set as wallpaper" I selected "save" but the download failed in Dolphin HD. However, I noticed that if I selected "View image" that I could then save it. It goes into "Downloads" on the sd card, by the way.

Ultimately, I decided to navigate on my PC, and then manually download and move them over to the NC. So there are lots of options. Here are a few (these are low-res):

$02406_thegherkinfrombelow_640x480.jpg$02397_starrynight_640x480.jpg$02453_nightmoves_640x480.jpg$02451_teaplantationsinkeralaindia_640x480.jpg$00026_patriotism_320x240.jpg

-Matt
 
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Something has been driving me crazy: sometimes when I try to resize an image for wallpaper, the NC insists on using a portrait (vertically oriented) frame for cropping. Doesn't matter how the NC is oriented...when I go to resize/crop the image, I get something like this:

$10-12-21-1.jpg

And of course the aspect ratio is fixed: no matter how you stretch the frame, it stays the same shape. Even when the image is in landscape. This ends up with wallpaper images like the one in the OP, which are narrowly focused on the center.

But today, by accident I pushed the "Discard" button and WHAT??? A new frame appeared:

$10-12-21-2.jpg

Resized the second one, and PERFECT.

Not sure if it's happening to other folks...? Please report back if so.

-Matt
 
^Do your wallpapers in the stock NC launcher (not Zeam) and lay the NC down flat.
 
Yep, using Home Manager. But it's kind of a hybrid solution:

(1) Mainly relying on SmartBar, which puts a home shortcut (and other utilities) on my notification bar.
(2) But, I created a widget/shortcut to Home Manager on my desktop (doing so was a bit complicated): this is cool, because it creates a button that allows my wife to switch directly to the NC homepage (which she prefers when reading). My goal is to figure out how I can get the button on to the Zeam dock!

Does that make any sense?

-Matt
 
If I'm not mistaken, I believe the home switcher app will provide a button to quickly go between the two. I'm not running anything at the moment.....

oh no, something is installing on my NC. It just rebooted itself and started installing. I think it's the update. :)


....well I was saying, I'm not running and switcher right now and I'm just haven't picked a default home. So all screens ask me which to use, "perform action using" pop-up. I like this way for now since I haven't installed a home switcher yet.
 
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rico2001 said:
If I'm not mistaken, I believe the home switcher app will provide a button to quickly go between the two. I'm not running anything at the moment.....

oh no, something is installing on my NC. It just rebooted itself and started installing. I think it's the update. :)
Click to expand...
Ah, the key word here is "quickly." What Home Manager does is it brings up a small window with the three home icons...select your favorite and voila. Of course, that's by definition what a home switcher does! So technically, I'm not "using" a home switcher.

Instead what I wanted was a button--ideally in the Zeam dock--that takes me directly (one click) to the NC home screen. Right now it's essentially a widget on the Zeam home screen, but I'll figure out a way to get it on the dock!

(I should note: once in the NC home screen, how do you get back to Zeam? Two answers: (1) open the notification bar, and use the SmartBar shortcut, or (2) press the "n" button!)

Sounds complicated...but the goal was to engineer the quickest way possible between NC home and Zeam home. Oh, it's not for me...it's for...ahem, the old lady.

WAIT! You're getting an OTA?!?!??!?! WTH?

-Matt
 
rico2001 said:
Trust me, this is not a good thing.
Click to expand...
I hate to get all philosophical on you (trust me, it's not a good thing) but I'm kinda glad we knew (a) the update was coming and (b) Froyo is coming too. Helps support my desire to embrace the whole Buddhist (I told you it was philosophical) notion of not forming attachments, and learning to let things go. So I've been happily playing with the NC, knowing that all my effort and hard work would come to nothing.

At least that was the plan. :rolleyes:

-Matt
 
Not really a big deal. Once custom roms start being made, I'm most likely going to be redoing my NC often anyway.
 
Ah, now aren't you the Zen master. ;) That's like black-belt level "letting go."

Story: When we used to live in San Francisco, these Buddhist monks were working on this huge sand painting in Golden Gate Park. For weeks. And near the end, there was this long line that weaved around it, so people could watch and admire. Sadly, this "crazy" lady jumped over the ropes, and ran around shuffling her feet and destroying the painting.

When they interviewed one of the monks, he shrugged and said (I'm paraphrasing): "Hey, what do you expect? It was made out of sand! That's the point!"

-Matt
 
Nice Matt. It would be a good idea to post good wallpapers we come upon.
 
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