Another creation of mine.
This is a blank live wallpaper that allows you to set your own video as a live wallpaper animation!
Lots of codecs and formats are supported.
You need to have your own video (preferably in MPEG-1 or MPEG-2 or divx) and set it in the Live Wallpaper's preferences. You can also set an entire folder (and optionally all its subfolders) and the Live Wallpaper will choose between all videos inside (randomly or not, your choice).
If you don't have any videos to play with, try this one or this one or this one. Download them with your computer and transfer them on your Android device, or downoad with the Android device directly (a common download destination is /sdcard/download). Then select one of them with the Video Live Wallpaper. (BTW, these videos are all reencoded electric sheeps designed by cqfd93 of the electric sheep project. Original links to the sheeps: 22906|22706|22551)
The preferences of the Video Live Wallpaper include Help which should help you get started with making your video(s) as live-wallpaper-friendly as possible. A copy of the same help document can also be accessed from here if you want.
Use the following link on your android device or scan this QR code:
{
"lightbox_close": "Close",
"lightbox_next": "Next",
"lightbox_previous": "Previous",
"lightbox_error": "The requested content cannot be loaded. Please try again later.",
"lightbox_start_slideshow": "Start slideshow",
"lightbox_stop_slideshow": "Stop slideshow",
"lightbox_full_screen": "Full screen",
"lightbox_thumbnails": "Thumbnails",
"lightbox_download": "Download",
"lightbox_share": "Share",
"lightbox_zoom": "Zoom",
"lightbox_new_window": "New window",
"lightbox_toggle_sidebar": "Toggle sidebar"
}
Alternatively, you can get the Video Live Wallpaper from this link:
VLW-084b.apk [via mediafire]
Or you can get it from the bottom of this post if you are registrered to xda-developers.
0.84b is the most current version.
Changelog:
0.84b, published 2011-03-20 [from post 36]
- fixed a bug which prevented this app from working on certain devices like Dell Streak (thanks to guyver3869 for testing)
- fixed a minor memory usage bug, still working on the bigger one
0.83b, published 2010-12-06 [from post 30]
- fixed a bug where memory consumption would slowly raise and eventually crashed the app
- a new feature/setting called Rendering mode is introduced
0.82b, published 2010-10-13 [from post 13]
- fixed a bug where changelog kept showing in settings. Sorry about this!
0.81b, published 2010-10-13 [from post 13]
- fixed a bug where selecting certain directories would cause force closes
- fixed a bug where selecting a different video file would have no effect (thanks to rod for discovering the bug)
- corrected grammatical errors in help
0.8b, published 2010-10-09 [from post 3]
- initial version
Frequently asked questions - FAQ
I've downloaded and installed it. How do I open it?
This is a live wallpaper, not an app, you can't open it in a traditional sense. That is why the market button is disabled and that is why there is no app icon.
Follow this procedure to set it as a live wallpaper:
go to your home screen
press the menu button on your device
select "Wallpaper"
select "Live Wallpapers" *
search and select for "Video Live Wallpaper"
select "Settings" to see the settings and select the video file to play back. Then select "Set wallpaper" to activate it
(* if you don't see "Live Wallpapers" option in the "Select wallpaper from" menu then your device probably doesn't support Live Wallpapers)
My video loads but it's very jerky/looses frames alot, and it makes the home screen app very slow. What to do?
Not every codec and format is the best choice for the Video Live Wallpaper. The maximum video resolution recommended is 854x480, the maximum FPS at that resolution is 20. You can go as high as 30, but then decrease the resolution. MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MJPEG and MPEG-4 are the best codecs to choose for, while x263 and x264 are two of the worst possible ones because they are complex. If you have your video in a .flv or .mp4 format, try converting them to .mpg or .avi. In any case, please read this page (also embedded in the live wallpaper's help) to learn which kinds of videos are good and which aren't.
Why is there no sound? Will sound ever be supported?
Sound will likely never be supported, because:
it's extremely hard (with some codecs even impossible) to sync live wallpaper video to its audio due to how live wallpapers are handled (they often have to pause, they are often killed or slowed down by android in order to make swiping look smoother, for example, etc.)
sound just doesn't belong in an app that would play it all the time (or at least all the time that you're on a home screen). Shorter non-spontanious sounds are fine in a live wallpaper, but a long-lasting sound that never stops just starts to annoy the user after a while. Imagine for example you're in a meeting/at your job/in class and you can't even check the time on your phone without interrupting the said event. Imagine someone calling you and you suddenly hear two sounds out of your phone. Imagine listening to mp3s and being in the home menu at the same time. Sound just shoudn't be a part of any live wallpaper.
Please enable Move to SD.
No. Live wallpapers shouln't be movable to the SD. To learn why, read the official developer guide by Google.
Why does this Live wallpaper require internet access?
It's to download and show ads. They appear in the Live wallpaper's settings.
I can't find this on the market. Where is it?
Try to access it on your device directly using this link. If your Market can't find it then you probably have a version of Android prior to 2.1 which doesn't support Live Wallpapers.
I've downloaded the APK but I don't know how to/can't install it. How do I do it?
Try this:
on the phone, go to Settings -> Applications -> check "Unknown sources" *
find yourself a file browser on the Market. ASTRO File Manager is a good choice
open your file browser app, search for the APK file on your SD card and launch it. The phone should offer you a dialog to install the live wallpaper (or to select the Package Installer)
later when installed, go to home screen, press the menu key, select Wallpaper -> Live Wallpapers, search for Video Live Wallpaper
(* if your phone doesn't show the "Unknown sources" option, your carrier has disabled it. You might want to try one of the APK sideloading applications instead, like this one (you need a PC))
I can't download the APK. My phone says "Cannot download. The content is not supported on this phone". What to do?
Try downloading the app from the market first. If you can't, then download the APK with your computer and transfer the APK to the phone's SD Card. Or download with your phone using a downloading app, like ByteTornado.
This LWP is very cool. Thanks! How can I contribute?
In a number of ways:
by contacting me if you have any issues, not mentioned in this FAQ
by saying thanks
by buying me a cup of coffee or a pizza
great job! trying this now
Awesome job, it does work with some mp4 videos too, just a thought, you can try adding zoom out and timed
Sent from my Nexus One using XDA App
Sounds great, but how much does it hammer the battery?
Naffets said:
Sounds great, but how much does it hammer the battery?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i havent seen too much battery drain with this so so far so good.
@OP are there any ideal settings for the best quality or performance?
trying this now, has google added slovenia to to market list (so you can release paid apps on market?)
very cool app Good job.
cheddie said:
i havent seen too much battery drain with this so so far so good.
@OP are there any ideal settings for the best quality or performance?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Depends on the codec of the video. Mpeg1, mpeg2, mjpeg and divx are amongst the best, x264 (mp4) is not great because it's complex to decode. See help for details for the best codecs and resolutions/frame rates. Or just do the similar to the sample videos: 560x420 (4:3), 20 fps (can go up to 23.976), divx codec, 2500-3500 kbps.
frankinstine said:
Awesome job, it does work with some mp4 videos too, just a thought, you can try adding zoom out and timed
Sent from my Nexus One using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
A tough one, since the rendering is heavily optimized on the idea that the entire video doesn't have to be decoded.
What do you mean by timed?
ermacwins said:
trying this now, has google added slovenia to to market list (so you can release paid apps on market?)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No, not yet (what a shame since we're in EU, we can't even buy paid apps yet).
awesome app!!!
LWP is added to the market. The link and the QR code are added to the first post.
Just downloaded, it seems very interesting!!
Sent from my Nexus One using XDA App
New version published:
0.82b, published 2010-10-13
- fixed a bug where changelog kept showing in settings. Sorry about this!
0.81b, published 2010-10-13
- fixed a bug where selecting certain directories would cause force closes
- fixed a bug where selecting a different video file would have no effect (thanks to rod for discovering the bug)
- corrected grammatical errors in help
Great app and premise, but imo doesn't really seem worth it since the quality of the video and fps have to be lowered so much. I'll go ahead and download this to see just how much the quality is degraded as I've got some great hidef videos I wouldn't mind having as wallpaper. Has this been an issue with anyone else?
I haven't had a problem with the fps of any of the 720p youtube vids I've downloaded, though 720p ends up looking pixellated. 270x360 looks better. Using http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92jyNSaNmT4 and it looks pretty good.
cr6 said:
Great app and premise, but imo doesn't really seem worth it since the quality of the video and fps have to be lowered so much. I'll go ahead and download this to see just how much the quality is degraded as I've got some great hidef videos I wouldn't mind having as wallpaper. Has this been an issue with anyone else?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No reason not to try and experiment. For example on my Nexus, a 1280x720 video in MPEG-1 format will play at about 15 FPS if I disable frame skipping.
If I wanted it faster, I could crop it down to 720x720, which would then be able to be played at 20 FPS.
If I cropped it down further to 432x720 (which is the same ratio as the phone's 480x800 display), it would easily play at 25 FPS which is enough for my eyes, but still in full display's resolution.
If you know how to use ffmpeg, then this command will crop and convert a 720p .mkv file down to 720x720 at 20 FPS .mpg:
Code:
ffmpeg -i "720-input.mkv" -an -vcodec mpeg1video -vb 8000k -vf "crop=280:0:720:720" -r 20 "720-output.mpg"
Or this command would crop it to 432x720 at 25 FPS:
Code:
ffmpeg -i "720-input.mkv" -an -vcodec mpeg1video -vb 8000k -vf "crop=424:0:432:720" -r 25 "720-output.mpg"
paulk_ said:
I haven't had a problem with the fps of any of the 720p youtube vids I've downloaded, though 720p ends up looking pixellated. 270x360 looks better. Using http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92jyNSaNmT4 and it looks pretty good.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wicket video!
Flv and Mp4, while they work, are not the best formats to use with VLW. Try to convert them to .avi (divx) or .mpg (MPEG-1) for even better results.
Find your own way to convert, or use the free ffmpeg tool in one of the following two ways:
Code:
ffmpeg -i "original.flv" -an -vcodec mpeg4 -vb 8000k "converted.avi"
ffmpeg -i "original.flv" -an -vcodec mpeg1video -vb 8000k "converted.mpg"
(bitrate is overrated at 8000k, but the quality will probably be very good)
Thanks for the info, I'll definately give it a try!
Would any one care to donate a little time to make a video tutorial on how to use this live wallpaper? How to select a file to play, how to select an entire folder, what options are there, what video sizes are bad, etc...
I would embed it in the main web page of the app (and of course thank the author):
http://android.ccpcreations.com/vlw/
best video specs
Hello pikipirs et all!
I donatated $10 bucks because I really like the idea of true video wallpaper on my N1 and hope that you continue to develop and improve the app!
One can find lots of great video loops on the net that can be used. Some of them look great (i.e. Wallpaper attachment). Others look poor quality (i.e fs21 attachment). And others stop all together sometimes.
So I guess what I would like is simple, step by step instructions on how to convert or optimize a video so that it looks great and runs smoothly. I've tried using MediaCoder for example to convert the videos that look bad to MPEG1 (which you indicated in the help section was the best format) but they still look bad. What is the best format? Size? Resolution? Frame-rate? So that it looks perfect and how can one convert a video to these specifications? Can any video, formatted correctly, look good?
Oh and another suggestion would be, instead of the app randomly picking videos and switching them all the time, what about the option to only switch it when you 'wake-up' the device so that it doesn't cut into another video while you are viewing it but continues to loop.
Thanks again for the great app. Like I said some vids I've found look great but still, it would be nice to know how to make any video look as good.
Bryce2010 said:
Hello pikipirs et all!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hey.
Bryce2010 said:
I donatated $10 bucks because I really like the idea of true video wallpaper on my N1 and hope that you continue to develop and improve the app!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks.
Bryce2010 said:
One can find lots of great video loops on the net that can be used. Some of them look great (i.e. Wallpaper attachment). Others look poor quality (i.e fs21 attachment). And others stop all together sometimes.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Be prepared for a long answer.
This is subjective, I guess. The video will show in as good a quality as it actually is. The VLW (video live wallpaper) always zooms into a video in such a way that it covers the entire height of the display, while its ratio is not changed. The video's width is then used as scrolling surface so it shifts when you swipe between home screens.
The first video you posted has a vertical resolution of 480. This resolution fits very well in the height of a small mobile display (whatever resolution it might be) so you don't see alot of pixels. In fact, 480 is the maximum vertical resolution that I recommend for VLW, as higher ones might start causing the animation to play slower/skip video frames.
The second video you posted has a vertical resolution of 220. This gets close to the lower bound of acceptible pixel density for your eyes. While this is good on your phone's battery (VLW doesn't have to struggle as much to decode the video), it's not good on you eyes, that is, you can see video pixels which spoils the experience. One idea that I would have for the second video is maybe to reencode it rotated by 90 degrees. This way its vertical resolution will become 400 (current width) which would be easier on the eyes. (hold back on the rotating/reencoding part a little longer, as I plan on adding an option to rotate videos in the VLW).
Videos may play slower or even stop if they are too large for the underpowered phone's processor to handle. If you've been using computers for the last 10 years, then you should remember the ones that struggled to even play divx files properly. Some computers (like netbooks) have problems playing back HD content even today. The same is true for your phone. While a common divx should be handled by VLW just fine, any HD content (720p or 1080p) is way to much to handle. I guess what I'm trying to say is, don't go overboard with the resolution and don't expect miracles from your phone's processor.
Bryce2010 said:
So I guess what I would like is simple, step by step instructions on how to convert or optimize a video so that it looks great and runs smoothly. I've tried using MediaCoder for example to convert the videos that look bad to MPEG1 (which you indicated in the help section was the best format) but they still look bad. What is the best format? Size? Resolution? Frame-rate? So that it looks perfect and how can one convert a video to these specifications? Can any video, formatted correctly, look good?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There is no easy way to describe how to convert videos, as it almost always depends on the original video itself. As I said, a video is as good as it actually is. Reencoding, converting and/or enlarging it digitally won't make it any nicer.
Format changing is reasonable when you are dealing with resolutions and sizes that become hard to handle by the phone. Imagine a video with 854x480 at 30 FPS (your usual 480p video on youtube, for example). VLW has to process 854*480*30=12,297,600 pixels each second if it wants to play the video in real time. If this video is in h264 (which 480p youtube videos with .mp4 extension are) then it's even worse because h264 codec is very complex, which makes the processing part even harder. That's why I recommend reencoding to a less complex format, like mpeg-1 or mpeg-4 (divx).
Best format globally in my opinion is divx (mpeg-4 .avi). It represents a good compromise between complexity and size for a given quality. If you want less complexity (=more battery live), go with videoCD format (mpeg-1 .mpg) which will require larger files for the same quality, but is easier to decode for VLW.
Also one other thing to note, .mpg files need a bit of time to reload. This makes them useless for looping animations as the animation appears to freeze when looping. This is true for a lot of other formats/codecs as well. Divx doesn't have that pause (well it does, but it's amost unnoticable).
Resolution/frame rate is another tough one. The easiest way of going about it is to calculate the processed pixels per second, as I did above for the youtube video example. You can find all the help on how to do this in the help section. If you get your videos from standard 16:9 or 4:3 sources, then a couple of good resolution/framerate combinations are described in the help section. I recommend 360p (640x360 for 16:9, 480x360 for 4:3 videos, both at 30 FPS) or 480p (854x480 for 16:9, 640x480 for 4:3 videos, both at 25 FPS) in divx format. Remember once again - the biggest factor in the appearent quality of a perfectly reencoded video, is its vertical resolution. be between 360 and 480 and you'll be fine. The second biggest factor is frame rate, hold that one between 30FPS for 360p and 25FPS for 480p.
Bryce2010 said:
Oh and another suggestion would be, instead of the app randomly picking videos and switching them all the time, what about the option to only switch it when you 'wake-up' the device so that it doesn't cut into another video while you are viewing it but continues to loop.
Thanks again for the great app. Like I said some vids I've found look great but still, it would be nice to know how to make any video look as good.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So you suggest adding an option to keep looping the same (but randomly choosen) video, and switch to another video only when the live wallpaper unpauses? That's a good idea. To a todo list...
PS: Are you on a mac or on Windows? I might be able to make a couple of simple scripts that use FFmpeg to convert videos with common ratios to better sizes/formats.
The Gallery app on our phone doesn't increase the detail of images after you pinch to zoom. Does anyone know of a way to fix this or a different gallery app that will do this properly?
If you view pictures directly from the camera app, it shows the full resolution of the photo when you zoom in (but its slow to pinch to zoom). If you do it from the gallery app, it just scales a lower resolution rendering of the photo to fit the screen, but it doesn't actually re-render the image at full resolution (but its very smooth). I'm looking for something that works like the iPhone's gallery app, which scales as you zoom so that the interface is smooth, but once you stop at a certain zoom level, it re-renders the image in a higher resolution (aka best of both worlds).
Just curious, which rom are you running?
I'm running JI6 Froyo. I noticed the same issue on JH7 as well...
It would appear he is correct! Even on a 5MP picture of the underside of my car, I can't get any more detail then I do looking at it normally.
I experience the same thing; my gallery also takes its sweet time to notice new images from downloads or edits in Photoshop. I suspect most of these anomolies are due to the beta Froyo I've been running since it was leaked.
Gallery just sucks , it always had crappy zoomed quality with no details , Be it my Nexus one with eclair -> froyo to Cappy eclair -> froyo.
Its as if your watching thumbnails and not actual pictures.
There was modified gallery a while ago in Nexus one forums not sure if its still around, supposed to be better then default one.
TheSopranos16 said:
I'm running JI6 Froyo. I noticed the same issue on JH7 as well...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Dunno why camera shots are coming out low res (I'd imagine that it's just the gallery program that sucks), but downloaded photos on JI6 are automatically resized to 305x203.
I actually remember reading some article a while back that talked about this issue (the gallery being low-res), and mentioning that this is by design. Apparently the developers decided that UI speed is more important than photo quality. I wish I still had the url to that article..
Also, forget searching for 'gallery' in the market. All the search results are retarded wallpaper/mostly naked girl spam. I wish spamming the market with valueless programs was a hangable offense.
Have you guys tried the apk from HERE? I have it loaded and while it does load alot slower it does seem to be higher res. Give it a shot, You will have to copy over the current APK in system/app with something like Root Explorer, or uninstall the gallery then try to install. I could not get it to install but coping worked great
I also remember reading an article that explained that the Gallery purposefully did not display images in their native resolution.
There is a free application in the Market called, "Floating Image" that will display images from any folder of your choosing as well as Flickr, Picase and Facebook in a floating collage of pictures. You can then tap on one and use multitouch to zoom in on the photo in it's full resolution.
I use it to display my camera roll as it allows me to see my photos in much more detail as opposed to the built in Gallery that I can't stand. The only issues that I have with it are that it stutters a little bit when using the high resolution thumbnail option and that it cannot see hidden folders.
I think the gallery is opengl-based and it treats photos as textures, which are limited to 1024x1024 res.
If you don't mind losing the 3d effects, download an app called JustPictures!. It's now my default photo viewer. You can double-tap to zoom to actual size or pinch-zoom. It's fast and free.
Bonus: slideshow live wallpaper
Did some searching and found an article that talks about the issue:
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2362605,00.asp
Apparently Google chose the cool 3d gallery instead of better image quality. Its clear to me why lowering the image quality is wroth it for making things smooth, but I don't know why the app can't render more detail after you zoom in. Anyway, JustPictures! works pretty good and does show better details. Its a bit slower (and the stock gallery isn't particularly fast), but it gets the job done. I wonder if JustPictures! is the best solution out there or if there are other apps worth checking out as well...
Previous posters are correct that the lower image quality is part of how the program was built. However, there is an article on this site that has a link to the HTC gallery version which can improve the quality, but still is not truly 1 to 1 quality, jest better than stock.