Photo Cube Live Wallpaper version 3.0 released!

Very happy to report that version 3.0 of Photo Cube Live Wallpaper was released yesterday.

That has the motion detection stuff I have been working for the past week or two, and a range of bug fixes for the various issues introduced during the Album mode release.

You can now shake to bounce the cube around the screen, and adjust the bouncing speed via the Settings. It has full 3d motion detection, it bounces off the sides, and also the "front" and "back" of the screen. I just added a little vibrate to the bounce event, will put that in the next version, its very cool and really makes the bounce seem real!

When in Album mode, you can shake the device a few times to trigger the picture refresh, the cube shrinks into the screen, and then zooms back out with the new pictures all ready.

Finally there is an experimental Background Depth feature, which when switched on moves the background image left and right as you tilt the phone sideway, as if the background is being shown a few cm "behind" the screen as opposed to on the screen. Its not perfect yet, but is still fun to play with.

I am off on holiday to England for a week tomorrow, so will not be working much on it, but will keep an eye out for any bug reports so I can fix any issues which arise. As much as I try, it is hard to find everything when I only have a few devices to test on.

Now I have to take a break and think about new development. Improving the Background Depth feature, maybe doing a nicer Motion Detection settings screen with live previews. And of course back to my long delayed project, the Weather Widget with top secret killer feature. :o)

Bug Fix Version 2.6

Almost finished the Motion Detection stuff, but had to release a quick bug fix version, too many Force Close issues popping up which I needed to sort out first.

Version 2.6 is on the Market/Play Store right now. It should fix all the Force Close problems that a few people have reported.

Then on to the end of Motion Detection!

Shaken not stirred..

Work on the Motion Detection continues at a good rate.

I have completed the Shake to Refresh for Album mode. When a shake is detected, the cube and floating panels quickly shrink into the screen, and then swiftly restore back to their original size with the newly refreshed pictures. The time for this operation will depend on the speed of the phone, but is usually less than a second. Looks very cool!

Jerking the phone left or right now gives the cube a bit of extra spin in that direction. That took a good bit of working out, particularly because the direction depends of course on how the phone is held, working out which way is really "right" or "left" can vary enormously, particuarly on newer devices like tablets, which can have 4 distinct orientations, not just landscape and portrait.

Today got the maths working for the 3D background effect, the phone now seems like a window on the background, tilting it left or right shows the background from another angle, as if you were walking past a window and looking out, the view through the window would change. A very subtle, cool effect, but I need to make it super smooth, its still a bit jerky. I think a day or two more for that.

Then need to extend the jerking effect to give the cube a bounce off the "walls" of the phone.

All this new Motion Detection stuff will be in a major new 3.0 release. I want to do a nice Settings screen, with nice previews of the effects.

Last night I did a quick bug fix release 2.5, to fix a few issues that had come up from Album mode, mostly from when users had only a single picture in an SD card album.