Can someone explain how contact images work?
I do not use facebook or real "square" pictures for the contacts. I just use PNG images that are more assigned by group or by company logo. I usually go the extra step and find some nice PNG's to use. It is easy then to see the phone from afar and know if I should jump up or let it ring. Here is what I have seen...
All my PNG's were entered using Outlook and then HTCSync'd to the phone. This seriously degrades the quality of the image when the phone rings and leaves it with a white background. The image is actually good on everything EXCEPT when the phone rings. This has to do with 95% of the phone where they show images being in a white area already.
If I change the image from the phone using the same PNG, it will then have a BLACK background... This then looks like crap everywhere else EXCEPT when the phone rings. And even then the black background is pretty noticeable.
The stock android "ring" image looks to be like a PNG, image on a clear background, so it looks nice and the shadow looks nice. I.E. not like anything else you can do, you either have WHITE or BLACK background and no choice.
Reading other threads of what people have gone through to get better resolution out of google contacts sounds very similar to what happens here. I don't think there will be any solution, but it sure seems like:
It would be nice to have 2 sources of the image, the one in the contact card and a link to the good png image for the during ring...
Has anyone learned anything or know of anything that has been updated in 2.2 (whenever we get that from Sprint, for those of us that have not rooted)??
Thanks
tschwenke said:
Can someone explain how contact images work?
I do not use facebook or real "square" pictures for the contacts. I just use PNG images that are more assigned by group or by company logo. I usually go the extra step and find some nice PNG's to use. It is easy then to see the phone from afar and know if I should jump up or let it ring. Here is what I have seen...
All my PNG's were entered using Outlook and then HTCSync'd to the phone. This seriously degrades the quality of the image when the phone rings and leaves it with a white background. The image is actually good on everything EXCEPT when the phone rings. This has to do with 95% of the phone where they show images being in a white area already.
If I change the image from the phone using the same PNG, it will then have a BLACK background... This then looks like crap everywhere else EXCEPT when the phone rings. And even then the black background is pretty noticeable.
The stock android "ring" image looks to be like a PNG, image on a clear background, so it looks nice and the shadow looks nice. I.E. not like anything else you can do, you either have WHITE or BLACK background and no choice.
Reading other threads of what people have gone through to get better resolution out of google contacts sounds very similar to what happens here. I don't think there will be any solution, but it sure seems like:
It would be nice to have 2 sources of the image, the one in the contact card and a link to the good png image for the during ring...
Has anyone learned anything or know of anything that has been updated in 2.2 (whenever we get that from Sprint, for those of us that have not rooted)??
Thanks
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It seems to me the reason for the poor quality is because in your contacts list (People app), the square images are set to a certain resolution (probably 24x24), so they look good. However, when the phone rings, the resolution is too has to conform to a newer and bigger resolution to display the picture, which in return makes the picture look poor.
I'd say the solution would be to make all of your .pngs a certain resolution (something relatively high... 96x96) maybe? That way, in the People app, they'll be smaller, but also be good quality, and then when someone calls, they should conform to the 96x96 for the max resolution, so you'll get a clear picture there as well.
Does that sense? I import all my pictures from the Facebook sync, which look great on the People application, but poor when the phone rings -- this is most likely due to a static rule being set about the resolution... which you can probably get around by uploading your phone pictures, like you're doing now.
pseudoremora said:
I'd say the solution would be to make all of your .pngs a certain resolution (something relatively high... 96x96) maybe? That way, in the People app, they'll be smaller, but also be good quality, and then when someone calls, they should conform to the 96x96 for the max resolution, so you'll get a clear picture there as well.
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Yes, makes sense, the worst part is the image background color.. Wish it kept the transparancy. I could tollerate the large/low res image if it were transparent!
I wonder if there is a way to increase the default resolution so facebook syncs high quality images? I wonder if the facebook sync app can be modified or is this a sense issue?
When using the dialer it looks like the phone is just increasing the size of low resolution photo that was synched to the contact.
Is there a way to increase the resolution so the photos can look better?
Is the problem with the contact photo resolution limit imposed by the way the contact cards were designed? I ask this because when browsing through your contacts the small thumbnail looks great, but when using the dialer it looks like the thumbnail the the required resolution and the large photo in the dialer is just a zoomed in version.
Maybe I'm not being clear but i think i got the point across.
When browsing websites with pictures or even looking at pictures in my phone, zooming in tends to blur the pictures pretty badly.
For instance, if a picture has text on it and I try to zoom in to see the text, the text is unreadable and distorted when taking the photo to full size. Whereas, if I went on a computer (no zoom required because the image is already fulls size) I can see the picture just fine.
Is there a way to fix this?
I use Dolphin HD browser.
anyone know why when switching the pictures back that the images is not sharp? i use a 14mp camera so i don think thats the reason, size perhaps? the images also look a little blurred on the Pictures tiles too.
as well as the contact tile. what am i doing wrong?
davidebanks said:
anyone know why when switching the pictures back that the images is not sharp? i use a 14mp camera so i don think thats the reason, size perhaps? the images also look a little blurred on the Pictures tiles too.
as well as the contact tile. what am i doing wrong?
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I'd love to help, but you be a little more clearer on exactly what is going on?
oh sorry , here goes ive put some pictures from my pc to my wp7, when i go to pictures and try to change the background i select one of my own pics that i have transferred from my pic. the background changes but it looks a little blurry and not as sharp as it should be, the same then applies to the pictures tile, its no longer as sharp as it was.
I know exactly what you mean. I accidentally formatted my phone using Mac connect and deleted my original sample photos from WP7. To change the background photo of the live tile and to make it not blurry, you need to use an image with big dimensions, somewhere along the lines of 1920x1200 or better. The picture tile image can be in widescreen or fullscreen but fullscreen mode is the correct resoluytion.
for contacts tile google contacts produce low resolutions automatically. If you want a higher resolution just create a new contact under windows live and the contact photo you use will not appear pixelated.
I hope that helps. Also if you wouldnt mind, could you attach the photo of the white dandelions/field from the original sample photos that came preinstalled on your phone? I would love to reset my pictures tile tothat photo but can't find it anywhere and I don't feel like factory resetting my phone to get it back.
thanks
Can you plz post screen shot or some pic of the blurry tiles?
ok.. so basically.. in order to get a crisp and sharp picture to appear on the live tile... then it has to be a big sized picture?? why wont 480x800 work?? that's the dimension of the phone??
and also.. how do you set or choose which photo appears in the tile?? is there a way to just have it constantly changing?? i think that would be pretty cool
thanks for the info, ill try it out.
to change the picture of the photo tile, after you open it, slide to the pictures hub, press hold anywhere on the background and it will pop up with two menu items : change background and change it for me.
from there you can choose a photo
I do not know why the normal phone resolution doesn't look as clear. This is just from my experience.
*EDIT*
as you can see, the photo you attached for me has a higher resolution than the phone's 480x800.
When you copy a picture to the phone, it is resized to 720x540 by the phone. This happens if you use Zune, email it to yourself, or use Skydrive to store it. This will be why it doesn't look as good as it should in the background.
I had a discussion with WinPhoneSupport on twitter, and they told me that was the maximum resolution for pictures on the phone.
It's one of the first things I've found on WP7 that irritates me. Fortunately, it doesn't irritate me too much and I still love the phone . However, if pics are important to you, I can understand the frustrations.
Has anyone found a way around this? This is driving me crazy
It's actually idiotic policy to do that.
eyan15 said:
Has anyone found a way around this? This is driving me crazy
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I wrote about this here: http://wpcentral.com/tip-get-high-res-photos-contacts-your-wp7-device
Basically, if you use Live, sync a high res photo to that linked account with your contact.
It's basically a Google thing--they downsize the photo. Microsoft Live does not. You can use both services, linked, for each contact. I did this for my Pinned contacts and they are all high rez and stay that way, thankfully.
Trust me, on Android, contact photos look just a crappy as they do when you sync Google to WP7.
malatesta said:
I wrote about this here: http://wpcentral.com/tip-get-high-res-photos-contacts-your-wp7-device
Basically, if you use Live, sync a high res photo to that linked account with your contact.
It's basically a Google thing--they downsize the photo. Microsoft Live does not. You can use both services, linked, for each contact. I did this for my Pinned contacts and they are all high rez and stay that way, thankfully.
Trust me, on Android, contact photos look just a crappy as they do when you sync Google to WP7.
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This I'm aware of, I have moved all my contacts from Google to live. Since Live now offers exchange support, all is well
But here we are talking about the Picture tile (not the contacts)
If you edit the contact you can change the picture there. If you have linked your contact from different accounts (eg live, facebook) you can choose which picture to take for that contact. Usually there is one that is sharp. After that your Tile should have the crisp pic on it. I had blurry pics too when I synced the first time...
Is there a way to invert the order pictures appear in photography app?
The thing is that seems weird to show the most recent pictures at the end.