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Help What am I missing?

Moozilla

Member
Feb 7, 2013
52
2
USA
I still have no idea how to make cool home screens and lock screens like the ones I see. Last night, in a last ditch effort, I downloaded Go Launcher and chose a theme. It didn't apply the whole thing (not all widgets were there) and I just couldn't stand the launcher itself and went quickly back to Nova.

I see threads where people say they change their theme all the time. I don't even know how to create it once, lol. This is one significant reason I bought this phone, to customize the look, and I have had it about a month and still haven't been able to do near what I want. I am not looking to root at this point, but I think I should be able to do some crafty things with an unrooted phone, right?

I try reading tutorials but many of them are written as if I know what they are talking about and I don't. I am not a tech-idiot. I understand a lot of things. But somehow, this is making me feel like I have the intellect of a fetus. I am sick of my phone still resembling an iPhone with just regular icons and folders.

Any help?
 
Hello Moozilla.

For me, no matter the launcher, icon themes are the biggest influence on the look of the screen(s). And there are hundreds available, some free, some paid, some collections of dozens in one download, some with only about a dozen or less (just the "fundamental ones like phone and messaging, etc).

Background wallpapers come next for me, then fonts. After that, exploring for matching widgets and the fun begins. :)

Nova is quite robust with regard to what can be done for eye appeal; many icon and other theme elements are made for being compatible with many launchers.. so if you see an icon set or even a theme set for GoEx or others you'll often find that it can be used with Nova and others.

Hours of searching around the Play Store reaps rewards. Experiment. ;)
 
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My iPhone had a crisp screen, I mean, extreme sharpness. I cannot find a wallpaper that looks sharp on this phone. Is that not possible with the kind of screen this phone has and do I need to get over it? That is one reason I haven't settled on a wallpaper. They all look slightly blurred even when they are the resolution needed.
 
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My iPhone had a crisp screen, I mean, extreme sharpness. I cannot find a wallpaper that looks sharp on this phone. Is that not possible with the kind of screen this phone has and do I need to get over it? That is one reason I haven't settled on a wallpaper. They all look slightly blurred even when they are the resolution needed.

Maybe you could try "no wallpaper," it's really just a black bg, but is placed in the "live wallpapers" folder for use. Here's mine:

155179d.jpg
 
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Hello Moozilla.

For me, no matter the launcher, icon themes are the biggest influence on the look of the screen(s). And there are hundreds available, some free, some paid, some collections of dozens in one download, some with only about a dozen or less (just the "fundamental ones like phone and messaging, etc).

Background wallpapers come next for me, then fonts. After that, exploring for matching widgets and the fun begins. :)

Nova is quite robust with regard to what can be done for eye appeal; many icon and other theme elements are made for being compatible with many launchers.. so if you see an icon set or even a theme set for GoEx or others you'll often find that it can be used with Nova and others.

Hours of searching around the Play Store reaps rewards. Experiment. ;)

And I have been trying to experiment. The first day with the phone, I downloaded some fonts and changed that. I grabbed Nova and ended up loving that. I have tried different wallpapers, though none are ever sharp in focus and that bugs me, so nothing sticks. I have browsed the google play store for icons and found some I like. I just did that last part last night. I am going to look into those more right now.
 
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My iPhone had a crisp screen, I mean, extreme sharpness. I cannot find a wallpaper that looks sharp on this phone. Is that not possible with the kind of screen this phone has and do I need to get over it? That is one reason I haven't settled on a wallpaper. They all look slightly blurred even when they are the resolution needed.

Very possibly.

Let's go back to tv sets. All things being equal for a fair comparison, a smaller screen will be crisper. You've probably noticed that before.

And all things are not equal here, as various iPhone models have had various sizes and resolution values.

In general, most iPhones have had a higher number of dots per inch, but with fewer actual dots (pixels) than the Note 2, because of the screen size difference.

So you may be seeing that trade-off, same as you would a small 720p tv vs. a big 1080p model.

Or, you may not have found a truly high-res wallpaper yet, the ones you've tried may have been scaled (magnified). In other words, they may be the right resolution, but they may have started out smaller.

Or it could be a combination of those factors.

You could test it by choosing a wallpaper from the web somewhere with _much_ higher resolution than your phone, let it scale or crop as necessary and test it out.

Hope this helps! :)
 
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I use live wallpaper for my background. I bought the Galaxy Pack LW and have it set to random.

Wondering if you tried using a higher resolution photo to crop rather than the standard 1280x720. I know the images are clear and sharp on mine, but I crop a much more higher resolution photo for the lockscreen. My other siblings use photos as backgrounds and are sharp, clear images as well. But again, using higher resolution photos for them. Maybe that helps?
 
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I use live wallpaper for my background. I bought the Galaxy Pack LW and have it set to random.

Wondering if you tried using a higher resolution photo to crop rather than the standard 1280x720. I know the images are clear and sharp on mine, but I crop a much more higher resolution photo for the lockscreen. My other siblings use photos as backgrounds and are sharp, clear images as well. But again, using higher resolution photos for them. Maybe that helps?

I have gone as far as to try 2048x2048 images that look crisp on my iPad but do not on my phone.

*Edit* I just found a few that look awesome! YAY!
 
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Frisco, what clock/date/weather is that?

Three different widgets:

That's Palmary Weather Pro Widget.. from Play Store. Comes in many sizes, but of course can be resized in the Nova screen via long press. Tapping it gives weather radar, short and long range forcasts, etc. Not much battery drainage at all, configurable update intervals (or just on demand/manual), etc.

The clock and date are both called "retro clock" in the Store; separate but come together, so I placed them on the same screen with the weather.
 
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