How Can I Send OMX Player To Background?

[AlphaBetaPie]

I recently had an issue with gameplay videos freezing (which I posted about here), which I found a solution for by turning the "OMX Player with Hardware Acceleration" to "ON" in the settings menu. However, it opened another can of worms.

I added an overlay in the XML files of my theme that covered part of the original video player (IE: the default video player for the gameplay clips was in the background, the graphic was over top of it).

Now, since OMX was turned on, the video clips are now in front of the graphic. What do I now need to add to my code to send the OMX player to the background layer, like before?

Edit #1: Looking at my file, it appears that the line originally used to bring the graphic to the top layer foreground was <zIndex>31</zIndex>

Edit #2: I found this thread from several years ago, and this was stated there (which is exactly the problem I'm having)..."When using OMXPlayer as the video player it is not possible to render anything on top of the video (like the raster lines in the oldroom theme). This is a limitation currently of this rendering method and unlikely to be fixed. Switching to VLC re-enables overlay on top of video."

But I'm hoping this has been updated/fixed since then?

[windg]

From omxplayer manual i find this option that you can try :
--layer n Set video render layer number (higher numbers are on top).

Source: https://elinux.org/Omxplayer

[AlphaBetaPie]

@windg Thanks! But can you be more specific? Where would this go?

[AlphaBetaPie]

@windg Thanks again. I see you updated your post with a bit more info since my last response. However, I'm new to working with OMX player, so the info in the manual is a bit confusing. I FTP into my Pie and edit config files and do various custom settings all day long (including theme editing), but this is a new one for me. So if you could explain just a bit more, I'd appreciate it.

For instance, that line about being able to render on specific layers seems like it might work. But how/where would I make this change? My only interaction thus far with OMX is in the Emulationstation settings menu where I can toggle it On/Off.

[windg]

@AlphaBetaPie said in How Can I Send OMX Player To Background?:

@windg Thanks! But can you be more specific? Where would this go?

Normally this parameter is going after omxplayer :

omxplayer [OPTIONS] [FILE]

omxplayer --layer n

But i don't know where in the theme code you have to add this option.

[AlphaBetaPie]

@windg said in How Can I Send OMX Player To Background?:

@AlphaBetaPie said in How Can I Send OMX Player To Background?:

@windg Thanks! But can you be more specific? Where would this go?

Normally this parameter is going after omxplayer :

omxplayer [OPTIONS] [FILE]

omxplayer --layer n

But i don't know where in the theme code you have to add this option.

Thanks, same here. I looked through the theme files I used for the graphics and a few go-to Retroarch config file locations. I see no OMX references. Can anyone direct on this?

[mitu]

@AlphaBetaPie said in How Can I Send OMX Player To Background?:

Can anyone direct on this?

Yes, it's not possible, since the layer parameter is set by EmulationStation internally and you can't modify it directly or configure it. The documentation in the topic you referenced is still correct.

[AlphaBetaPie]

@mitu said in How Can I Send OMX Player To Background?:

@AlphaBetaPie said in How Can I Send OMX Player To Background?:

Can anyone direct on this?

Yes, it's not possible, since the layer parameter is set by EmulationStation internally and you can't modify it directly or configure it. The documentation in the topic you referenced is still correct.

Thanks, that's what I suspected. Fortunately, I found a workaround by using the default player and turning off power saving mode (which was the culprit, in this thread). Just an FYI for others finding this thread later.