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Marcin Krzywonos

ScreenFocus - Working with multiple monitors made right.

by•

Working on multiple screens?

Getting distracted by side monitors brightening somewhere in your peripheral vision?

That’s why we created ScreenFocus.

The app dims your screens. You don't have to click any button to dim a screen. It's dimmed automatically when you move the cursor away. By default, only the side screens are dimmed. Of course, you can change it within the app menu.

You can easily customize its settings:

- dim level (how dark a screen gets),

- which monitors are dimmed,

- fade-in duration,

- fade-out duration,

- dimming delay time.

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James McKinven
I'm a little confused about this product actually. When I am using multiple screens, it is usually so I can have extra functionality, for instance, reading a doc on one screen and entering correlating data into another doc or app on the second screen. That would make this app redundant, right? Would be interesting to know people's thoughts.
Marcin Krzywonos
Maker
@jmckinven It depends on user preferences. Personally, I don't like when side monitors are bright. They distract me. Actually that was my only problem with working on multiple monitors. So the perfect solution for people like me is to dim them a little bit when they're not used. Doing that manually (physical button) is bad idea. Turning them off is even worse. ScreenFocus follows my cursor position and does the job for me.
James McKinven
@m_krzywonos Completely understand, Marcin! I think the product is cool and super valuable for people who prefer that particular workflow - nice work.
César Cardoso
@jmckinven , yeah, I use multiple screens a lot with that workflow. For instance when coding with live reload, I always need the two screens "active" Reading information in one screen to place it on another, etc etc. I just can't see myself using this most of the time.
Marcin Krzywonos
Maker
@jmckinven @cesar_cardoso I should have also mentioned that you can disable dimming for particular monitors anytime. Personally I use both workflows (mostly with dimmed side screens), but sometimes I need both monitors active as well.
Sean M Masters
@jmckinven I do the same. Whenever I wish to focus on one screen, which is rare, I just tap the power button on those screens.
Anthony Da Mota
Nice features, but how do you compare with HazeOver from @pointum? :) Thanks!
Marcin Krzywonos
Maker
@akdm_ HazeOver dims everything but current window. I find it great for big monitors (like 27"). ScreenFocus dims other monitors and focuses on the entire screen.
Anthony Da Mota
@m_krzywonos That's not totally correct, you can focus the window you're working on and dim all the others. But I get your point since HazeOver does not focus the entire screen. Thanks for the reply :)
Elior Boukhobza
As a multiple monitors user, I don't see the advantage of having such a software. The advantage of working with multiple monitors is that you can put windows side to side in order to work better, like having a webpage and an editor, or maybe span multiple screens. Dimming the screens "not in use" completely beats the point in my opinion, not to mention dimming screens actually contributes to more distraction. I can see some uses to this though, like watching a movie, or playing a game, or maybe focusing on writing an article or something like that
Francois Jurado
Pros: well it seems nice... Cons: no windows version? it also seems a little bit overpriced
jeff!
This is probably one of those things I didn't know I needed until I had it. I get distracted easily by the other screens so this will be super useful. Can it easily be disabled for those times you need two screens to work? Like with a hot key or single click?
Marcin Krzywonos
Maker
@the_real_jw Yes! You can disable particular monitors or even the entire app using a global shortcut 😀
Teo Decu

I realised I needed this so much! Not only it helps me focus, but it's also good for the eyes. The price? Totally worth it.

Pros:

- well thought mechanism.

- easy to customize.

- improves focus.

- is a blessing for the eyes.

Cons:

Nothing yet.

Fawad Ansari
This sounds like a great tool. I'll definitely ask the team to try this out!
Hunter Becton
I like it! Just curious, will you ever build in functionality to adjust the overall brightness of a monitor? If so I'd definitely buy! I've been searching for a Mac app that will let me dim the overall brightness of non-Mac monitors. At night I can easily dim the light on my Macbook Pro, but I'm lost when it comes to my other monitors. I've tried several apps that are all garbage, so I have to adjust the brightness manually.
Marcin Krzywonos
Maker
@hunterbecton We'll make it!
Damjanski
<3
João Victor Gelio
I need this for Windows, pleeeease
tharandur
I can't find how select which monitors should dim. Any tips?
Marcin Krzywonos
Maker
@tharandur Just open the app menu on the monitor you want / don't want to dim and click "Dimming enabled"
Matthieu de Luze
Good idea 🙂 With how many screen can you use it simultaneously?
Marcin Krzywonos
Maker
@matthieudeluze There are no limits. However we tested with 3 screen only.
Abhishek Biswal
I work with multiple monitors and this makes so much sense. I had been looking for something similar which can also "focus" on a window without me clicking on it (Not sure if it's possible through the api), but no luck :/
Marcin Krzywonos
Maker
@wirddin It will be part of 1.1 update :)
Lalit Pandey
right now, This looks like a great product but I only work on a single external monitor. So, Idk
Vladyslav Sitalo
Wanted to give it a try but does not seem to be working for me =/ macOs version: 10.12.6
Marcin Krzywonos
Maker
@stvad Sad to hear that! Please contact us via apptorium.com/contact so we can figure out what's wrong.
Rod Ramos
Should make more clear its for Mac only. Neither post description nor website makes this very clear. Windows users will be confused. Maybe change animation to use Apple monitors as well, it will help.
Arjun Rao
Would it be possible to add a feature where the monitor with the current active window is automatically brightened regardless of where the mouse cursor is?
Marcin Krzywonos
Maker
@iamarjunrao We're working on that
Dominik Stec
Hey Marcin Are you actually DIMMING the screen or putting a BLACK overlay instead? (I feel it is the second one). I find this a bit annoying, because on the "dimmed screen" the monitor backlights are still visible (and they are bright). You probably had a reason to do this in that way, but if it's possible, please fix that (in the next version) and use the "REAL BRIGHTNESS" of the monitor. 🙏 Cheers! PS: Would be great if SF would dim the keyboard backlights as well (on the MacBooks laptops) ;)
Jason McMinn
Hmmm . . . this has never been a problem for me and I run three displays at once :-)