Where to put album art?

[Beemer]

I would like to know if Album Art must be inside the same folder that contains either a single flac file or a folder of a flac album? I have a large number of Album Art files that somehow have been placed are in a single folder without any flac or MP3 files. Do I need to manually copy them to the separate folders or can one of my illustrate products do this for me without having to download them again?

Ian

[Dat Ei]

Re: Where to put album art?

Hey Ian,

best way is to have the album art embeded within the music file. Second best is to have the album art within the folder of the music files.


Dat Ei

[garym]

Re: Where to put album art?

I have a single "cover.jpg" file for the album within the same subdirectory of the album for all my FLAC files (typically 1000x1000 size). For my mp3 mirror of my FLAC files, I have the art embedded in the tag of the file (in a smaller size, 300x300).

[Beemer]

Re: Where to put album art?

Hey Ian,

best way is to have the album art embeded within the music file. Second best is to have the album art within the folder of the music files.


Dat Ei

Dat Ei,

Is there such a thing as a tagging Album Art? Could my "bulk" Album Art files in the single folder have been previously tagged so that somehow I could automatically get them to be embedded back into their associated flac or MP3 files which are presently in hundreds of folders?

Ian

[garym]

Re: Where to put album art?

Dat Ei,

Is there such a thing as a tagging Album Art? Could my "bulk" Album Art files in the single folder have been previously tagged so that somehow I could automatically get them to be embedded back into their associated flac or MP3 files which are presently in hundreds of folders?

Ian

Yes, album art can be embedded in file tag. dbpa can easily embed the art if if is in the same album directory. But in a separate directory as in your case I'm not sure it is possible. However, you might consider using illustrate's PerfectTunes product. One thing it is very good at is adding artwork to files/directories without art. It is also good at adding BETTER QUALITY artwork to tracks that already have artwork. Very powerful program!

EDIT: you mean is there a way that your album art has been itself tagged so that it can be matched with your albums? Generally no, but is your album art files named in any particular way (for example, the art file itself has the name of the album or artist?). Also, what program created this album art and put it in a separate directory? Perhaps if you open the files with that program (whatever it is), you can have it embed the art??? For example, itunes puts its artwork in a separate database from the files/directories. But one can use certain free and cheap ($5) programs to automatically take the itunes art and embed into the files themselves so other programs can use the art too.

[Beemer]

Re: Where to put album art?

I have tried PerfectTunes to download artwork but I found that it offers too many unrelated images.

Many of my downloaded files were put into separate folders and only afterwards did I find hundreds of related artwork left behind en masse.

Somehow I had got it into my head that there could be a Windows parent folder holding artwork and that software (?) could find this and either move it to the flac/MP3 subfolder or that it could start an embedding process.

Sorry I'm a newbie as you have no doubt guessed.

Ian

[Beemer]

Re: Where to put album art?

I forgot to ask...Why does mp3tag offer to store Album Art in a "Cover Art Directory"
Ian

[Supernaut]

Re: Where to put album art?

If I want to add different artwork to that which appears when ripping a CD, does it matter where that artwork file is stored? For example, if I have a selection of album art stored in a folder labelled "Pictures", and I select that artwork to be embedded upon ripping, if I later move the artwork file from "Pictures" and put it in the same folder as the ripped music files, will that cause any problems down the road? I'm guessing that once embedded in the ripped file, the original file location becomes unimportant.

Also, I seem to remember reading somewhere that I have to delete the artwork pulled up by CD ripper before adding my own. Do I also need to change the artwork file name to folder.jpg before selecting it for embedding? If I decide to store a copy of the artwork alongside the ripped files for reference (as is often included when you buy music online), I would prefer to keep the album name as the artwork file name.

[Supernaut]

Re: Where to put album art?

If I want to add different artwork to that which appears when ripping a CD, does it matter where that artwork file is stored? For example, if I have a selection of album art stored in a folder labelled "Pictures", and I select that artwork to be embedded upon ripping, if I later move the artwork file from "Pictures" and put it in the same folder as the ripped music files, will that cause any problems down the road? I'm guessing that once embedded in the ripped file, the original file location becomes unimportant.

Also, I seem to remember reading somewhere that I have to delete the artwork pulled up by CD ripper before adding my own. Do I also need to change the artwork file name to folder.jpg before selecting it for embedding? If I decide to store a copy of the artwork alongside the ripped files for reference (as is often included when you buy music online), I would prefer to keep the album name as the artwork file name.

Never mind, I see now that the artwork is automatically copied to the folder containing the music files. Not sure how I missed that before. ( 0 _ 0 )

I would still like to know, however, if it is safe to change that copied file name from "Folder" to the same name as the album.

[Spoon]

Re: Where to put album art?

The standard is folder.jpg, less programs would read the album name as the art.

[garym]

Re: Where to put album art?

The standard is folder.jpg, less programs would read the album name as the art.

As Spoon notes, "folder.jpg" or "cover.jpg" are basically universal naming methods for album art. Anything else may or may not work with your current or future music server/player. In CD Ripper options, ID tags, where you set artwork settings, you can choose either folder.jpg or cover.jpg or [filename].jpg. The latter might do what you want. But again, this is not necessarily universal for many players. My advice is stick to folder or cover. I use cover.jpg myself.

edit: and even when ripping a CD, you can choose any artwork you want at that point. You don't have to wait and change it later. Just click on the album art icon in lower right of CD ripper screen and you see options to load from another source.

[Supernaut]

Re: Where to put album art?

The standard is folder.jpg, less programs would read the album name as the art.

As Spoon notes, "folder.jpg" or "cover.jpg" are basically universal naming methods for album art. Anything else may or may not work with your current or future music server/player.

OK, thank you. I thought that the program (music server/player) read the album art that is embedded in the file, not from the associated "folder.jpg" or "cover.jpg" file. Glad that I checked.

I do have some downloaded music files with embedded art but no artwork saved as a separate file. How do things work in this case? The album art is still showing up in my music player, even though the "folder.jpg" or "cover.jpg" file isn't there.

[garym]

Re: Where to put album art?

OK, thank you. I thought that the program (music server/player) read the album art that is embedded in the file, not from the associated "folder.jpg" or "cover.jpg" file. Glad that I checked.

I do have some downloaded music files with embedded art but no artwork saved as a separate file. How do things work in this case? The album art is still showing up in my music player, even though the "folder.jpg" or "cover.jpg" file isn't there.

Most music programs can read both embedded art and art in a separate file within the folder (folder.jpg). And you can have both if you want. Different players/servers have different rules about which art is used if both exist. If you want ultimate flexibility, probably embedding the art in your files *and* creating a folder.jpg file as well will insure something always works. dbpa can both embed the art in the file and create the "folder.jpg" file. Just set this in the dbpa settings.

edit: personally, I use a maximum 1000x1000 file called "cover.jpg" in the album folder of my FLAC files. When I create mp3 files for use on portable devices, I have the converter embed the album art into each file (with a maximum size of 500x500). This gives me flexibility as I might not always copy entire albums to my portable devices, and the embedded art makes sure that even a single mp3 file will have art.

and if you create folder.jpg or cover.jpg and later decide to embed all the art, you can run a batch job with dbpa converter and create embedded art very easily.

[Supernaut]

Re: Where to put album art?

Thank you @garym