Matching images for soundtracks

[Steven]

this is what i am planning to do:

i'm inclined to agree with zak on this - if people have to tag the name of the movie or game then many wont bother and it seems any automated solution based on the album title and Soundtrack genre might work in some cases but perhaps not very successful.
How would people feel about having a tool to assist with downloading pictures locally? It would prompt for the name of the movie when Soundtrack is tagged in the genre and wasnt able to make a match. Is there a usual way for identifying game files?
So once the files are downloaded musicbee would use them. It would also allow you to add more pictures if you wanted.
As the pictures would be named by the album and for compilations, additionally the track number. I think a new folder would be needed so it doesnt ever clash with locally stored artist pictures

[redwing]

Honestly I don't get where this feature is heading. So, to avoid inputting movie titles in a custom tag, people should always be ready to type in movie titles when prompted while they're listening to soundtrack music? And to avoid that, people must edit the genre tag of their soundtrack music files to "Soundtrack"? To avoid that, people should download and store movie pics in the folder unlike artist pics that don't require such steps and show different pics randomly without storing them? So do people really think this obtrusive and convoluted approach is more user-friendly for general users than using a custom tag?

[Steven]

first off i dont think either what i am proposing or the custom tags are great solutions or can i think of a better way.
i just think depending on a custom tag, most people wont bother and secondly probably only people reading this topic will know about it.
Having an automated approach, although probably not great at catching the bulk of the cases should still be useful. Your fallback would be to use the downloader tool, you will need to enter the movie name much less often than tagging all your soundtrack files. Additionally you are free to add any extra pictures yourself in the new folder. It wont depend on having "Soundtrack" as the genre.
Also I am making the downloader tool more general purpose, so should make this feature more discoverable as it will also support downloading artist and album covers. It will be in the tools menu.

[redwing]

first off i dont think either what i am proposing or the custom tags are great solutions or can i think of a better way.
i just think depending on a custom tag, most people wont bother and secondly probably only people reading this topic will know about it.
Having an automated approach, although probably not great at catching the bulk of the cases should still be useful. Your fallback would be to use the downloader tool, you will need to enter the movie name much less often than tagging all your soundtrack files. Additionally you are free to add any extra pictures yourself in the new folder. It wont depend on having "Soundtrack" as the genre.
Also I am making the downloader tool more general purpose, so should make this feature more discoverable as it will also support downloading artist and album covers. It will be in the tools menu.

OK. I guess I'll need to see the implementation before making any case for improvement. Thanks for the detailed responses.

[Xyzzy]

BTW:

http://www.soundtrackinfo.com/
http://www.soundtrackcollector.com
http://www.soundtrack.net/
http://www.theisdb.net/index.php
http://www.ost-search.com/

and

http://vgmdb.net/
http://www.mirsoft.info/gmb/

[ma_t14]

I cant check myself atm (so everything that follows is just speculation) but i assume what xyzzy posted are online databases of soundtracks. If those databases hold the movie title of each soudtrack and are reasonably comprehensive I think all problems are actually solved!

A check could be made each time a track plays whether it's part of one of the soundtrack databases and then display the relevant pictures. Obviously this check will be optional for people that want this behaviour.

[Zak]

No offense to OP, but I still say it sounds like a lot of work for a feature only one person seems to want.

How does artwork rotation work now? Can they be files in a subfolder of the album folder or do they have to be embedded?

[Xyzzy]

No offense to OP, but I still say it sounds like a lot of work for a feature only one person seems to want.

How does artwork rotation work now? Can they be files in a subfolder of the album folder or do they have to be embedded?

My idea was simple:
1) If an album (track) it determined as game/movie soundtrack
2) then display screenshots/movie stills/ covers in slideshows (or in views- fe when I group in main panel by Game - game cover should be displayed)

So far most of the steam in the discussion went into 1).
The sources for 2) can be either local or online (fe.  http://www.moviestillsdb.com/, http://www.movieposterdb.com/, http://vgimg.com/, http://www.gametdb.com/ - first hits from Google, damn, they have everything covered in these internets). In case of local, there must be a way to tell what is movie poster(s), movie still(s), game cover(s) and game screenshot(s), to be used in proper context.

That's it.

Judging by the number of replies I don't think this is one of rather forgotten ideas.

BTW, in case of games hardware platform can also make a difference

[Zak]

My idea was simple:

The idea is simple. Implementing it is not.

It should be something that works for everyone's soundtrack collections and not specifically catered to how you have tagged yours. That introduces a lot of variables that Steven will need to account for if this is going to be a useful new feature.

Hence why I'm suggested using the existing artwork rotation instead of adding (and testing and debugging) something soundtrack specific.

[vivadavid]

I don't agree at all with the statement that this is a feature for only one person. It is a very interesting tool and one from which many people will be able to benefit from. If I am not interested in one feature, I simply don't participate in the thread. In any case, the real issue is how to implement it, and I can see there are different approaches.

[Steven]

please everyone, i have already said twice what i am doing with this

[vivadavid]

You're right there, Steven. Sorry about that.

[redwing]

Would be great if gallery element of TM works the same way as modern compact player for soundtrack tracks.

[vivadavid]

Hello, Steven, do you intend to release a beta with what you planned for this feature or will we find it in the final version 2.2? It'd be nice if we could test it a little bit. Thanks.

[psychoadept]

I'm pretty sure it's already in the latest patch: http://musicbee.wikia.com/wiki/Latest_Update