iPod and Artwork

[drbeachboy]

Hi Steven,

When you have a few minutes would you please explain how sending and updating artwork works with MB? I noticed (I think) that MB does not use the stand alone artwork in the folder with with the music files. Does artwork need to be embedded in all music files being sent to the iPod? I normally embed art in the first music track only. When I send the files, "Cover Flow" is updated ok, but when I play the tracks of an album, only the first track shows art on the screen. The rest of the tracks show the default grey music icon instead of the album artwork. Also, if I update any files with iTunes the artwork database seems to get messed up and I lose artwork completely. When I go back into MB some files seem to have corrupt artwork after working in iTunes.

[Steven]

Does artwork need to be embedded in all music files being sent to the iPod?

no, i should use whatever the primary picture is - whether its embeded or not. I'll check it out later whether i've done something to break that

I normally embed art in the first music track only. When I send the files, "Cover Flow" is updated ok, but when I play the tracks of an album, only the first track shows art on the screen.

I think i'm (incorrectly) only sending the primary picture - bad assumption on my part, so i will correct that

Also, if I update any files with iTunes the artwork database seems to get messed up and I lose artwork completely. When I go back into MB some files seem to have corrupt artwork after working in iTunes.

Cant say i've had that problem, but let me fix the above and see if its stil doing that. The other factor here is the iTunes version you are using

[drbeachboy]

I'm not sure of the version number, but I updated iTunes a few weeks ago, so I'm assuming that it is the latest and greatest. 

[drbeachboy]

One thing that I did notice when adding coverart through iTunes is that, at least in mp3tag, it shows the embedded art as "Other", instead of "Front". Maybe that is why it shows corrupt in MB. MB's embedded art always shows as "Front" in mp3tag. Also, I had few iTunes embedded pix show as blacked out, and one showed up as a half pic. You just gotta love iTunes quirkyness.

[Steven]

you might have your id3 preferences to ID3 ver 2.4, which iTunes has known issues with writing non-standard format - if i recall it only shows up as an issue after a certain number of bytes in the tagging, so for other applications following the standards it usually shows up as a corrupted picture. i try to detect and correct but i guess its not perfect.
Am i right about it being set to 2.4 with the ID3 tagging? If so it might be better to use 2.3 if there is no special reason to use 2.4

edit: just to clarify, i am talking about your iTunes preferences, not MB

[Steven]

how do you transfer your files to the iPod? Through manual drag/ drop, Send To > Device, or auto-synch?

[drbeachboy]

Send To>Device

[drbeachboy]

I use v2.3 ISO. I may have sent a v2.4 if I used fb2k on them prior, but I generally rewrite them to v2.3 with mp3tag.

Edit: I will need to check my tag preference in iTunes later this evening.

[Steven]

i wasnt clear - i meant what your iTunes prefs are. If you added covert-art through iTunes, i expect iTunes would be re-writting the tags

Also, regarding the multiple pictures its definitely only writing one picture but to correct and test will take some time so will try to get something done later this week or weekend

[drbeachboy]

See "Edit" to my previous post. I will change it to 2.3 if it is set to 2.4

[drbeachboy]

I would think that if it picks up my "Front.jpg" image file, then that should correct my problem. I know that foo_dop uses that image file to update the artwork db after all files for that album are copied over. Until recently I never embedded artwork into my lossy files, only into my FLAC images.

[Steven]

MB doesnt have any logic to look for Front.jpg at the moment - in terms of external files, it only looks for folder.jpg and Cover.jpg by default (and any external files you explicitly link). If there is no embedded image and no folder.jpg, i dont know where MB would be getting the image from for your library in the first place.
Its easy enough for me to add a check for Front.jpg but could you confirm

edit:
i just did a just with Send To> Device and its definitely picking up folder.jpg when saving to the ipod

[drbeachboy]

I link to Front.jpg in Album Layout and Artwork Layout. My Front.jpg images are always in the same folder as the music files.

[Steven]

linked explicity in MB or you mean logically linked in foobar?

[drbeachboy]

Linked in MB so that artwork shows in the library. I confimed that using "Cover.jpg" gets picked up too. So, that confirms that the filename was my pix issue.