iTunes 11 - Any way to manually add artwork without using get info?

[DaGrandMastah]

I know you can manually add artwork to a artwork to an album without selecting all the tracks and dragging the artwork through "get info". The problem is that, doing so causes itunes to increase the size of the album signifciantly. For example, I'm adding a picture that's 50 kb but adding it to the album converts the file to whatever format itunes uses and brings the album from 101 mb to 115 mbs. Before, we used to be able to drag the artwork over to the sidebar but that option is no longer there. Is there any way to work around this? When you dragged it over to the sidebar itunes would leave the file as is...therefore the size would only increase by however many songs were in the album multiplied by whatever the size of the artwork was.

[qbricc]

Have you tried opening the get info for the first track of an album and adding artwork to that song only. Now when you view it as an album, iTunes can use it for display of album.

[DaGrandMastah]

Originally Posted by qbricc

Have you tried opening the get info for the first track of an album and adding artwork to that song only. Now when you view it as an album, iTunes can use it for display of album.

That's a good idea but I prefer to have all of the tracks tagged...that way when they display on my iphone they each have individual artwork.

I did find a slight workaround using one of dougs apple scripts.

http://dougscripts.com/itunes/script...estorealbumart

What you need to do is take the jpg file and manually add it to the album's folder in the itunes media directory. Then use the above script to reembed that artwork. It took my album that was 109 mb and brought it up to 110.1 mb. Conversely, doing it through get info brought the total album size from 109 to 120 mb.

It's a pain of a workaround but it works. I really hope they bring back the artwork in the left hand side. Seems that a lot of people are raising this as a legit issue. I personally love the new itunes but i do feel that's an unncessary omission from the final release.

[EyeAmLuv]

Originally Posted by DaGrandMastah

I know you can manually add artwork to a artwork to an album without selecting all the tracks and dragging the artwork through "get info". The problem is that, doing so causes itunes to increase the size of the album signifciantly. For example, I'm adding a picture that's 50 kb but adding it to the album converts the file to whatever format itunes uses and brings the album from 101 mb to 115 mbs. Before, we used to be able to drag the artwork over to the sidebar but that option is no longer there. Is there any way to work around this? When you dragged it over to the sidebar itunes would leave the file as is...therefore the size would only increase by however many songs were in the album multiplied by whatever the size of the artwork was.

I don't quite understand. iTunes 11 is no different from previous releases. The file size always increases by the size of the artwork since your own artwork isn't linked but embedded in the file itself.

[DaGrandMastah]

Originally Posted by EyeAmLuv

I don't quite understand. iTunes 11 is no different from previous releases. The file size always increases by the size of the artwork since your own artwork isn't linked but embedded in the file itself.

No it doesn't. If you use get info then it always does (including in previous versions) but if you used the aforementioned artwork box on the left hand side (which has been removed from the sidebar) then it would not convert the file from jpg to png, thus preserving the file size.

[EyeAmLuv]

Originally Posted by DaGrandMastah

No it doesn't. If you use get info then it always does (including in previous versions) but if you used the aforementioned artwork box on the left hand side (which has been removed from the sidebar) then it would not convert the file from jpg to png, thus preserving the file size.

Oh, you mean preserving the file size of your image -- not the file size of the track (because that is changing for obvious reasons)? I didn't know there was a difference at all. I've always used the one on the sidebar, too. Yeah, not all updates are brilliant. Out of curiosity -- and because it concerns me as well --, what is the downside of converting the image to PNG, apart from size? And why would they do it in the first place? Does it affect the quality, too?

[DaGrandMastah]

Originally Posted by EyeAmLuv

Oh, you mean preserving the file size of your image -- not the file size of the track (because that is changing for obvious reasons)? I didn't know there was a difference at all. I've always used the one on the sidebar, too. Yeah, not all updates are brilliant. Out of curiosity -- and because it concerns me as well --, what is the downside of converting the image to PNG, apart from size? And why would they do it in the first place? Does it affect the quality, too?

Yeah sorry maybe I wasn't completely clear. So for example, in this specific scenario, I wanted to add a 50 kb 500X500 artwork to a mixtape in my iTunes. The tape, without artwork, is 109 mb in size. When I added the file using the method above with dougscripts (or the previous method of using the sidebar) it increased the size of the album to 110.1 mb (which makes sense with that size file). Using that same file and adding it through get info inscreased the file size to 120 mb though. Now that may not be a big deal in the grand scheme of things but I have a ton of music cataloged on my computer and that's going to signficantly affect the space on here and, more importantly, on my iphone when i sync back.

To go back to your question though.....I really don't know what the reason is for why it's convereted to png. I only know that everything being equal, a png will always be signficantly larger file than a jpg. As far sa I know it does not affect the quality at all.

I'm not dogging Apple though. I absolutely love the new itunes 11. Does this suck? Yes. But it seems that all that's missing is that artwork on the sidebar which, based on how many complaints they've received, I would think they would add it back in a future update. Until then I have a workaround. Hopefully more people see this post (if they care about stuff like this) so they don't get stuck with bloating album sizes.

[EyeAmLuv]

Originally Posted by DaGrandMastah

Yeah sorry maybe I wasn't completely clear. So for example, in this specific scenario, I wanted to add a 50 kb 500X500 artwork to a mixtape in my iTunes. The tape, without artwork, is 109 mb in size. When I added the file using the method above with dougscripts (or the previous method of using the sidebar) it increased the size of the album to 110.1 mb (which makes sense with that size file). Using that same file and adding it through get info inscreased the file size to 120 mb though. Now that may not be a big deal in the grand scheme of things but I have a ton of music cataloged on my computer and that's going to signficantly affect the space on here and, more importantly, on my iphone when i sync back.

To go back to your question though.....I really don't know what the reason is for why it's convereted to png. I only know that everything being equal, a png will always be signficantly larger file than a jpg. As far sa I know it does not affect the quality at all.

I'm not dogging Apple though. I absolutely love the new itunes 11. Does this suck? Yes. But it seems that all that's missing is that artwork on the sidebar which, based on how many complaints they've received, I would think they would add it back in a future update. Until then I have a workaround. Hopefully more people see this post (if they care about stuff like this) so they don't get stuck with bloating album sizes.

OK, I see, thanks for your explanation. With your (old) method, each track would probably increase by those 50 kb. PNG is always bigger, that's true. I really don't get why they convert it, though. I also wonder why they used to offer two methods with two different outcomes. Has it always been that way -- JPG if using the sidebar, PNG if using the info window? That is not very consistent. I mean, I've been using iTunes from the very beginning, and I had no idea there was a difference at all. I probably wouldn't have noticed hadn't I read your thread. The scans I'm using are somewhere between 1 and 2 MB, so I never really cared either. I like the rest, too. The fact they chose Helvetica over Lucida Grande is interesting. It looks more Windows now, and it doesn't really add to clarity or readability, even though it creates space which helps on a small MacBook Air.

[DaGrandMastah]

Originally Posted by EyeAmLuv

OK, I see, thanks for your explanation. With your (old) method, each track would probably increase by those 50 kb. PNG is always bigger, that's true. I really don't get why they convert it, though. I also wonder why they used to offer two methods with two different outcomes. Has it always been that way -- JPG if using the sidebar, PNG if using the info window? That is not very consistent. I mean, I've been using iTunes from the very beginning, and I had no idea there was a difference at all. I probably wouldn't have noticed hadn't I read your thread. The scans I'm using are somewhere between 1 and 2 MB, so I never really cared either. I like the rest, too. The fact they chose Helvetica over Lucida Grande is interesting. It looks more Windows now, and it doesn't really add to clarity or readability, even though it creates space which helps on a small MacBook Air.

Yeah each track will only increase in size by the size of the file you're adding. I really don't know the reason as to why it works the way it does...nor why they made the change but this was a long time ago that it happened.

I didn't even notice the change in the font. I love the look of the blended color with the artwork in album view though...and I love how instead of being one column of songs it now shows in 2 columns. I also prefer this artist view to the previous since it gives you a quicker view of what else you have.