Missing movies and TV show artwork iTunes

[dpriest]

I am not sure this is the best place to post this question because this is iTunes specific and I have already searched exhaustedly for a solution to this frustrating problem on the web with no luck. Here is what is going on: I have movies and tv shows as well as music in iTunes that I use with my Apple TV. I am using a PC for this and at home there are no issues at all. I have my movies and TV shows on a Synology network drive that I named X: All of my music including my iTunes library is on my D: drive which is a partition on my PC. Everything is fine here. All artwork shows on my ATV as well as in iTunes.

I now did the same config as above for a setup in a vacation house. I have another older PC that I used where I partitioned it with a D: drive. I copied my music folder with my iTunes library from my PC at home to this PC. I went out and bought a 2TB external drive, named it X: and copied my movies and TV shows to that drive. All of the media is playable. My artwork for my music is still in tact but the artwork for movies and TV shows is not showing in iTunes. I know the artwork folder in my iTunes folder is there. I tried selecting a movie and right clicking to show get info and verified it was tagged as a movie. I am also getting a message in iTunes saying that several items cannot be located with the ! symbol showing.

Are there any solutions to this problem? I thought I did everything exact. What am I missing? Thanks for your help in advance.
[doublepost=1468934316][/doublepost]

I am not sure this is the best place to post this question because this is iTunes specific and I have already searched exhaustedly for a solution to this frustrating problem on the web with no luck. Here is what is going on: I have movies and tv shows as well as music in iTunes that I use with my Apple TV. I am using a PC for this and at home there are no issues at all. I have my movies and TV shows on a Synology network drive that I named X: All of my music including my iTunes library is on my D: drive which is a partition on my PC. Everything is fine here. All artwork shows on my ATV as well as in iTunes.

I now did the same config as above for a setup in a vacation house. I have another older PC that I used where I partitioned it with a D: drive. I copied my music folder with my iTunes library from my PC at home to this PC. I went out and bought a 2TB external drive, named it X: and copied my movies and TV shows to that drive. All of the media is playable. My artwork for my music is still in tact but the artwork for movies and TV shows is not showing in iTunes. I know the artwork folder in my iTunes folder is there. I tried selecting a movie and right clicking to show get info and verified it was tagged as a movie. I am also getting a message in iTunes saying that several items cannot be located with the ! symbol showing.

Are there any solutions to this problem? I thought I did everything exact. What am I missing? Thanks for your help in advance.

There is more info I forgot to add. I have iTunes 12.4 on a PC running windows 7. I use metax to add info to my movies and tv shows including artwork which sends it to iTunes. I tried deleting a movie in iTunes and then adding it back to the library, but once I remove the movie from the iTunes library I cannot add it back. I click add file to library but the movie does not show up again.

 

[benjitek]

Maybe reset your ATV as a new device and start over.

 

[dpriest]

Maybe reset your ATV as a new device and start over.

This has nothing to do with the ATV. The artwork is not in iTunes.

 

[Rigby]

I'd try deleting and re-adding the movies to the iTunes library. Simply delete them in iTunes (but make sure not to select the "move files to trash" option so that the files are not deleted on your USB drive). Then drag your movie folder back into the iTunes window. Make sure that the option "copy files to iTunes folder" is disabled in the iTunes preferences.

 

[dpriest]

I'd try deleting and re-adding the movies to the iTunes library. Simply delete them in iTunes (but make sure not to select the "move files to trash" option so that the files are not deleted on your USB drive). Then drag your movie folder back into the iTunes window. Make sure that the option "copy files to iTunes folder" is disabled in the iTunes preferences.

I will try it this way but when I tried by selecting add file to library, iTunes could not add it back which is very strange. Does iTunes have access to databases like metax where it searches the web for art? In general I would like to understand iTunes better. Does the iTunes library store the music info such as playlists, ratings, etc. including artwork separate from movies and tv shows? If so, I would be willing to start from scratch with a new database, reloading my movies and tv shows if I can keep the music in tact. This would be a very tedious process for me to have to go through all this again and plus there is no problem with the music. I also don't understand what the previous libraries are and why they were created. I would like to understand all of this please.

 

[Rigby]

I will try it this way but when I tried by selecting add file to library, iTunes could not add it back which is very strange.

Indeed. Are you sure the files are readable for iTUnes? What happens if you drag a file into the iTunes window?

Does iTunes have access to databases like metax where it searches the web for art?

It can look up artwork for music (e.g. when you rip a CD), but for movies it only uses the artwork embedded in the files' metadata in my experience. But it probably caches the images in the artworks folder for faster access when first adding the movie.

 

[dpriest]

Indeed. Are you sure the files are readable for iTUnes? What happens if you drag a file into the iTunes window?
It can look up artwork for music (e.g. when you rip a CD), but for movies it only uses the artwork embedded in the files' metadata in my experience. But it probably caches the images in the artworks folder for faster access when first adding the movie.

I will not be at the other house until this Saturday and I will try to drag the movie into iTunes.

 

[jeff051177]

Perhaps not 100% relevant to your situation, but by album/movie/tv show cover art would hardly ever load smoothly on iTunes or on the apple TV, with the library on my synology.

I ran one of dougs scripts to add the individual jpgs to each movie/tv show folder, rather than it just sitting in the metadata..... and now it works. The cover art loads quickly every time in both iTunes and on the apple TV.

 

[dpriest]

Indeed. Are you sure the files are readable for iTUnes? What happens if you drag a file into the iTunes window?
It can look up artwork for music (e.g. when you rip a CD), but for movies it only uses the artwork embedded in the files' metadata in my experience. But it probably caches the images in the artworks folder for faster access when first adding the movie.

I deleted a movie in my itunes library and then dragged it back but the movie does not show up. Now the problem is worst because I cannot get a movie back in my itunes library once I delete it. When I drag it and drop it in, there is no progress bar at top that shows it saving. I searched and cannot find it at all. WTF Apple?? So frustrating!!!
[doublepost=1469853379][/doublepost]It doesn't seem like I am alone on this at all. https://discussions.apple.com/thread/6606394?tstart=0

 

[Rigby]

I deleted a movie in my itunes library and then dragged it back but the movie does not show up. Now the problem is worst because I cannot get a movie back in my itunes library once I delete it. When I drag it and drop it in, there is no progress bar at top that shows it saving. I searched and cannot find it at all. WTF Apple?? So frustrating!!!

Have you checked if it has been imported into the Home Video or Music Video sections? This can happen if the "video kind" hasn't been selected properly in MetaX when tagging the file.

Also make sure that the library (.itl) file is writable on the new computer.

If nothing else helps, you may have to rebuild a new iTunes library (i.e. make a backup of the current one, then delete the library (not the movie files of coures), start iTunes with the now empty library, and import all the movie files (without copying).