Database Develop

Media Player and Album Art

So, when running media player are you suppose to see the Album Art? I would assume the Blue Box I am seeing is where the art could be displayed but of course I only see a blue box in the upper/left and scrolling information in the bottom of this box about the mp3 that is playing.

yes you're supposed to see the cover.
Has the mp3 you're playing the cover in its tag ?
If you transfer your mp3s using WMP on your computer, do you have the covers ?

Yes, I see the Album art in Media Player and in iTunes on my Vista PC. Also, all other meta data is seen on the Tilt by going to the properties of the mp3.
This is how it looks in my folder on vista.

How did you put the mp3s you're playing on your tilt ? Did you use the sync function of WMP ? If you've just transfered it using explorer, it may not work because I think WMP is using a little picture of the cover instead of the corresponding tag in the mp3.

lpaso said:
How did you put the mp3s you're playing on your tilt ? Did you use the sync function of WMP ? If you've just transfered it using explorer, it may not work because I think WMP is using a little picture of the cover instead of the corresponding tag in the mp3.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I only direct copied it... that could be it.

yup-
to get the album art-ya gotta synch it through media player

You are both correct, after using Media Player to sync up "Dark Side of the Moon" I got album art (I see the little jpg file it places in the directory with the mp3 files). That is rather stupid but at least I know now.
Thanks for you time and helping with my stupid question.

Most of the mp3s I direct copied kept their cover art (manually added in itunes) but 1 or 2 albums didn't. The only thing I can see in common is that the albums that didn't bring their cover art were the albums that itunes automatically found art for. The albums I added the covers manually kept theirs. Funny.....

Music - album art and the library

I had issues getting album art to work (read it here before as well)
I have tested some different methods, but now finally got it:
- connect as usual with activesync, then explore to the location you want to have you files and copy the stuff.
- when you want to have album art to show up with your albums/songs, you need to make sure that you have a cover (folder.jpg or whatever name) in the same folder when copying: thus not after the fact, as it will never work.
- in the library go to "all songs", you will actually see the files appearing during copying, together with the album art.
an additional _htc<name>.jpg will be created as well, I suppose this one is actually being used by the library. Creating this file manually does not work - in my experience anyway.
Give it a try if you have similar troubles. For me, this is the only way for it to work properly.

bakman said:
I had issues getting album art to work (read it here before as well)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Why not just use wmp to sync? work flawless for me...
You can drap and drop any picture to album to create album art...
create playlist, then drag and drop the mp3(or drop the whole album), then sync.

Idiot steps...?
I am almost sorry to ask this question but please forgive my stupidity:
Can someone bullet the tasks necessary to add an album with art to my Diamond. I have had a go with Windows Media PLayer but have never synched music to my PDA before. I ended up with an album synched but it didn't appear in the Diamond player when I went to library all my Media Player library seemed to be listed but nothing would play.
Sorry for being so stupid...
Sam.

crash74 said:
Why not just use wmp to sync? work flawless for me...
You can drap and drop any picture to album to create album art...
create playlist, then drag and drop the mp3(or drop the whole album), then sync.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i have the same problem, wmp syncs ok the music but dont the music art

I've create a folder for each MP3 and inserted a bmp 200x200

andres_lol said:
i have the same problem, wmp syncs ok the music but dont the music art
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I must confirm having kind of the same issue.
Step proces which seems to fail:
1. Update Artwork directly on desktop through WMP
2. Drag and drop "album" to WMP Sync
3. Sync and check all files in WMP Mobile4
4. Confirm : All music and Artwork visible.
5. TouchFlo Music screen: All music there, though missing Artwork.
Question - assumption (not found in Manual)
Artwork Jpeg's limited in size? Should not be as these files are not bigger than 50Kb --> Bug?
Hope someone finds the workaround.

bakman said:
.
- when you want to have album art to show up with your albums/songs, you need to make sure that you have a cover (folder.jpg or whatever name) in the same folder when copying: thus not after the fact, as it will never work.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
does it mean I have to copy all mp3´s together with the associated .jpg from a folder on my PC to a folder of my mobile device, OR do I have to copy the .jpf first and the insert the .mp3 from my PC?
I don´t get the exact order!

what i do in the wmp...
- I select "album" in the wmp
- Drag and drop the folder which contain mp3
- Drag and drop the picture which i want to have it as album art, on top of the album which i had just drop
- WMP should should show ur album with the picture which you selected. (pic 1)
- Drag the whole album into the syn list and sync away....
In the diamond music folder, you should have what it show in the pic 2...

Mediaplayer syncing doesnt work for me.
@horstborsch; your first statement is correct. you must have a .jpg in your album in your pc-folder before copying, then when you copy the folder to your diamond, the album art will show up (choose "all songs" in the player)

bakman said:
Mediaplayer syncing doesnt work for me.
@horstborsch; your first statement is correct. you must have a .jpg in your album in your pc-folder before copying, then when you copy the folder to your diamond, the album art will show up (choose "all songs" in the player)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Another possibility why it does not work is the length of the "artwork" naming - file transfered to the Diamond.
As I can see , I only have visibility on jpgs if it starts with ~HTC - xxxx.jpg
Am looking now hosw to fix, but it should be flawless when synchronizing directly with WMP. All other "manual" implications are simply not fitting the expectations as I never hand any issue with my Tytn II

ceevee369 said:
Another possibility why it does not work is the length of the "artwork" naming - file transfered to the Diamond.
As I can see , I only have visibility on jpgs if it starts with ~HTC - xxxx.jpg
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This htc<xxx>.jpg file is created automatically when you copy the files (or when you open the music library). I see the files+art appearing in realtime when I go to "all songs" and copy the folder.

I have same problem.
WMP sync carrying artwork into WMP Mobile fine.
But no artwork in Touch Flo 3D music app.
I want WMP sync to work not have to copy folders onto device.
Its well sad.
We have to beat this one.
I'm going to google!

Pocket player 3.6 --> forget about Diamond player
Give the 30 days trial a chance to show you how well integrated it is with the Diamond and forget about WMP and the Manila missing albums and art files.
It is just rubbish in my humble opinion
Only thing I can not figure out anymore how to set-up Pocket Player as main player disabeling the on-board Touchflo/ WMP player
Main issue is when using a bluetooth headphone with A2DP, this only controls the WMP- touchflo UI and not Pocket player. Changing volume works, but skip FF RW and pause-play interacts with WMP & touchflo only
Any advice is helpfull - googled it but no workaround identified

dunno if thisis the right thread, but it took me already to to page 200000 of the forum. I was just wondering if there is a problem with album art and *.wma files. drm-something
has anyone solved this problem or am i just a stupid fool using *.wma?

updating library?
Hey there!
I am using Tag&Rename for all my mp3 to edit via IDtags and embedding the cover art.
So all my mp3 on the XDA Diamond show the cover in the player.
But I do have an other problem or I didn't figured it out (Just have my Diamond for 2 days).
I transfered new songs via Winamp on my Diamond (used as USB device) - How can I now update the library that I will find the new ones?
Thanks Sebastian

All I want is for the touchflo 3D music player to display the folder.jpg just like windows media player. Can it do this?

The reason for this behaviour has been posted elsewhere, but I can't find it now. A clever bloke on PocketNow explains things here...link.
Apparently, when WMP syncs it copies over a copy of the mp3 file without album art embedded and a separate jpg of the album art. You can't stop it doing this!
HTC Audio Manager in Touch Flo 3D is programmed to find the album art in its embedded form in mp3 files. You can't do anything about that either!
So he very clearly walks us through a work round. It works very well and doesn't take very long. But you would want to get fairly organised about what music you want on your device as you wouldn't want to have to do this frequently. Essentially he suggests using an app called "Flash Renamer" to rename all the jpg files on your device because they start with complex numerical filenames. Then you use an app called "Mp3Tag" to embed the artwork into the mp3 files on your device.
Also when you want to change your music you have to start all over again by deleting the music on your device. Otherwise WMP will sync additional copies of the same mp3's, as the file on your device is different to the one it wants to sync (that is, the device file has been changed by the workround to one with artwork embedded).
The workround is good and also keeps WMP Mobile functional if you prefer to use that.
Again the workround is here...link.

Once again I have to ask - why isnt folder.jpg sufficient. I cannot be bothered will all of this embedding art in files nonsense

Ok can anyone advise how to show more than one album at a time . I can get the album to show but only one

Anyone any ideas?

( Tutorial )The easyest way to add album art to touchflow3d

Ok today i decided to transfer some mp3 albuns to the touchflow3d and it seemed hard to say the least, searched xda and all the tutorials where even harder... so i did some trial and error and got into this:
I rename the cover to folder.jpg ( already discussed this trough the forums
then i make a new copy of folder.jpg and rename it to hTC_AM_AlbumArt.jpg and put it on hidden, upload all the directory into the storage of diamond, startup mediaplayer ( on diamond ) and do a update library, check the album i just uploaded and the picture shows when i play the mp3 trough media player, soft reset and thats it the album now shows on touch flow 3d
this was the only way i managed to get the pictures to appear, oh btw i resize the pictures to 200 x whatever it gives

Domitri said:
Ok today i decided to transfer some mp3 albuns to the touchflow3d and it seemed hard to say the least, searched xda and all the tutorials where even harder... so i did some trial and error and got into this:
I rename the cover to folder.jpg ( already discussed this trough the forums
then i make a new copy of folder.jpg and rename it to hTC_AM_AlbumArt.jpg and put it on hidden, upload all the directory into the storage of diamond, startup mediaplayer ( on diamond ) and do a update library, check the album i just uploaded and the picture shows when i play the mp3 trough media player, soft reset and thats it the album now shows on touch flow 3d
this was the only way i managed to get the pictures to appear, oh btw i resize the pictures to 200 x whatever it gives
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
256x256 for best restults, or if uneven, keep the larger side at 256 pix.

Found a way that works!!!
Add all the albums in Windows Media Player as normal and check that all MP3-tags are correct (Album, artist etc) and to update the album art I use the free tool "AV Art Fixer for WMP and MCE" that checks all songs/albums for errors and embed the album art.
When done, do a synchronize to the TD.
The program can be downloaded from here: http://www.avsoft.nl/cms/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=80&Itemid=4

The easiest way to add album art to touchflo3d is called "folder.jpg"
Other than that, something like "Tag & Rename" can add and embed art work to all your files, it can pull art from a location you specifiy, pull art from amazon.com or pull art from the folder.jpg already in your album folder. In one click all files can be embeded with art.

I used to use Itunes, and had added my own artwork on it.
These pix get embedded in the mp3 file, thus increasing the file size, anyhoo my point being , most of the artwork is shown when transfered via media player to the Diamond, but not all , still working on it.
It could be because most of the artwork pix are of different sizes.
Must get it working coz it took me close to 2 months finding my own artwork for about 4gigs of music alone.

kaush said:
I used to use Itunes, and had added my own artwork on it.
These pix get embedded in the mp3 file, thus increasing the file size, anyhoo my point being , most of the artwork is shown when transfered via media player to the Diamond, but not all , still working on it.
It could be because most of the artwork pix are of different sizes.
Must get it working coz it took me close to 2 months finding my own artwork for about 4gigs of music alone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
tag and rename also has a tool to extract embeded art from all your files and create a folder.jpg in the album folder in just one click. This would definately solve your problems with touchflo

And again, why so complicated?
1) Tag the file correctly. That means, put the cover into the mp3tag.
2) Make sure the tag is ID3v2.3 ISO 8859-1 or ID3v2.3 UTF 16. ID3v2.4 UTF 8 will NOT work. Check the settings of your tagging-tool. I prefer mp3tag (mp3tag.de). Its multilingual.
3) Copy your files to your phone (e.g. my documents\music)
4) Enjoy your covers... The phone creates them itself from the embedded tag. What you will find in your directorys now looks like ~hTC_albumname.jpg
Anyone issues with this solution? Maybe this does not work on older firmware, idk. Me is using a 1.93 ROM.
Have a nice play
BCS

will dropping these properly tagged files into the music folder be sufficient...or do i have to make folders? many of my songs are single tracks..should i put it into a general folder instead?
will try it out tonite...thanks for the tip!

Meh, I did it manually. Using "Folder.jpg" for each album took me a few hours but hey, it's worth it and thought me some fun stuff about my favorite bands through wikipedia'ing for the covers.

The easiest:
[email protected] said:
Found a way that works!!!
Add all the albums in Windows Media Player as normal and check that all MP3-tags are correct (Album, artist etc) and to update the album art I use the free tool "AV Art Fixer for WMP and MCE" that checks all songs/albums for errors and embed the album art.
When done, do a synchronize to the TD.
The program can be downloaded from here: http://www.avsoft.nl/cms/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=80&Itemid=4
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It works and is the best and esaiest way see the album art in the touchflo3d
Thanks,

This one works on All Devices
Hi,
I have used MediaMonkey for ages now and on different devices from phones to Sansa Music Players and now on my MDA Compact IV
Its available as a free version and a Gold one (that costs)
The free version does allow you to do everything including album Art etc and tag, genre, renaming & changing etc etc
Take a look
http://www.mediamonkey.com/
Enjoy.

ricarp said:
It works and is the best and esaiest way see the album art in the touchflo3d
Thanks,
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I downloaded and installed it.. I get an error everytime I just try to run it.. PRobally becasue I am using Vista 64-bit edition.. Does anyone here know how to jsut make Album Art visible so when I drag and drop files to my phone, the art will be there?

How do i load albums with cover to the TF3D player?

Hi ,
i Deleted the sample albums that came with the Diamond and i dont know how , and to where i should place my albums (and how i load to them cover)
thanks for your's help.

Hey
Well, I've discovered a very easy method. I use Media Monkey 3.0 to download the coverart of an album. You simply load in the mp3's, select one and rightclick on it and select search tag on web and voila, the programm automatically attaches the albumart to the mp3 so it will show up in the TF3D music player. Very very easy.
Regards
TheWizzard

I too have the same problem. I tried to use Media Monkey but for some reason the album art doesn't attach itself to the tracks.
I successfully transferred the tracks to my phone but when i go into the tf3d music screen the album aart isn't there. Tried various methods but to no avail.
What am i doing wrong???????????

The easiest way is to just put a folder.jpg image in the folder with the album.

I tried that too. I renamed the album art which i placed in the same folder as the album tracks but even that didn't show the cover on tf3d. I can view the album art when i go into the track listing, but it doesn't show up when i'm playing the tracks.
Thanks for your reply btw

i'd recommend attaching a folder.jpg instead of putting the artwork within the tags, as apparently the new versions of TF3D do not like embedded artwork and will cause the music player to crash

So do i just place the artwork in the same folder as the tracks and then rename it to folder.jpg? I have tried this way but i just can't seem to get it to show on the tf3d screen....

no, that method does not work.
use windows media player, it's easy.

When you embed a jpg or png file as artwork in the MP3-tag the HTC player will extract it and create a hidden file in the same folder. The name is ~hTC_Album Name.jpg
The easiest way to have your cover shown in the TF3D player is to create such a file yourself (it doesn't have to be hidden). I have my favorite 120 tracks in the same folder and every single one is shown with the right cover.
But: the album name in the tag has to match the file name exactly and it has to be a valid file name according to the windows rules, i.e. the following characters are forbidden: \/:*?"<>|

Hi Obsidian,
I have tried that, but it doesn't seem to work for me
Can I just check how you do it?
Lets say you have two mp3s, one with an album tag of XXX and one with album tag of YYY.
You then have 2 jpgs with the album art in your Music folder, one called ~hTC_XXX.jpg, and one called ~hTC_YYY.jpg?
That is how I am doing it, yet they are not appearing in the Library or TF3D. If I have the mp3s in seperate folders, then I can make an folder.jpg for each one, which it then translates into hTC_AM_AlbumArt.jpg, that works fine, but I would love to be able to use your method.

graculusthegreenbird said:
Lets say you have two mp3s, one with an album tag of XXX and one with album tag of YYY.
You then have 2 jpgs with the album art in your Music folder, one called ~hTC_XXX.jpg, and one called ~hTC_YYY.jpg?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's right. I checked again and discovered that the jpg file generated by TF3D has a size of 256x256 the same as hTC_AM_AlbumArt.jpg also generated by TF3D. The ~hTC... files are hidden but that shouldn't be a problem. You could try taking one mp3 of album XXX and one of album YYY in the same folder and copying the corresponding hTC_AM_AlbumArt.jpg renaming it to ~hTC_XXX.jpg.
Besides that I have no idea.
Edit: Try this attached set of mp3 with artwork. The "song" is by me so no copyright issues here.

Heres what I did.. downloaded the picture of the album (google)...
make sure the file extension is jpg and not png .. rename the file to Folder.jpg and place it in the album folder.. connect your phone using it as a disc drive delete all existing pictures in the music folder .. copy paste.. then disconnect ur phone wait 10 seconds and voila!
ps Ive tried all other methods mediamonkey etc
This one worked best for me

http://discuss.pocketnow.com/showthread.php?threadid=23550
step by step

Thanks shaka-ban. Just followed the instructions from your post. All my albums now have the album art displayed. Was doing my head in.
Just one thing, which i hope you may be able to answer, how do i get all the albums covers to display on the screen so i get 3d flipping?
Hope you can help, or if anyone else knows that would be so so good.
Thanks in advance

just import album files with mp3tag program into mp3 files and they will appear in your touchflo3d after you you copy them to your device.

Thanks for your reply. I've got the album art on the screen when i select an album to play, and the album art stays there for all the tracks, but i've only got the album art for the album thats currently playing. I wanted to be able to see all the covers in my collection and be able to choose an album to play from there, by flipping through them.

Obsidian72 said:
That's right. I checked again and discovered that the jpg file generated by TF3D has a size of 256x256 the same as hTC_AM_AlbumArt.jpg also generated by TF3D. The ~hTC... files are hidden but that shouldn't be a problem. You could try taking one mp3 of album XXX and one of album YYY in the same folder and copying the corresponding hTC_AM_AlbumArt.jpg renaming it to ~hTC_XXX.jpg.
Besides that I have no idea.
Edit: Try this attached set of mp3 with artwork. The "song" is by me so no copyright issues here.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks, Obsidian. Actually, I was doing it right all along, but what I was missing was that I didnt soft reset in between adding the new jpg files. Once I did that (or otherwise restarted Touchflow 3d), then as I hit the Music tab, I could see a little "working" cursor rotating in the top left as it updated the database internally. After that, it displayed the new albums fine.
So now I have the choice of directories with a "folder.jpg", or an range of album specific jpgs in a single directory.
Thanks for the help, my music tab looks superb now.

Stevie18 said:
Thanks for your reply. I've got the album art on the screen when i select an album to play, and the album art stays there for all the tracks, but i've only got the album art for the album thats currently playing. I wanted to be able to see all the covers in my collection and be able to choose an album to play from there, by flipping through them.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can hit the Library button, then scroll to the album tab and flip through them that way, but it is a little slow to update, and doesnt use the same 3d flow look as the main music display, more of a 2d list.

Good music management.....
Starts with good managing of your albums and music on your PC...
I use iTunes (Mediamonkey just as good);
Each .mp3 has an Info tag that you can assign a picture to, typically I keep 1 Album to a folder, then change all the music files within to the same folder to the same Album name and then assign my own Album cover (search on web...Amazon is good for a 200x200 size jpg).....in Itunes right click for info, and change as you like....drag and drop you Album cover and you music will be set forever.
Album covers, genres, titles, artists, whatever can be assigned and the data will carry to all the Music players (itunes, media monkey, coreplayer, etc)
Bit of effort at first, but once done your music is set the way you want it forever!!

can someone tell me how to delete the temporary files of the htc player?
i deletet the default mp3s and now im stuck. the player wont show my musik and wont delete the sample musik out of the playlist.

HTC Hero Music app in DrizzyDrake Rom 2.8

All,
I have the current DrizzyDrake 2.8 Hero ROM installed and I'm loving it. very, very little lag....
However, does anyone know wher to put the album art for it to show in the music widget? I have the album .jpgs in the same folder as the music but the artwork is still blank on the widget.
Cheers, JJ

Amdathlonuk said:
All,
I have the current DrizzyDrake 2.8 Hero ROM installed and I'm loving it. very, very little lag....
However, does anyone know wher to put the album art for it to show in the music widget? I have the album .jpgs in the same folder as the music but the artwork is still blank on the widget.
Cheers, JJ
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I use "Tag&rename" (it's shareware) to add the jpg's to the ID3 tags. It works fine, but does anyone know any freeware, possibly for Linux?

The android stores the album art on a seperate folder in the sd card. I think it is the same folder, albumthumbs. It has a file that is synced over when you sync your music, and there is no way to just drop the art in. Do the following:
1. assuming you are using wmp, highlight all of the tracks in said album that you want to sync, and right click
2. go to advanced tag editor
3. pictures tab
3. select a pic for your cover art (can retrieve from amazon mp3 or wherever)
4. choose cover (front
5. save and resync
6. before the album art will display you will need to play the song for it to update
(note: even if wmp is displaying an album cover this will still need to be done, upon resync the albumart file will be stored in the folder automatically)

AdrianK said:
I use "Tag&rename" (it's shareware) to add the jpg's to the ID3 tags. It works fine, but does anyone know any freeware, possibly for Linux?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I use http://perl.thiesen.org/scripts/id3image to add a JPG to an MP3 (uses the APIC tag). It's a commandline PERL script.
Having said that, I'm having some problems with the HTC MP3 player picking up some of the ID3 information - JPG corruption, ID3v1 .vs. ID3v2, etc. Still need to do some research before copying over my 8 gigs
Cheers,
Rich

album art grabber will grab all album covers automatically.

gtrplr71 said:
album art grabber will grab all album covers automatically.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
yeah this is a great little app, also works well in conjunction with mp3 tagger.