[Karsanac]

I'm having trouble with my album cover screen saver. Only 8 or 9 covers come up for my screen saver. I was hoping to erase the album cover files and start over. And it's not the screen saver options. I tried everything. Even though I have over a 100 different covers, only the same 8 or 9 come up.
Thanks.

[mdawson]

iTunes has never stored album artwork separately; that is, there is not a collection of image files stored on your hard drive in the same manner as there are music files stored in the iTunes Music folder. Unlike most databases with image support, iTunes does not link to image files stored elsewhere, hence the reason all cover art in iTunes are converted to 72 ppi regardless of the original image resolution.
The Album Artwork folder in the iTunes folder does not appear to contain anything other than a folder tree structure with .itc (iTunes CoverFlow data) files. The Album Artwork folder was added with the introduction of iTunes 7 and CoverFlow.
As to replacing your album covers, you have to do so album by album in iTunes in the same way in which you added the images in the first place. Perhaps someone else knows of a quick and dirty trick for you or a script that will handle image importing/album art management. Dougs Applescripts is a good place to look for iTunes scripts for a number of mundane tasks.

[Dan Frakes]

Unless things have changed recently, this isn't quite accurate. iTunes stores album art in one of two ways, depending on how that art was added. If you access the Info window for a track in iTunes and then paste or drag artwork into the album art field, the art is imbedded in the track itself (so every track on an album will contain its own copy of the art). However, if you use iTunes' Get Album Artwork command, the album art is saved as .itc image files (one image for an entire album) in subfolders in [location of your iTunes folder]/AlbumArtwork/Download.

[Karsanac]

Hmmm... You know what. I got rid of all of my downloaded "Get ALbum Artwork". Then went to album view.
There were still 9 albums with covers. THE SAME 9 ablums that get played on my screen saver.
So does that mean that the iTunes album cover screen saver only uses those songs with the album cover embedded in it?

[mdawson]

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However, if you use iTunes' Get Album Artwork command, the album art is saved as .itc image files (one image for an entire album) in subfolders in [location of your iTunes folder]/AlbumArtwork/Download.

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Hmm, that is interesting as I never use the Get Album Artwork commandall of my album artwork is scanned from the physical media and embedded in the tracksand I have an Album Artwork folder full of .itc files. What does my Album Artwork folder contain?

[mdawson]

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So does that mean that the iTunes album cover screen saver only uses those songs with the album cover embedded in it?

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Based on what Dan posted and what you found, that may very well be the case, but it would also make no sense. There would be little point to adding the album art screen saver if it refuses to use artwork collected by iTunes.

[Dan Frakes]

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Hmm, that is interesting as I never use the Get Album Artwork commandall of my album artwork is scanned from the physical media and embedded in the tracksand I have an Album Artwork folder full of .itc files. What does my Album Artwork folder contain?

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If you go into the Download folder, you can open those .itc files in an image viewer such as Graphic Converter -- are they images of album art you've scanned? I ask because some have speculated that iTunes grabs album art whenever you import CDs (or, of course, purchase tracks from the iTunes Store), so there will be some there even if you embed art.
Other people have speculated that some of the .itc files are cached versions of embedded art that get used by the album-art screen saver and Cover Flow.
In other words, there are still some mysteries here /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif

[mdawson]

When I attempt to open the .itc files in GraphicConverter I get the message:

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Unknown file format
The file filename.itc is broken, the format is
unknown or it isnt a graphics file.
So, GraphicConverter cant open it.

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I have GraphicConverter 5.4.1, which came with my Mac.
Also there is no download folder in my Album Artwork folder; this is likely due to the fact that I do not allow iTunes to get album art or download any music. The general file structure is,

Album Artwork/Local/5151FBA8E7E053FB/.
[/list]In that directory there are 16 folders named sequentially as 00 through 15. Each of those folders includes a secondary level of no more than 16 similarly named folders. Some of these numbered folders are missing one or two folders on the secondary level; that is, the folders are still named from 00 to 15, but, for example, in Album Artwork/Local/5151FBA8E7E053FB/01/ a folder named 10 does not exist. After the second level, a third level of folders is also named from 00 to 15, but several folders are not present in the numbering sequence. The third level folders contain the .itc files.

[albloom]

This is fun. Like you I have no Download folder in iTunes/Album Artwork, just
a Local folder. I always use my own artwork, too.
I looked into one of those odd .itc files (with a meaningless string as a title)
and found it to be the cover of Tony Bennet's "Duets" album. but not quite
as I loaded it. The original is a 4.8" square jpg at 100 dpi. The artwork inside
the mp3 file in my iTunes library is the same size.
But the .itc file (Graphic Converter 6 can open it) is 72 dpi and 5.55" square.
When I "get info" on one of the album's tracks in iTunes and copy the art
into Graphic Converter, it is also 72dpi, but 6.67" square. Which is what
one woul;d expect from changing a 100 dpi image to 72 (100/72 x 4.8").
It is a puzzlement.

[mdawson]

I noticed iTunes resolution conversion some time ago. When I scan and retouch my album art, the final image is either 300x300 pixels (most CD covers) or 300x264 (CD singles in non-standard jewel cases) and is saved as a 150 ppi JPEG (2x2 in.). The cover art JPEG is linked in my Music Collector database, which was used to build my online CD catalog (go to the Music section to see individual album entries) then, I copy and paste the image file into tracks associated with the album art in iTunes. If I grab an album cover out of iTunes the 300x300 size is retained, but the resolution is dropped from 150 ppi to 72 ppi.

[Dan Frakes]

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Also there is no download folder in my Album Artwork folder; this is likely due to the fact that I do not allow iTunes to get album art or download any music.

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Right. The files in /Download are in a different format than the ones in /Local; perhaps the Local ones are indeed the cache files for embedded art?