Step 2.4 of the “MP3 Manufacturing” Workflow: Adding the album art to the MP3 files
We come to the most important (in my opinion) of the MP3 “manufacturing process”.
To add album art to the files, we will again use the software MP3tag. You can use your own favourite MP3 tagging software. But we will NEVER use iTunes to find the album art and hence will not use iTunes to add the album art.
“Why I don’t use iTunes to get Album Art”
In MP3tag software, select all the tracks and then right click on the songs and choose EXTENDED TAGS. A familiar dialog box will appear. On the right hand side, is the the cover section. You then click on the “ADD COVER” button and navigate to your album art file. This is the JPG file that you would have created. If you have been following the process, you should have a folder.jpg in the folder.
Click OPEN and you will see the album art copied to the preview box:
Click okay and you can see the album art transferred over to the MP3 file as evidenced by the album art box on the left hand side:
Click SAVE and you are done ! The album art is now embedded into the MP3 ID tag and will always be available for different media players (even some handphones) or different media softwares. It is independent of the software or hardware as long as you are using the standard MP3 tags.
A successfully completed process will mean that the files look like these properly formatted file names with correct Unicode album names, titles, and artists. And of course album art embedded in them.
Cool !