OnArtowork - capture missing covers - details
Basics:
At startup OnArtwork lists all the tracks available in the main playlist of your iTunes library.
Every listed track is visualized showing the following informations: artwork status, artist name, album name, track name:

The track's list

The artwork status is a coloured icon indicating if the a tracks has an artwork assigned or not, the colours admitted for each icon are the following:

Assigned artwork status the track has an artwork assigned
Unassigned artwork status the track does not have an artwork assigned
Unknown assigment artwork status the assignment artwork status is unknown, this is the status is used during startup process. OnArtwork progressively analyzes the loaded tracks and replace their unknown status with the assigned or not assigned one. During artwork status identification a progress indicator is shown in the lower left corner of the main window:
Progress bar

The OnArtwork toolbar let you filter which tracks you want to show in the list populated at startup, you can filter by artwork status or by searching tracks for a particular text:
Track's list filters
 
How to's:

See details about a listed track:

  • select the track from the list, its name, album, artist and artwork (if assigned in iTunes) will be displayed in the window's upper side.


Remove and artwork from a track:

  1. select a track having an assigned artwork from the list
  2. the track's artwork will be displayed and the "Remove" button will be enabled
  3. press the "Remove" button, this will remove the artwork from the selected tracks and from all tracks of the same album

Track's details

Edit and assign an existing image to a track in iTunes:

You have the image of a CD cover. You downloaded it from internet, or in iPhoto after having captured it with a digital camera. Follows those steps to edit and assign it to a track in iTunes:

  1. drag the cover's image to the 'Captured Cover' box in OnArtwork
  2. proceed with the 9th step in the following section
'Captured Cover' box

Capture a CD cover using your video camera, edit it and assign it to a track:

You have real CD cover in your hands and you want to capture and assign it to a track (and its album) follow those steps:

  1. place the camera over your main screen (this is not strictly necessary, but it can help, many newer Mac computers already use an iSight camera integrated in the upper side of the main screen)
  2. verify that there is a good illumination (best results can be obtained in rooms having diffused and bright light, while light sources near the camera can generate undesired glares)
  3. if the CD cover is mounted on a CD case, remove the CD case, usually the presence of the CD case produces undesired glares
  4. press the Capture (or Flash Capture) button on the lower right side of the main window
cover capture buttons
  1. the main screen will become black with a square delimited area filled by your filming video camera
  2. a count down will start and you'll listen one beep every second (you can decide the duration of the countdown from the preferences)
  3. get your CD cover and place it in front of the camera trying to fill the square delimited area (you need to practice a little, keep the cover with your open hand, avoid to put fingers on the cover, and try to keep the cover perpendicular to the video camera axis)
capturing a cover
  1. when count down ends you'll listen a flash sound and the capturing window will close
  2. the captured cover will appear on the main window and the Adjust palette will open to show the editing controls

captured cover

  1. the editing controls will activate
  2. captured cover can moved vertically and horizontally, scaled, rotated and cropped,
  3. noise, sharpness, expsoure, saturation, contrast and brightness can be modified too

adjust controls panel

  1. not satisfied with the captured cover ? try again, change lighting, use the Capture Flash button and practice. Send us a feedback at this subject specifying if you need more controls
  2. if your capture is satisfying, select a track to which you want to assign the cover (it has to be a track with unassigned cover), then press the "Assign" button

assign button

  1. the cover will be assigned to the selected track and to other tracks without artwork of the same album