Cover size discrepancy

[stephensw]

In the Style Guide under Prepare Your Cover Image it says, "500 pixels wide by 800 pixels tall is generally a good dimension. The image must be at least 600 pixels tall."

In the website, Support Center FAQ, under Cover Image requirements, it says, "They should be vertical rectangle-shaped (the height is greater than the width), not squares, and must be a minimum width of 1,400 pixels. A recommended size is approximately 1,600 pixels wide by 2,400 pixels tall"

Which is correct, and is there somewhere to preview the upload?

[eskimo]

Jun 28, 2012 11:31:50 GMT -8 stephensw said:

In the Style Guide under Prepare Your Cover Image it says, "500 pixels wide by 800 pixels tall is generally a good dimension. The image must be at least 600 pixels tall."

In the website, Support Center FAQ, under Cover Image requirements, it says, "They should be vertical rectangle-shaped (the height is greater than the width), not squares, and must be a minimum width of 1,400 pixels. A recommended size is approximately 1,600 pixels wide by 2,400 pixels tall"

Which is correct, and is there somewhere to preview the upload?

The cover image size is changing from July 15th to the values shown in the FAQ. (You should have had an e-mail informing you of this which I received today). This is to improve th image, and also to fit in with Amazon's new guidelines.

At present you don't need to change any covers that are all ready published but upgrading a cover will need to fit into the new specifications.

[Ted]

The Style Guide was updated to reflect cover size changes, as mentioned in the Smashwords News forum on June 26th. Members should download latest version of Style Guide and regularly check the Style Guide page for updates. You can tell if the Style Guide has been updated by the Rev date in the Description of the ebook.

[idiotprogrammer]

I'm sorry, but this makes no sense.

Every ebook creation guideline I have seen (including Amazon's own formatting guide) have specified that the dimensions for images should be 600x800 pixels more or less.

What readers on the market currently require this dimension for their ebook submissions?

This poses a problem for me. I hired an artist to do a cover for ebook which is 600x800, and that's what the artist delivered. Must I pay this artist again to do a different cover?

I'm guessing I could use gimp to upconvert the cover to your dimensions, and then Meatgrinder will do its business -- which inevitably means downconverting the original image to 600x800. But why is this extra requirement necessary?

Also, if I use gimp to upconvert my image for the MS Word file, are there any cases where downconverting will hurt the overall image?

*******************
Update: I see that Amazon's cover guidelines have changed:

Requirements for the size of your cover art:

• Minimum of 1000 pixels on the longest side
• Ideal height/width ratio of 1.6

For better quality, we recommend that images be 2500 pixels on the longest side.

[Julie Harris]

I use a free program called Photoscape - much easier to learn than GIMP.
I suggest you make a copy of the original image and experiment with the copy (leaving the original intact).
I have successfully resized existing 600 x 900 and 500 x 800 covers to 1400px wide, keep proportions. There doesn't seem to be any problem with quality but the file size increases.
Julie.

[tangomike]

The changes in Smashwords cover requirements are not being driven by Amazon, but by Apple, so that the books distributed to Apple by Smashwords will not be rejected.

When I received the Smashwords email informing me of the changes and mentioning Amazon's information, I began researching their style-guide cover requirements and found confusing information and direct contradictions. I sent them a message asking for clarification, and this is what they said in reply:

*****

While formatting your cover image for Kindle, please make sure it meets the following requirements:

— TIFF (.tif/.tiff) or JPEG (.jpeg/.jpg) format
— Dimensions of at least 2500 pixels on the longest side
— Ideal height/width ratio of 1.6

Please know, 1000 pixels on the longest side is accepted; however, 2500 Pixels on the longest side is recommended for better quality. Further, 72 DPI limitation no longer applies and there is no restriction on the dpi.

600*800 is recommended for images which are embedded within the content file, which will be compressed to 127 KB during the conversion process and this is not related to the catalog image you upload on KDP. Hence, you can format the cover image with the aforementioned guidelines.

Further, we need only one cover image (the one you upload on KDP will be used as the thumbnail image on the detail page of your book), you don't have to embed the cover image within the content file. During the conversion process, the catalog image you upload on KDP image will automatically be re sized and embedded in the very first page of the content file. Only one product image would suffice.

***End of Amazon's reply***

That should clarify once and for all that the old, previous, outdated, incorrect (substitute the adjective you like the best) guideline of 600 x 800 and 72ppi is bogus. If you want to use a cover that will satisfy Amazon, Smashwords, and Apple, and not alter the height to width ratio of your current 600 x 800 cover, that is very easy to do.

The Smashwords blog post on the subject includes a sample size that works very well: 1800 x 2400 is a 1.33 height to width ratio just like 600 x 800. Yes, the height is 100 px less than Amazon's recommendation, but it makes absolutely no difference in the visible quality of the image as viewed on any computer or ereader screen.

And the Smashwords blog post statement that you should not resize an image to meet the new requirements because that will make the image pixelated (blurry) is bogus as well.

I'm fairly proficient with Photoshop Elements (translation: Photoshop for Dummies) and I just finished resizing all of my previous 600 x 800 72ppi covers to 1800 x 2400 @ 300ppi and they look gorgeous. File size increases because there is 3 times as much color information, but it is not an issue. I haven't done this with Apple yet, but Amazon, PubIt, and Smashwords all accepted the cover without a single blip.

If you want to trust me on this, I submit that you won't be disappointed.