[Tex2002ans]

Originally Posted by odamizu

What is the benefit of wrapping a cover jpg (or any image) in SVG code? I've seen ebooks with cover images without SVG; and other ebooks wrap the cover jpg in SVG. SVG also seems to be the default for Sigil and Calibre.

As others have mentioned, the SVG Wrapper allows the underlying image to stretch/expand without distortion.

This differences really stand out when you have Tall/Skinny or Fat/Short images, OR you turn your device from Portrait->Landscape.

For example:

Example 1 (SVG Wrapper vs. HTML Width) [Portrait]

You can see the SVG Wrapper stays the proper ratio:



but the HTML version that stretches to "100% width/height of the screen" starts turning into an oompa loompa:



Example 2 (SVG Wrapper vs. HTML Width) [Landscape]

The problem becomes much worse when you turn the device to landscape.

You can see the SVG Wrapper keeps the ratio correct:



but the HTML Width+Height version gets severely distorted:



while the HTML Width version gets chopped off and flies off the screen:

Originally Posted by j.p.s

I don't know whether SVG images can cause problems with KF8, but I do know that SVG images that are actually made with vectors instead of pixels can look great in KF8 books.

But sadly, SVGs don't work in old MOBI. So you would have to create fallback images anyway. A real giant pain.

I still recommend having the SVG sources though, so in the future you could generate higher quality/resolution images (like in my Formulas to PNG tutorial).

Though an absolutely fantastic post you referenced if I do say so myself.