FREE/BARGAIN — Science Fiction & Fantasy

[Dr. Drib]

Originally Posted by salty-horse

I only checked Kobo.

OK, thanks. I was under the impressions (from discussions in other forums here) that Kobo's illustrations were of a higher resolution than Kindle's.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by salty-horse

A bit low-res compared to the print edition.

You have to remember that Amazon plays games with images and you could end up with lower resolution images. The only way to know what the correct resolution is is to get the ePub version.

[Dr. Drib]

This month's FREEBIE from Tachyon Publications is listed below:

The Bruising of Qilwa
Naseem Jamnia

Available as Epub and PDF. (Clicking on one these buttons does NOT take you to their site, but does download the file of your choice.)

You may (as I am) need to be on their mailing list.

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by Dr. Drib

OK, thanks. I was under the impressions (from discussions in other forums here) that Kobo's illustrations were of a higher resolution than Kindle's.

amazon is not shy about reducing the resolution on low resolution images.

[salty-horse]

The Galaxy Game by Karen Lord is £3 in the UK (Kobo, Amazon)
Second in a series of loosely-connected novels.

For years, Rafi Delarua saw his family suffer under his father's unethical use of psionic power. Now the government has Rafi under close watch but, hating their crude attempts to analyse his brain, he escapes to the planet Punartam, where his abilities are the norm, not the exception. Punartam is also the centre for his favourite sport, wallrunning - and thanks to his best friend, he has found a way to train with the elite. But Rafi soon realises he's playing quite a different game, for the galaxy is changing; unrest is spreading and the Zhinuvian cartels are plotting, making the stars a far more dangerous place to aim. There may yet be one solution - involving interstellar travel, galactic power and the love of a beautiful game.

[salty-horse]

Here's an illustration from the Earthsea book from The Verge's article:
Books_of_Earthsea_plate.jpg - it's a 1692x2508 pixel JPEG, almost 5MB.
In the Kobo ePub, it's a 676x1045 pixel JPEG, 200kb.

[Dr. Drib]

Originally Posted by salty-horse

Here's an illustration from the Earthsea book from The Verge's article:
Books_of_Earthsea_plate.jpg - it's a 1692x2508 pixel JPEG, almost 5MB.
In the Kobo ePub, it's a 676x1045 pixel JPEG, 200kb.

That's a significant reduction.

Thank you for the additional info. I appreciate it.

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by salty-horse

Here's an illustration from the Earthsea book from The Verge's article:
Books_of_Earthsea_plate.jpg - it's a 1692x2508 pixel JPEG, almost 5MB.
In the Kobo ePub, it's a 676x1045 pixel JPEG, 200kb.

Thank you for the details.

What is the file size of the EPUB and how many total illustrations? I don't think there are many, if any, commercial ebooks with multiple 5MB images and 5MB seems excessive for 1692x2508, which would be only 12.7MB for an uncompressed 24bit/pixel image.

I did

djpeg Books_of_Earthsea_plate.jpg | cjpeg > Books_of_Earthsea_figure.jpg

and the result was 834KB and don't notice any change switching between them, but I think reducing the dimensions to 676x1045 and especially compressing to 200KB would significantly degrade the quality.

But the amazon versions are probably worse except maybe those directly delivered to a tablet.

[Hollow Man]

A Song of Ice and Fire (all five books in one file) by George R.R. Martin is on sale at Amazon USA for $2.99.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00957T6X6

[Aleron Ives]

I believe that sale ended last night. It's $40 now.

[Hollow Man]

Originally Posted by Aleron Ives

I believe that sale ended last night. It's $40 now.

I got an email about it at 10 pm Eastern on July 4, and it was still going when I checked at that time. It does show higher now...I wonder when it flipped over, since usually these things end at 3 am eastern.

[salty-horse]

Originally Posted by Hollow Man

I got an email about it at 10 pm Eastern on July 4, and it was still going when I checked at that time. It does show higher now...I wonder when it flipped over, since usually these things end at 3 am eastern.

It was already posted in this forum 4 days ago

[Hollow Man]

Originally Posted by salty-horse

It was already posted in this forum 4 days ago

Missed it due to being bombarded by the endless "images in Kindle ebooks are low resolution" posts...

[Dr. Drib]

Originally Posted by Hollow Man

Missed it due to being bombarded by the endless "images in Kindle ebooks are low resolution" posts...

You have to be fast on your git-a-longs, young grasshopper!

[Hollow Man]

Originally Posted by Dr. Drib

You have to be fast on your git-a-longs, young grasshopper!

I already own the separate ebooks, so it was no big thing for me in any way.

But if I could wave a magic wand and never again, especially in this particular forum, see a post about how the images in Kindles are low resolution, I'd be ecstatic.