Book covers not loading properly on Kobo Forma

FavSport:Reading · 12-08-2018, 11:59 AM

I just bought a Kobo Forma and love it. I use Calibre to side load a lot of my books. The covers do not load properly on a lot of the books. They are either very small or not there at all. This is not a problem when loading them to my nook. I would really love a solution to this problem. Any thoughts?

davidfor · 12-08-2018, 07:40 PM

That is, probably, working as designed.

From the description, I guess you are sideloading epubs. For these, Kobo create the cover by rendering the first page of the book. So, if the first page has a small image stuck in the top left corner, that is what the device will show. You should see this when you open the book on the device, the calibre viewer, or any other epub reader. If this isn't the case, I'd need to see an example to see what was going on.

The, to me, best fix is to fix the cover page in the book. Calibre can do this with a conversion or the Polish books function. Or you can edit the books.

You can also have calibre generate the cover images and send them to the device when sending the books to the device. There is an option in the driver to do this. And for books already on the device, you can use my Kobo Utilities plugin to send just the covers.

JohnnyENZ · 12-09-2018, 03:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FavSport:Reading

I just bought a Kobo Forma and love it. I use Calibre to side load a lot of my books. The covers do not load properly on a lot of the books. They are either very small or not there at all. This is not a problem when loading them to my nook. I would really love a solution to this problem. Any thoughts?

I had this issue for some of my epubs which were sideloaded. Calibre fixed it with editing metadata and downloading a higher resolution cover from any of the sources that had one.

A couple of books I had to google search a cover and download it and select the cover that way but it completely fixed the issue.

mountian · 12-09-2018, 05:38 PM

I met this problem twice, while it can be fixed when restart the machine...you can try...

ps67 · 12-10-2018, 10:38 AM

you can download covers, along with other metadata, from calibre. if the covers you find are too small and are not displayed well on the kobo there is the plugin Prettify Cover that works very well.

FavSport:Reading · 12-10-2018, 02:20 PM

Yes, they are tiny little images, although some have no images at all (only the name of the book and author, etc.) Where do I find Polish Book function? Is that complicated? I need this to be somewhat user friendly for me.

I did download the Kobo Utilities plugin. I also got Prettify Cover plugin. Once you have the plugins, do they just automatically do their magic or do I have to do something special to make it happen? I only know how to edit the metadata as needed. I have turned the device off and back on, but would rather not take it back to factory settings. I’m thinking that is not going to work. I have tried adding new covers and downloading new covers from the Edit Metadata function. Nothing works. The covers are still small. Not all of them are this way. The majority of them loaded correctly, but there are several that I need to fix.

ps67 · 12-10-2018, 03:36 PM

Configure the prettify cover plugin with the little arrow at right side of the icon, You can set up the desired dimension of covers. Then select the book whose cover you want to change and click on the icon.
After modified covers, With the Kobo Utilities plugin You can "upload covers for selected book". It works well.

FavSport:Reading · 12-10-2018, 06:19 PM

Ok. I now understand how to use prettify. The instructions in there say to then use Polish Books. I went to plugins to get it but it doesn't give me the option to install it. I don't know how to make it work. It doesn't show up with the icons. No idea how to use it. Any ideas? Sorry to be such a pain.

jackie_w · 12-10-2018, 09:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FavSport:Reading

Ok. I now understand how to use prettify. The instructions in there say to then use Polish Books. I went to plugins to get it but it doesn't give me the option to install it. I don't know how to make it work. It doesn't show up with the icons. No idea how to use it. Any ideas? Sorry to be such a pain.

'Polish books' is a standard calibre utility. Add it to one of your calibre menus/toolbars via
Preferences > Change calibre behavior > Toolbars & menus

Once you've done that you can update the covers inside each selected epub by running 'Polish books' with the 'Update the cover in the book files' option checked.

Although you might have good reasons for wanting to do all of the above, I should point out that it is not strictly necessary if all you want to do is update the cover thumbnails/screensavers on your Kobo. As davidfor has already said, once you have covers you're happy with in the calibre library metadata you can use the Kobo Utilities plugin ('Update covers for selected books' option) to update any existing thumbnails/screensavers on the Kobo.

davidfor · 12-10-2018, 10:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FavSport:Reading

Ok. I now understand how to use prettify. The instructions in there say to then use Polish Books. I went to plugins to get it but it doesn't give me the option to install it. I don't know how to make it work. It doesn't show up with the icons. No idea how to use it. Any ideas? Sorry to be such a pain.

[Started writing this earlier but got interrupted by work, so there is some duplication of what @jackie_w said.]

Polish books is part of calibre. Unless you have a very old calibre installation, it will be on the toolbar. The icon is a brush. If it isn't there, you can add it in the preferences on the "Toolbars & Menus" page.

But, you don't need to use Prettify. That is a way of fiddling with the cover in the calibre library. If you have a cover there already, it will usually be reasonable starting point. If you used metadata download to get a cover it will probably be all you need. Prettify is mainly for tweaking the cover image in some way.

My process is roughly:

Add the book to calibre.
Download the metadata including the cover. I choose the cover I like the best and is a decent size.
Update the cover in the book. This can be by using Polish books, the Modify ePub plugin, a conversion (only if other things need to happen) or just opening the editor (depends on the book).
Check everything looks good in the viewer.
Send to the device and look at it there.
Tweak things in the editor as needed.

Once the you have done the third step, if you change the cover later, calibre can automatically update the cover when you send the book to the device. Even if you haven't done this, calibre will try to update it, but might not be able to, or the results might not be as good.

And as has been said, my Kobo Utilities plugin has a function to replace the covers on the device if you change them or don't like how they look,

FavSport:Reading · 12-11-2018, 09:23 AM

Ok I'm getting closer. I have somehow managed to get a full size cover on the Home page. However, when looking at it in my Library, it is still small. I did use the Upload Cover for Selected Books. It didn't change it in the Library. What am I missing? Sorry to be so inept but I am learning thanks to all of you.

davidfor · 12-11-2018, 09:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FavSport:Reading

Ok I'm getting closer. I have somehow managed to get a full size cover on the Home page. However, when looking at it in my Library, it is still small. I did use the Upload Cover for Selected Books. It didn't change it in the Library. What am I missing? Sorry to be so inept but I am learning thanks to all of you.

Try restarting the device. There is some memory caching and the updated cover might not be reread immediately. Restarting will clear the cache.

FavSport:Reading · 12-11-2018, 09:51 AM

That did it. THANK YOU SOOOO MUCH! I can’t tell you how much I appreciate the help. It is so nice that there are people out there willing to help those of us who struggle with this stuff. Again, thank you!

JSWolf · 12-14-2018, 09:39 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FavSport:Reading

That did it. THANK YOU SOOOO MUCH! I can’t tell you how much I appreciate the help. It is so nice that there are people out there willing to help those of us who struggle with this stuff. Again, thank you!

You will find that MobileRead is a really friendly place and we do help when we can.

12-08-2018, 11:59 AM	#1
FavSport:Reading Enthusiast Posts: 37 Karma: 1000 Join Date: Mar 2018 Location: Maine Device: Nook Glowlight 3	Book covers not loading properly on Kobo Forma I just bought a Kobo Forma and love it. I use Calibre to side load a lot of my books. The covers do not load properly on a lot of the books. They are either very small or not there at all. This is not a problem when loading them to my nook. I would really love a solution to this problem. Any thoughts?

12-10-2018, 02:20 PM	#6
FavSport:Reading Enthusiast Posts: 37 Karma: 1000 Join Date: Mar 2018 Location: Maine Device: Nook Glowlight 3	Yes, they are tiny little images, although some have no images at all (only the name of the book and author, etc.) Where do I find Polish Book function? Is that complicated? I need this to be somewhat user friendly for me. I did download the Kobo Utilities plugin. I also got Prettify Cover plugin. Once you have the plugins, do they just automatically do their magic or do I have to do something special to make it happen? I only know how to edit the metadata as needed. I have turned the device off and back on, but would rather not take it back to factory settings. I’m thinking that is not going to work. I have tried adding new covers and downloading new covers from the Edit Metadata function. Nothing works. The covers are still small. Not all of them are this way. The majority of them loaded correctly, but there are several that I need to fix. Last edited by FavSport:Reading; 12-10-2018 at 03:40 PM.

12-10-2018, 03:36 PM	#7
ps67 Guru Posts: 731 Karma: 7000000 Join Date: Aug 2017 Location: Italy Device: Kindle Paperwhite, Kobo Elipsa, Pocketbook Color PB633, Inkpad Color	Configure the prettify cover plugin with the little arrow at right side of the icon, You can set up the desired dimension of covers. Then select the book whose cover you want to change and click on the icon. After modified covers, With the Kobo Utilities plugin You can "upload covers for selected book". It works well. Last edited by ps67; 12-10-2018 at 04:39 PM.

12-11-2018, 09:23 AM	#11
FavSport:Reading Enthusiast Posts: 37 Karma: 1000 Join Date: Mar 2018 Location: Maine Device: Nook Glowlight 3	Ok I'm getting closer. I have somehow managed to get a full size cover on the Home page. However, when looking at it in my Library, it is still small. I did use the Upload Cover for Selected Books. It didn't change it in the Library. What am I missing? Sorry to be so inept but I am learning thanks to all of you. Last edited by FavSport:Reading; 12-11-2018 at 09:32 AM.

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12-08-2018, 07:40 PM	#2
davidfor Grand Sorcerer Posts: 24,907 Karma: 47303748 Join Date: Jul 2011 Location: Sydney, Australia Device: Kobo:Touch,Glo, AuraH2O, GloHD,AuraONE, ClaraHD, Libra H2O; tolinoepos	That is, probably, working as designed. From the description, I guess you are sideloading epubs. For these, Kobo create the cover by rendering the first page of the book. So, if the first page has a small image stuck in the top left corner, that is what the device will show. You should see this when you open the book on the device, the calibre viewer, or any other epub reader. If this isn't the case, I'd need to see an example to see what was going on. The, to me, best fix is to fix the cover page in the book. Calibre can do this with a conversion or the Polish books function. Or you can edit the books. You can also have calibre generate the cover images and send them to the device when sending the books to the device. There is an option in the driver to do this. And for books already on the device, you can use my Kobo Utilities plugin to send just the covers.

12-09-2018, 05:38 PM	#4
mountian Member Posts: 10 Karma: 10 Join Date: Nov 2018 Device: kobo forma	I met this problem twice, while it can be fixed when restart the machine...you can try...

12-10-2018, 10:38 AM	#5
ps67 Guru Posts: 731 Karma: 7000000 Join Date: Aug 2017 Location: Italy Device: Kindle Paperwhite, Kobo Elipsa, Pocketbook Color PB633, Inkpad Color	you can download covers, along with other metadata, from calibre. if the covers you find are too small and are not displayed well on the kobo there is the plugin Prettify Cover that works very well.

12-10-2018, 06:19 PM	#8
FavSport:Reading Enthusiast Posts: 37 Karma: 1000 Join Date: Mar 2018 Location: Maine Device: Nook Glowlight 3	Ok. I now understand how to use prettify. The instructions in there say to then use Polish Books. I went to plugins to get it but it doesn't give me the option to install it. I don't know how to make it work. It doesn't show up with the icons. No idea how to use it. Any ideas? Sorry to be such a pain.

12-11-2018, 09:51 AM	#13
FavSport:Reading Enthusiast Posts: 37 Karma: 1000 Join Date: Mar 2018 Location: Maine Device: Nook Glowlight 3	That did it. THANK YOU SOOOO MUCH! I can’t tell you how much I appreciate the help. It is so nice that there are people out there willing to help those of us who struggle with this stuff. Again, thank you!