Book Covers as screensavers

[911jason]

A Game Of Thrones





A Clash Of Kings






A Storm Of Swords






A Feast For Crows

[HappyGuy]

Here is a method for those do-it-yourselfers who aren't handy with Photoshop or don't have it.  If you already have Windows 7 or Vista installed and working, this method uses only programs that came with it -- no stretching applied:

1.  Go to Amazon.com, find the book, click on the small picture of the cover (or 'See larger image'), right-click on the resulting large image, and then save ('save image as').  Usually this will give you a 500 x 500 pixel image.

2.  Find the image file in your browser's 'Downloads' folder (or wherever else your browser saved it; in Firefox, the list of recent downloads should already be open in a separate FF window if you just downloaded the image, or go to FF 'Tools' > 'Downloads' and reopen the list).  Click on the file name, which will open the .jpg file automatically in the default program for viewing photos, not surprisingly called 'Windows Photo Viewer'.  Then, in the Windows Photo Viewer menu, click on 'Open' > 'Microsoft Office Picture Manager'  (later, if you wish, you can bypass the Windows Photo Viewer step by making Microsoft Office Picture Manager your default program to open all .jpg files).

3.  In Microsoft Office Picture Manager, in the toolbar at the top, click on 'Edit Pictures'; the 'Edit Pictures' toolbar will appear down the right side of the screen.  Click on 'Edit using these tools' > 'Crop'.  The 'Crop' toolbar will appear.  Under 'Crop Settings' click on the drop-down menu next to 'Aspect Ratio', select '3 x 4', click on the 'Portrait' radio button, and then click on 'OK'.  At the bottom of the Crop toolbar click on 'Back to Edit Pictures'; then, under 'Edit Pictures', click on 'Resize'.  The 'Resize' toolbar will appear.  Click on the radio button for 'Predefined width x height' and then scroll down to 'Document -Small (800 x 600 px)' and select that choice; then click on 'OK' below.  You have now created an 800 x 600 pixel copy of the book cover.  (For DX Kindles, use 'Document -Large').

4.  Still in Microsoft Office Picture Manager, go to the menu at the top and click on 'File' > 'Export'.  The Export toolbar will appear on the right in place of the Resize toolbar.  Under 'Export selected files to', uncheck 'Original locations' and click on 'Browse...'.  In the directory tree window which opens, click on 'Pictures'.  The contents of your Pictures library will appear.  Either highlight an existing folder or create a 'New folder' for this book cover; then click on 'Open'; that folder's name should appear in the 'Export selected files to' window.  Now, move down the toolbar to 'Export with this file name' and uncheck 'Original file names'; then click on 'Rename...' and  and type in your choice of file name.  Move down to 'Export with this file format' and select the format of your choice (I prefer .gif to .jpg as the file is smaller yet the compression is less 'lossy').  Move down to 'Export using this size' and select 'Document - Small (800 x 600 px)' again  (you will not have to resize the image as it is already that size).  Then click 'OK.'

That's it, step by step. 

Great instructions!!  I might add one more step. After you've exported, you may want to run the picture through this process to get the 18 shades gray scale (so you can see what it looks like: http://charles-reace.com/kindle_screensaver.php

Many thanks to whoever (Charles Reace?) created this VERY handy tool.

[911jason]

Charles Reace = NogDog

[Neekeebee]

Be careful what you ask for Neekeebee!

I found slightly better quality artwork along with cover art from several foreign versions of the books. I'll post them in 1 second... =)

P.S. DX Versions also available

THANK YOU, thank you, Jason!  These are some great screensavers!

Hubby loves art, so he is going to really enjoy looking at these everyday!

N

[911jason]

I thought you might like them! I really enjoyed seeing how different the artwork was for each country... and I only included about half of them!

[Neekeebee]

Looking at these screensavers on my K1 is tempting me to hack my K3 too. 

N

[911jason]

You know I didn't even catch in your request that these were going to be for a K1. Do they look alright? I know the K1 only shows 4 shades of gray, whereas the K2/K3 show 16 shades of gray.

[ulysses]

can anyone make a screensaver for me from the cover of the "Pillars of the Earth" book?
Thank you very much.
its my favorite book.

[nogdog~6op6ou]

can anyone make a screensaver for me from the cover of the "Pillars of the Earth" book?
Thank you very much.
its my favorite book.

[ulysses]

thank you!

[amauriced]

Can you work with a link from Smashwords? This book has Amazon's "Look Inside" feature, so it can't be saved from there. Here's it is:


http://resources.smashwords.com/bookCovers/e3daa49b8ca6dbd9971e5b520df2149e43fc8837

[911jason]

Here you go...

[Neekeebee]

You know I didn't even catch in your request that these were going to be for a K1. Do they look alright? I know the K1 only shows 4 shades of gray, whereas the K2/K3 show 16 shades of gray.

Yes, they do look great!  Of course, I can't see them on the K3 to compare, but I'm very happy with them.  Thanks!

And now I have to add the Pillars SS too.

N

[amauriced]

Thank you Jason!

[r1chard]

for Kindle 3 WiFi, does it have to be 600x800
or it could be large than that as long as the ratio 3:4 is retained?

and if it's larger than 600x800 will it be better looking (less pixelated) at the kindle screen or just the same?

[911jason]

I think it will still work with larger images, but it won't look any better, since 600x800 is 1:1 pixel.

[ereaderbackgrounds]

There are several book covers available at ereaderbackgrounds.com. Let me know if you have any special requests to add to the site.