The format required for your cover art in is a minimum of 1440×1440 pixels, maximum 3000×3000 pixels, jpeg files only.
As your partner, Dallas’s goal is to deliver your content to all the authorized platforms. Our main concern is to keep your product live, by following the stores’ rules and providing you with guidelines to support you during content creation.
The rules we follow regarding covers/artworks are also applied by the Digital Music Services and respect certain legal guidelines.
Stores are constantly reviewing their rules in order to provide users with original and qualitative content. As Preferred partners of the key platforms, we strictly apply the cover/artwork guidelines in order to provide you with the status benefits and keep your product live.
Please find below the guidelines to follow for your cover/artwork:
Cover guide
Deliver the original cover whenever possible.
The ideal cover art may contain the following information (Correctly spelt):
- Name of the main artist(s)
- Release title
- Label name and/or label’s logo
- Featuring artist(s) (as long as it is clear who is the primary artist and who is the featuring artist)
- Name of cover creator/designer (i.e. “designed by …”) on condition this information is credited in c-line of the release. Do not display only the name of cover creator/designer on the cover art.
- The display of mentioned information is not mandatory, the cover may contain only a visual part without any additional information.
Cover art must comply to the following rules regarding quality, image and displayed information:
Quality rules:
- Pixelated covers. Any cover is considered pixelated, when upon zooming to 100% resolution, pixels can be distinguished with naked eye. Pixelated covers are not accepted.
- Blurry covers. Any cover is considered blurry, when upon zooming to 100% resolution, the full image depicted on the cover is not neat to naked eye. Blurry covers are not accepted.
- Stretched covers. Any cover is considered stretched, when the initial image underwent horizontal or vertical stretching in order to fit the required resolution, while deforming the initial proportions of the image. Stretched covers are not accepted.
- Cropped images / Additional bars on covers. Covers containing additional bars (that are not a part of cover’s design) in order to fit the required resolution or covers that a missing part(s) of the image (or information) are not accepted.
- Misaligned covers. A cover is considered misaligned when the image has been moved within the actual cover art leaving a border (of any color) on one or two sides. Misaligned covers are not accepted.
- Rotated covers. A cover is considered rotated when the image is clearly on the side or upside down without any artistic reason. Rotated covers are not accepted.
- Artistic choice. In some cases, blurry, pixelated, misaligned, cropped and rotated covers may be accepted if the mentioned effects are displayed as artistic choice and in artistic purposes.
Image rules:
- Third parties IP. Displaying of third party’s intellectual property on the cover is not accepted. Do not display famous characters, pieces of arts, logos, trademarks, industrial design etc. without prior authorization from their owner.
- In some rare cases when an album is sponsored by a trademark, a confirmation of the sponsorship agreement from both label and a trademark may be ask in order to accept such covers.
- Note, that representation of an artist as a character of movie, TV show or cartoon may be tolerated in certain cases.
- Shocking and graphic content. Covers displaying shocking images or graphic content are not accepted.
- Note, that in certain cases (i.e. Metal genre covers) shocking images may be tolerated to a certain extent.
- Xenophobic, discriminatory and harassment content. Covers promoting or displaying any form of harassment, xenophobic content or any other discriminatory images are not accepted in any form.
- Terrorism. Covers displaying terrorist content or promoting terrorist activities are not accepted in any form.
- Minors. Covers displaying minors are accepted. Note, that in certain cases (i.e. displaying of a shocking scene with a minor) a rights confirmation of displaying a minor may be asked.
- Nudity. Covers containing images (direct or suggestive) or depictions of genitals (male and female), nipples (male and female), sexual intercourse, pubic hair or intergluteal cleft are not accepted. Using of such images is not accepted even in combination with Explicit Content logo.
- Generic templates. Covers using generic templates are not accepted. Covers using the same image while changing the color pallet are considered as generic templates and are not accepted either.
- Note, that using the same artist’s photo for different releases may be considered as generic template.
Information rules:
- Cover/Metadata Mismatch. Information displayed on the cover should match exactly the release’s metadata (i.e. Artist’s Name, Release Titles, etc.).
- Note, that displaying information in alphabet/language that is different to metadata’s but matches it in meaning is considered a mismatch.
- If a cover contains information displayed in several languages and one of these languages matches release’s metadata such cover can be accepted.
- Parental Advisory/Explicit Content logo. Don’t use the Parental Advisory/Explicit Content logo on the cover unless one of the tracks is marked as explicit.
- Note, that the “Restricted logo” is solely used for R rated movies, not music.
- DMS logos. Covers containing Digital Music Store logos are not accepted. Do not display DMS logos even if your release will be distributed on these stores.
- Note, that in some rare cases, when a release is exclusively delivered only to one store (and has an exclusivity deal with that store), the display of that store’s logo can be tolerated upon prior authorization from the store.
- Misleading covers / Missing content. Covers referencing information or content (i.e. “video included”) that is not included in the release are not accepted. Do not display information that may mislead a customer in any way on the cover.
- References to physical product. Covers containing references to physical support or packaging (i.e. “CD”, “Cassette”, etc.) are not accepted.
- Note, that displaying of images of physical support (i.e. image of VHS cassette) as cover design without any information references (i.e. words “cassette”, etc.) may be accepted.
- References to digital product. Any cover containing terms and notions that refer to a digital product (i.e. “mp3”, “Digital Edition”, etc.) are not accepted.
- Information limited in time. Covers containing terms and notions that can be true only for a certain period (i.e. “New”, “Latest”, etc.) are not accepted.
- Pricing tags / Barcodes. Covers containing prices in any currency or barcodes (even for design purposes) are not accepted.
- Rights limitation. Covers that forbid or limit distribution rights in any way are not accepted (i.e. phrases like “All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means”).
- Up-selling / Advertising. Covers that up-sell or advertise another product are not accepted (i.e. phrase like “…from upcoming album…” is considered as an up-selling).
- Contact information. Covers containing contact information of any sort (phone numbers, e-mail, etc.) or web-links are not accepted.
- Note, that social media account names (i.e. Twitter, Instagram, etc.) are considered contact information.