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Artist Extras

Artist Extras automatically downloads additional content about artists during live DJ sets, including images (banners, logos, thumbnails, fan art) and biographies. This enhances audio-only streaming with visual content and background information.

Note: Many settings in this section require restarting What's Now Playing to take effect.

What You Get

Images

OBS screen with an example of each image type

Type WebSocket URL Raw Image URL Size Description
Banners /artistbanner.htm /artistbanner.png 200px × unlimited Artist image with name text
Fan Art /artistfanart.htm N/A 800px × 1280px High-quality background images
Logos /artistlogo.htm /artistlogo.png 200px × 480px Stylized artist text/graphics
Thumbnails /artistthumb.htm /artistthumb.png 480px × 200px Artist photos

Biographies

Artist biographies are available in two formats:

  • artistlongbio - Full biography content
  • artistshortbio - Biography truncated to fit in a single Twitch chat message

Preventing Repeated Bios

Enable Don't repeat artist bios within a session to avoid sending the same artist's biography to chat (Twitch, Kick) more than once per set. Once a bio has been sent for an artist, it is suppressed for the rest of the session.

  • Playing three Nine Inch Nails tracks in a row sends the NIN bio only on the first track.
  • For collaborations, What's Now Playing picks the first artist on the track whose bio has not yet been shown. For example: playing a solo Elton John track sends his bio; then playing "Elton John & RuPaul" skips Elton John (already shown) and sends RuPaul's bio instead.

The session resets when What's Now Playing is restarted.

Setup

Artist Extras Settings

How It Works

Download Timing

Content downloads during the write delay period (set in General Settings):

  1. Immediate downloads: Banners, logos, and thumbnails download first
  2. Background downloads: Fan art continues downloading while the track plays
  3. Track changes: New banners/logos/thumbnails are selected if available
  4. Artist changes: Full download process starts for the new artist

Multi-Artist Support

For collaborations (e.g., "David Bowie & Lou Reed"):

  • Attempts to download content for both artists
  • Only one set of images is displayed (banners, logos, fan art)
  • Both artists' content is cached for future use

Caching

  • Local storage: All content is cached locally for fast access

  • Automatic cleanup: Old content is eventually removed to manage disk space

  • Hourly verification: Cache is verified every hour for performance

  • Clear Cache button: Removes artist-to-image mappings but preserves API response cache

Configuration

Download Limits

Control how much content to download per track:

  • Banners/Logos/Thumbnails: Downloaded first, before track announcement

  • Fan Art: Downloaded continuously while track plays

  • Size Limit: Total cache size in GB (approximately 1,000 images per GB)

Performance Settings

  • Download Processes: Background workers for downloading content
  • Higher = faster downloads but more system load

  • Lower = gentler on system resources but slower downloads

  • Write Delay: If the image area shows blank when a track starts, increasing the write delay gives more time for images to download before the display updates. Try 10+ seconds.

Fallback Options

When specific image types aren't available, a substitute can be used so the image area shows something rather than going blank:

When artist images are missing:

  • Use cover art for missing fan art
  • Use cover art for missing logos
  • Use cover art for missing thumbnails

When cover art is missing:

  • Use fan art, logo, or thumbnail as a cover art substitute (configured via the "For missing coverart use:" setting)

Requirements for Best Results

Artist Extras works best with well-tagged music files:

  • ISRC codes: Enable automatic MusicBrainz lookups for missing information

  • Complete artist/album/title tags: Improve matching accuracy

  • MusicBrainz integration: Provides artist IDs for more accurate results

Available Services

Configure specific services for different types of content:

  • Discogs - Artist information and album artwork

  • TheAudioDB - Artist biographies and additional images

  • FanArt.TV - High-quality curated artist artwork

  • Last.fm - Artist biographies with multilingual support

  • Wikimedia - Free artist biographies from Wikipedia

Troubleshooting

Images Not Appearing

  • Increase write delay in General Settings (try 10+ seconds)
  • Check that Artist Extras is enabled
  • Verify your music files have good artist/title tags

Slow Performance

  • Reduce download processes (try 2-4)
  • Lower image download limits
  • Check internet connection speed

Cache Issues

  • Use "Clear Cache" button to reset image mappings
  • Restart What's Now Playing after changing cache size
  • Monitor disk space usage

Missing Content for Artist

  • Check if artist exists in the configured services
  • Verify artist name spelling matches service databases
  • Try enabling MusicBrainz for better artist matching