EPUB 3 Best Practices

Chapter 5. Multimedia

One of the primary drivers of the EPUB 3 revision was the publishing community’s desire to natively include audio and video content in publications, a key ingredient in breaking EPUB out of the static confines of the printed page. In our ever-growing world of tablet computers, it’s simply not feasible or realistic to expect content creators to make do with the artificial print compromise of two-dimensional images where video works better, or to include text transcripts and quotes in place of audio. By adopting HTML5, the uncertainty of plug-in support that has held back multimedia publications is now a thing of the past.

With the requirement to print becoming less of a roadblock for many genres, and going ebook-only is no longer equated with publishing suicide, the growth in fully integrated multimedia books can only continue from here on. Why limit readers to text instructions in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) materials when you can also embed a video illustrating exactly how to carry out a procedure or experiment? Why paint in words alone the impact of a powerful piece of music when you can embed a recording for the reader? While the plain-Jane novel will undoubtedly continue on in its current form, publishing can now be much richer and deeper than text-and-headings novels.

In keeping with the nature of this guide, this chapter won’t cover the endless ways you might integrate audio and video content into a work. Instead, it will demonstrate ...