objective-c scale background on one axis - objective-c

hi
i have a background pattern image (vertical lines) like:
llllllllllllllllllllllllll
the line is a pattern image:
bgimg.backgroundColor = [UIColor colorWithPatternImage:[UIImage imageNamed:#"pd_line2.png"]];
my problem:
i would like to reframe the bgimg - it should repeat the line on x-axis: but stretch the line on y-axis.
next problem: the pattern image also uses an alpha channel.
is this possible?
can someone please give me a hint?
thanks in advance

Well you can certainly scale the image in various ways via GCContext functions, but perhaps the easier way would be making your view transparent (clearColor background) and adding an extra UIImageView (with pd_line2.png in it) underneath.
UIImageView's built-in stretching options may be enough to achieve what you need without any coding.

Related

CIContext drawImage:inRect:fromRect: scaling

I am using CIContext method - (void)drawImage:(CIImage *)im inRect:(CGRect)dest fromRect:(CGRect)src to draw my image to screen. But I need to implement zoom-in/zoom-out method. How could I achieve it? I think zoom-in could be achieved increasing dest rect, because apple docs says:
The image is scaled to fill the destination rectangle.
But what about zoom-out? Because if dest rectangle is scaled down, then image is drawn in it's actual size, but only part of image is visible then (part that fits in dest rectangle).
What could you suggest?
You may try using this for image resizing (zooming). Hope this helps you.
Take a look at this little toy app I made
It's to demonstrate the NSImage version of your CIContext method:
- (void)drawInRect:(NSRect)dstRect
fromRect:(NSRect)srcRect
operation:(NSCompositingOperation)op
fraction:(CGFloat)delta
I did this to find out exactly how the rects relate to each other. It's interactive, you can play with the sliders and move/zoom the images. Not a solution, but it might help you work things out.
You can use CIFilter to resize your CIImage before drawing. Quartz Composer comes with a good example of using this filter. Just look up the description of the Image Resize filter in QC.
EDIT:
Another good filter for scaling is CILanczosScaleTransform. There is a snippet demonstrating basic usage.

How to add a shadow to an UIImageView which fits the shape of the image content but with some rotation and shift effect

I have been looking for the solution on the web for a long time. Most tutorials are fairly simple about adding shadow to a UIView. I also noticed that if we add a shadow to an UIImageView. The shadow shape could perfectly fit the shape of the content image if the image itself has alpha channel in it. Say for example, if the image is an animal with transparent background, the shadow shape is also the same as that animal (not a rectangle shadow as same as UIImageView frame).
But these are not enough. What I need to do is to add some changes to the shadow so it may have some rotation angle and compressed (squeezed or shift) effect so that looks like the sunlight comes from a certain spot.
To demonstrate what I need, I upload 2 images below, which I captured from the Google Map App created by Apple. You can imagine the Annotation Pin is an image which has the Pin shape, so the shadow is also "pin shaped", but it is not simply "offset" with a CGSize, you can see the top of the shadow is shifted right about 35 degrees and slightly squeezed the height.
When we tap and hold and pin, the shadow is also animated away from the pin, so I believe that such shadow can be made programmably.
The best shadow tutorial I can found so far is http://nachbaur.com/blog/fun-shadow-effects-using-custom-calayer-shadowpaths But unfortunately, that cannot make this effect.
If anyone know the answer or know any better words to search for, please let me know. Thank you.
(Please note that the shape of the image is dynamic in the App, so using any tool like Photoshop to pre-render the shadow is not an option.)
In order to create dynamic effects like this, you have to use Core Graphics. It's incredibly powerful once you know how to use it. Basically you need to set a skew transform on the context, set up a shadow and draw the image. You will probably have to use transparency layers as well.
It doesn't sound like you can use CALayer shadows, since that is meant to solve a specific use-case. The approach Apple takes with the pin marks on the map is to have two separate images that are created ahead of time (e.g. in Photoshop) and they position them within the map relative to a reference point.
If you really do need to do this at run-time, it should still be possible by using either Core Graphics or ImageKit. To get a blurred shadow appearance, you can use the kCICategoryBlur CIFilter. You can then convert the image to grayscale. And to get that compressed look you just need to resize and skew the image.
Once you have two separate images, you can either take the CGImageRef for the shadow image and can set that as the content of another sublayer, or you can add it as a separate view.
If you know what all the shapes are, you could just render a shadow image in Photoshop or something.

Translate Colors to Image?

Im not sure how else I should approach it, but if I was to (in my mac application) have a grid of NSViews, which the user can change the colour of each, is it possible to then translate this, so now I have been given a colour for each pixel by the user, make this into an exportable image?
I honestly can't think of how else to do this. I don't want to go ahead an realise I have taken a rather foolish path.
The idea is I will have a grid of squares which the user can paint, a colour in each square, a square representing a pixel in the final image. So they paint with like a paint bucket filling each one, then export it into an actual image file.
Any help much appreciated, thanks.
A grid of NSViews sounds really heavy for what you're doing. Why not write one single custom view that checks the mouse position and modifies the data appropriately? Then you'd write a custom drawing method to fill the custom view, and you could use the same exact draw method to write to an NSImage which you could export.
You'll need to do a bit o' math. For each "pixel", call -set on the appropriate NSColor, then use NSBezierPath's -fillRect method. It may help you to get out a pencil & paper to figure out the math for the rect origins & sizes.
Check http://developer.apple.com/library/mac/#documentation/Cocoa/Conceptual/CocoaDrawingGuide/Introduction/Introduction.html for help if you've never done custom drawing before. It's really not that bad, just takes a little reading. :)

How to transparent UIImage gradually?

I have a small UIImage, I want to make it become solid at the center, and transparent gradually forward to the border ? Anyone has a good idea on this?
Thanks so much !
At least two of the ways you could accomplish this are:
Create a series of images with the varying opacity in them. Then animate the UIImage by showing them in sequence.
Use a similar technique but use mask images. This involves using a series of images as a mask for your original image. Then animate the UIImage by redrawing it repeatedly using a different mask image each time to achieve the effect you want. See CALayer mask.
The second may be preferred because it will work with any image and allows you to change the image without having to generate the animation for it or load the image dynamically.

Draw a shadow behind UIWebView

I know similar questions have been asked before, so don't get snarky and link to previous answers. The reason I am repeating this is that none of the answers have worked.
I have a UIWebView, and I want to draw a pretty drop-shadow behind it. I have tried subclassing and using some CoreGraphics goodness in drawRect:, but to no avail. Can anyone point me in the right direction? Thanks.
You could place a UIImageView under the UIScrollView with a slight offset, and give the image view a shadowy-looking image.
In this case, it would be convenient to use the stretchableImageWithLeftCapWidth:topCapHeight: method of UIImage to get a shadow image that can have nicely blurred edges and corners without distorting if you alter its size.
I think the usual quartz shadows are hard to apply to a UIWebView since you don't really have access to the raw drawing code, which would be the best place to plug that in.
Addendum Here's a sample drop shadow image:
. It has 4 pixel cap size all around, for use with the above stretchableImage method, and an alpha of 80% (so it's 20% transparent in the middle, tapering out at the edges). Feel free to use it. They're easy to make with a selection + feathering in your favorite graphics app.