Creating icons with PNG image

[jinuthomas]

Hi,
I need to create the icons out of PNG files in S60 5th edition C++ SDK. Is it possible with the mifconv ? If not is there any other way other than using the CImageDecoder?

Thanks & Regards,
Jinu

[ltomuta]

mifconv takes as input SVG, SVGB or BMP files (or any random mix of such files). Convering the PNGs to BMP is not an issue so yes, you can create such icons. The output will be an mbm file with the raster icons inside. Make sure to inclide also mask images if needed.

If you need however to create the icons at run-time then CImageDecoder is your only option.

[jinuthomas]

I need to create the bitmaps during the compile time only. So how can i convert the PNG's to bitmap?

Thanks & Regards,
Jinu

[jinuthomas]

Hi ltomuta,
I read that the PNG can be converted to CFbsBitmap by CImageDecoder. Is there any other method to convert the PNG to bitmap? Is there any way I can use the PNG image for Application icon? I m using S60 5th edition C++ SDK.

Thanks,
Jinu

[ltomuta]

Microsoft's Paint can open PNG images and save them as bitmaps and so can any other image handling tool that I know off. Try IrfanView for example if Paint is not good enough.

For icons that are to be added to your application at compile time I strongly recomend however to use SVGs. Just throw away the PNGs and create vectorial graphics for your app.

[jinuthomas]

Hi ltomuta,
Thanks alot for the reply. But the issue is that I am an application programmer and i was given PNG images even for application icon. Converting to bitmap is fine, but as you know size of a bitmap is far more compared to PNG images.This will increase the binary size too. I read from some posts on the forum that there are no good tools available which can convert PNG's to SVG. Creating SVG needs great skill too. So I am in a confused state. Looking forward for ur suggestions.

Thanks,
Jinu

[ltomuta]

The bitmaps will not be stored as such on te device, you will build an .MBM with them and it can only contain bitmaps so basically you have no choice, you have to convert the file.

You can try to fake SVG usage by embedding the PNG inside SVG tags but that will bring you more problems than benefits.

You should notify your app's designer about the realities of aplication development and ask him/her to adopt real SVGs for this and the next projects. It might require new tools/skils but that's the way to go forward.

[jinuthomas]

Thanks a lot for the reply. Actually what is the advantage in using the SVG files as such over normal bitmaps? Anyways mifconv converts the svg to bitmap and save in an .MBM file

Thanks,
Jinu

[jinuthomas]

Hi ltomuta,
Looking forward for your reply.

Thanks,
Jinu

[ltomuta]

mifconf converts SVG files to ... *.mif, and bitmap files to *.mbm.

At run time, you load a "frame" from either *.mbm or *.mif [using the same APIs], rezize it according to your needs (mandatory for SVGs loaded from *.mif as they are still pure XML data and only rendered as bitmap after resize) and then you blit it on the screen. The diference (and SVG's advantage) is in the resizing step as a bitmap does not resize well while the SVG, being vectorial, scales perfectly to any size.

Compare for example the quality of the two graphic objects animated at http://www.streamhead.com/vector-vs-...-png-in-flash/