Develop Reference

Use an image as the background of a canvas and keep it resized

I'm currently working on an Android app. I have a canvas onto which the user will draw something. I need to have a picture as the background of this canvas.
I already managed to import a pic and set it as the background using
mBitmap = BitmapFactory.decodeResource(getResources(), R.drawable.my_background_pic));
However, the picture appears ten times bigger than the screen.
Is it possible to keep the picture resized, so it fills the canvas and not more?
Also, later I will need to add other things to the activity. The canvas will not be the only thing on the screen, so I need the picture to be the size of the canvas, and not the screen.
Thanks a lot.

Nevermind I found it:
canvas.drawBitmap(bitmap, null, new RectF(0, 0, canvasWidth, canvasHeight), null);
By Kai at stackoverflow.com/a/27466127/8205282

drawBitmap() of canvas gives white image on parent image android

I'm newbie with canvas.
I'm trying to draw child bitmap on parent bitmap using canvas.drawbitmap(childbitmap,matrix,point) method. I'm getting number of bitmaps using loop and trying to overlay image on all that bitmaps But somehow the output which I got haven't original child image. It looks like white image. so I'm able to seen child image on parent one but don't know why it looks like this?
Let me put my code over here with output image.
Canvas mCanvas = new Canvas(bitmap);
Paint p = new Paint();
Bitmap icon = BitmapFactory.decodeResource(getApplicationContext().getResources(),
R.drawable.ic_launcher);
mCanvas.drawBitmap(icon,0,0,p);
This above code will run with loop and it will give multiple "bitmap" object on which I have to draw canvas. So now I'm taking launcher icon as child bitmap.while checking final output it shows like below image :
Check the white image instead of launcher icon.So what's wrong with my code?
Waiting for your best suggestion ASAP.

You are drawing your bitmap on top with the current canvas. So you have to call mCanvas.drawBitmap a second time to draw the foreground bitmap.

Bitmap from View not displayed on Android

I am trying to create a bitmap from a View that is not displayed yet to set it as a texture with OpenGL in android.
The problem is that when I create my bitmap the layout parameters of my View have 0 value cause the onLayout() function has not been called yet.
Is there a way to "simulate" a layout or do a "background layout" to get the right layout params ?
I was thinking about a Frame layout having two views, the background one would be used to create my bitmap as the layout would have been done.
Thanks.

You indeed need to layout your View before drawing it into a Bitmap. Simply call
myView.measure(...);
then
myView.layout(0, 0, myView.getMeasuredWidth(), myView.getMeasuredHeight());
I have posted an example on how to do this in one of the following presentations: http://www.curious-creature.org/2010/12/02/android-graphics-animations-and-tips-tricks/

So, some edits after the question was clarified :)
I suggest you create the bitmap independently of the view, then scale it to the same size as the view once the view is created. Create an arbitrary size bitmap that allows you to render what you want to it ..
// This in some class that renders your bitmap independently, and can be
// queried to get the bitmap ...
Bitmap b = Bitmap.createBitmap(100, 100, Bitmap.Config.ARGB_4444);
// render something to your bitmap here
Then after your view is created, take the precreated bitmap and rescale it to the right size (I've not actually checked this by compiling it -- might be errors):
Rect original = new Rect(0, 0, 100, 100);
RectF destination = new RectF(0.0, 0.0, (float)myView.getWidth(), (float)myView.getHeight());
Canvas canvas = new Canvas();
canvas.drawBitmap(myRenderingClass.b, original, destination, null);
myView.draw(canvas);

can an image be manipulated using canvas

Is it possible to manipulate images using canvas? How do we get the image onto the canvas?
#Override
protected void onDraw(Canvas canvas) {
Bitmap bitmap = BitmapFactory.decodeResource(getResources(), R.drawable.icon);
Bitmap mBitmap = bitmap.copy(bitmap.getConfig(), true);
canvas = new Canvas(mBitmap);
Matrix matrix = new Matrix();
canvas.drawBitmap(mBitmap, matrix, mPaint);
}
I'm unable to see the image on the screen. canvas.drawBitmap() shouldn't be necessary since I'm using the constructor and passing mBitmap.

Yes you can, but you don't "get the image onto the Canvas," a Canvas is just an interface to draw onto a Bitmap. To do so, simply create a Canvas and give a reference to your mutable Bitmap:
Canvas c = new Canvas(myBitmap);
Very easy :)

You shouldn't do this in your onDraw method. Try to create an ImageView that should display the image and then set the bitmap via setImageBitmap(bitmap).
In general you are doing somethings wrong in your code.
Loading an image every time something should be drawn to the screen will slow down your application a lot. Try to load the image only once and then just edit and set it to the imageview.
You are assigning a new Canvas to the parameter you got. But this won't change anything on the screen. Think of it like somebody puts a paper in front of you and says:"Please write your message on the paper". Now you take another blank paper and write on it. But the other person only knows about his paper and will use this paper to read your message.

How to blit() in android?

I'm used to handle graphics with old-school libraries (allegro, GD, pygame), where if I want to copy a part of a bitmap into another... I just use blit.
I'm trying to figure out how to do that in android, and I got very confused.
So... we have these Canvas that are write-only, and Bitmaps that are read-only? It seems too stupid to be real, there must be something I'm missing, but I really can't figure it out.
edit: to be more precise... if bitmaps are read only, and canvas are write only, I can't blit A into B, and then B into C?

The code to copy one bitmap into another is like this:
Rect src = new Rect(0, 0, 50, 50);
Rect dst = new Rect(50, 50, 200, 200);
canvas.drawBitmap(originalBitmap, src, dst, null);
That specifies that you want to copy the top left corner (50x50) of a bitmap, and then stretch that into a 150x150 Bitmap and write it 50px offset from the top left corner of your canvas.
You can trigger drawing via invalidate() but I recommend using a SurfaceView if you're doing animation. The problem with invalidate is that it only draws once the thread goes idle, so you can't use it in a loop - it would only draw the last frame. Here are some links to other questions I've answered about graphics, they might be of use to explain what I mean.
How to draw a rectangle (empty or filled, and a few other options)
How to create a custom SurfaceView for animation
Links to the code for an app with randomly bouncing balls on the screen, also including touch control
Some more info about SurfaceView versus Invalidate()
Some difficulties with manually rotating things
In response to the comments, here is more information:
If you get the Canvas from a SurfaceHolder.lockCanvas() then I don't think you can copy the residual data that was in it into a Bitmap. But that's not what that control is for - you only use than when you've sorted everything out and you're ready to draw.
What you want to do is create a canvas that draws into a bitmap using
Canvas canvas = new Canvas(yourBitmap)
You can then do whatever transformations and drawing ops you want. yourBitmap will contain all the newest information. Then you use the surface holder like so:
Canvas someOtherCanvas = surfaceHolder.lockCanvas()
someOtherCanvas.drawBitmap(yourBitmap, ....)
That way you've always got yourBitmap which has whatever information in it you're trying to preserve.

In android you draw to the canvas, and when you want it to update you call invalidate which will the redraw this canvas to the screen. So I'm guessing you have overridden the onDraw method of your view so just add invalidate();
#Override
public void onDraw(Canvas canvas) {
// Draw a bitmap to the canvas at 0,0
canvas.drawBitmap(mBitmap, 0, 0, null);
// Add in your drawing functions here
super.onDraw(canvas);
// Call invalidate to draw to screen
invalidate();
}
The above code simply redraws the bitmap constantly, of course you want to add in extra thing to draw and consider using a timing function that calls invalidate so that it is not constantly running. I'd advice having a look at the lunarlander sources.