Microsoft Visual C++/CLI - Bitmap Operations: Scaling a Picture

	Bitmap Operations: Scaling a Picture

Description

Scaling a picture consists of changing its size, either to widen, to enlarge, to narrow, to heighten, or to shrink it. Although there are various complex algorithms you can use to perform this operation, the Bitmap class provides a shortcut you can use. Of course, in order to scale a picture, you must first have one.

To support picture scaling, the Bitmap class provides the following constructor:

public:
    Bitmap(Image^ original, int width, int height);

The original argument is the Image, such as a Bitmap object, that you want to scale. The width and the height arguments represent the new size you want to apply to the picture. After this constructor has been used, you get a bitmap with the new size. Here is an example of using it:

Picture Normal Size

public ref class Picture : public System::Windows::Forms::Form
{
public:
    . . . No Change

    System::ComponentModel::Container ^components;
    
    Bitmap ^ bmpPicture;

    . . . No Change

    System::Void Picture_Load(System::Object^ sender,
			   System::EventArgs^ e)
    {
	 bmpPicture = gcnew Bitmap(10, 10);
    }
	
    System::Void Picture_Paint(System::Object^  sender,
				System::Windows::Forms::PaintEventArgs^  e)
    {
	 e->Graphics->DrawImage(bmpPicture, 120, 12);
    }

    System::Void btnLoadPicture_Click(System::Object^  sender,
					System::EventArgs^  e)
    {
	 OpenFileDialog ^ dlgOpen = gcnew OpenFileDialog;

	 if( dlgOpen->ShowDialog() == ::DialogResult::OK )
	 {
		 String ^ strFilename = dlgOpen->FileName;
		 bmpPicture = gcnew Bitmap(strFilename);
		 int width = bmpPicture->Width;
		 int height = bmpPicture->Height;

		 txtWidth->Text  = width.ToString();
		 txtHeight->Text = height.ToString();

		 Invalidate();
	 }
    }

    System::Void btnResize_Click(System::Object^  sender, System::EventArgs^  e)
    {
	 int width, height;

	 try {
		 width = int::Parse(txtWidth->Text);
	 }
	 catch(FormatException ^)
	 {
	     MessageBox::Show(L"The value you entered for the width is not valid");
	 }
			 
	 try {
		 height = int::Parse(txtHeight->Text);
	 }
	 catch(FormatException ^)
	 {
	     MessageBox::Show(L"The value you entered for the height is not valid");
	 }

	 Bitmap ^ bmpNew = gcnew Bitmap(bmpPicture, width, height);
	 bmpPicture = bmpNew;
	 Invalidate();
    }
};

Picture Resized

You can also specify both the width and the height as the size. To do this, you can use the following constructor:

public:
    Bitmap(Image^ original, Size newSize);

As you can see, the scaling operation could produce a kind of distorted picture. An alternative would be to keep the ration of both dimensions while changing the value of one.