How to use Toolkit.prepareImage()??

Question

hey,
I was wondering how to use the prepareImage() method in the Toolkit class. So far i've been using the method just before I paint an image to the screen. Is there any better usage for it. Is my way slowing the painting proccess down?
here's some sample code
Image image;
Toolkit tk;
public void paint(Graphics g){
        tk.prepareImage(image, 32, 32);
        g.drawImage(image, 0, 0, this);
}Thanks,
Bluelikeu

Answer 1

Do you really want to load the images asynchronously or are you willing to wait?
If you can wait, javax.imageio.ImageIO is a simpler way to load images.
And even if you load in a seperate thread, you can do it with ImageIO:
import java.awt.*;
import java.io.*;
import java.net.URL;
import javax.imageio.*;
import javax.swing.*;
import javax.swing.border.*;
public class BackgroundBorderExample {
    public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException {
        JFrame.setDefaultLookAndFeelDecorated(true);
        JFrame f = new JFrame("BackgroundBorderExample");
        f.setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE);
        JTextArea area = new JTextArea(24,80);
        area.setForeground(Color.WHITE);
        area.setOpaque(false);
        area.read(new FileReader(new File("BackgroundBorderExample.java")), null);
        final JScrollPane sp = new JScrollPane(area);
        sp.setBackground(Color.BLACK);
        sp.getViewport().setOpaque(false);
        f.getContentPane().add(sp);
        f.setSize(600,400);
        f.setLocationRelativeTo(null);
        f.setVisible(true);
        String url = "http://today.java.net/jag/bio/JagHeadshot.jpg";
        final Border bkgrnd = new CentredBackgroundBorder(ImageIO.read(new URL(url)));
        Runnable r = new Runnable() {
            public void run() {
                sp.setViewportBorder(bkgrnd);
                sp.repaint();
        SwingUtilities.invokeLater(r);
import java.awt.*;
import java.awt.image.*;
import javax.swing.border.*;
public class CentredBackgroundBorder implements Border {
    private final BufferedImage image;
    public CentredBackgroundBorder(BufferedImage image) {
        this.image = image;
    public void paintBorder(Component c, Graphics g, int x, int y, int width, int height) {
        int x0 = x + (width-image.getWidth())/2;
        int y0 = y + (height-image.getHeight())/2;
        g. drawImage(image, x0, y0, null);
    public Insets getBorderInsets(Component c) {
        return new Insets(0,0,0,0);
    public boolean isBorderOpaque() {
        return true;
}Warning: explicit image!