Saving an off screen Swing JPanel to a BufferedImage

Question

First, thanks for reading this. I have read through almost the whole forum and tried countless deviations of examples given here, but to no success.
The situation is that from an Java 1.3 Applet, I am creating the ability for a user to create a simple graphic using standard Swing JTextArea components. This gives him/her the ability to place text arbitrarily on an JPanel. This works fine. The problem comes when the user wants to preview the image with the parametes replaced in the JTextAreas.
We are generating GIF files after the user puts in the data. The problem occurs when we create an off screen JPanel with new JTextAreas with the parameters replaced with the test data filled in. We seem unable to create a BufferedImage from the un-shown JPanel.
I have tried putting the JPanel in a JFrame and showing it before I call paint/print, etc. The only thing that seems to happen is that the JPanel background color is rendered to the GIF file, but not the JTextAreas on the JPanel. I have sucessfully written directly to the Graphics of the JPanel using drawString and generated a GIF, but that does not accomplish our goal.
Any help would be appreciated. A test routine is included to give you the code. TIA.
Kurt
void test() {
int height = 400;
int width = 400;
JFrame jf = new JFrame();
jf.setBounds(0, 0, width, height);
JPanel p = new JPanel();
p.setBackground(Color.blue);
p.setSize(width,height);
JTextArea ta = new JTextArea();
ta.setBackground(Color.black);
ta.setForeground(Color.red);
ta.setText("This is the text to set");
ta.setColumns(10);
ta.setRows(3);
ta.setEditable(true);
ta.setEnabled(true);
ta.setVisible(true);
p.add(ta);
p.validate();
jf.getContentPane().add(p);
jf.validate();
saveToFile(p);
// This was taken and slightly modified for the AnimagedGifEncoder
void saveToFile(JComponent source) {
int w = source.getWidth();
int h = source.getHeight();
int type = BufferedImage.TYPE_INT_RGB;
BufferedImage image = new BufferedImage(w, h, type);
Graphics2D g2 = image.createGraphics();
source.paint(g2);
g2.dispose();
AnimatedGifEncoder gif = new AnimatedGifEncoder();
gif.start("D:/tmp/gifs/mygif.gif");
gif.setDelay(1000);
gif.addFrame(image);
gif.finish();

Answer 1

Your approach "putting the JPanel in a JFrame and showing it before I call paint/print" was ok, but it must be done in another thread, this sample is doing a similar job.
You will see that when the print dialog is shown, the frame is fully visible with the button,
import java.awt.*;
import java.awt.event.*;
import javax.swing.*;
import java.awt.print.*;
public class PrintF extends JFrame
     JPanel  pan = new JPanel();
     JButton pri = new JButton("Print");
     JButton b1 = new JButton("The Click");
public PrintF()
     super("This is a full frame print test");
     setBounds(1,1,500,350);     
     addWindowListener(new WindowAdapter()
    {     public void windowClosing(WindowEvent ev)
               dispose();     
               System.exit(0);
     getContentPane().add("Center",pan);
     pan.setBackground(Color.white);
     pan.add(new JLabel("Label 1"));
     pan.add(pri);
     pri.addActionListener(new ActionListener()
     {     public void actionPerformed( ActionEvent e )
               TheT t = new TheT(b1);
//               printIt(); 
     setVisible(true);
public class TheT extends Thread  implements Printable
     JFrame  frame = new JFrame("The printed frame");  
public TheT(JButton b)
     frame.setBounds(50,50,400,350);     
     frame.getContentPane().setLayout(null);     
     frame.getContentPane().add(b);
     b.setBounds(20,80,150,30);     
     start();
public void run()
     frame.setVisible(true);
     printIt(); 
     frame.dispose();
private void printIt()
     PrinterJob pj = PrinterJob.getPrinterJob();  
     PageFormat pf = pj.defaultPage();
     pf.setOrientation(pf.LANDSCAPE);
     pj.setPrintable(this,pf);
     if (pj.printDialog())
          try
               pj.print();
          catch (Exception e){}    
public int print(Graphics g, PageFormat pf, int pi)
                                            throws PrinterException
     if (pi > 0)
          setCursor(new Cursor(Cursor.DEFAULT_CURSOR));
          return Printable.NO_SUCH_PAGE;
     setCursor(new Cursor(Cursor.WAIT_CURSOR));
     g.translate((int)pf.getImageableX()+2,(int)pf.getImageableY()+2);
     try
          Robot     r     = new Robot();
          Rectangle rect  = frame.getBounds();
          Image     image = r.createScreenCapture(rect);
          g.drawImage(image,2,2,null);
     catch(AWTException awe)
          System.out.println("robot excepton occurred");
     return(Printable.PAGE_EXISTS);
public static void main (String[] args)
     new PrintF();  
}       Noah