Retina icons with jQTouch - iphone

Anyone knows how I can replace the orignial icon with the retina version of it, if the user have a iOS with retina display?
I've tried with data-mask="[name]#2x.[ext]" but without luck.
Hope someone have a solution

You have to include two files in your project: image.png and image#2x.png. But it's not necessary to write #2x-suffix in code. Just:
UIImageView *imageView = [[UIImageView alloc] initWithImage:[UIImage imageNamed:#"image.png"]];
iOS will automatically detect, what image should be used.

I'm using the following approach:
Assuming I want to display a 100x40 px height image
Create a single image, 200x80 px
Specify a css width of 100 px and height of 40 px for the image
On non retina displays this will stretch the original image to 50%. For my personal taste the result looks more than OK.
On retina displays this will practically result in a 1-to-1 mapping between image pixels and device (real) pixels.
I have to mention that I didn't test this with Phonegap, but used it in a MonoTouch project, with a web container.

Related

How to create big image when we have small image in iOS without pixel distortion?

I am working on an app which is fully dependent on images. I have images like 320*480 now I want those same images with 768*1024 dimension. I can get it by UI designer and place in my bundle but my application is for universal app so I needed to include same image for iPhone retina, iPad, iPad retina. If I am using multiple images my IPA size goes increase (ex: if an image with 320*480 having 200KB now if I again adding 768*1024 the size of my IPA will increased to at least 200KB).
Idea: I am placing only 320*480 images and planning to create 768*1024 images programmatically which means only one set of images I am using in my bundle.
Work done: By looking some blogs I found that using below code we can create required image sizes.
- (UIImage *)scale:(UIImage *)image toSize:(CGSize)size
{
UIGraphicsBeginImageContext(size);
[image drawInRect:CGRectMake(0, 0, size.width, size.height)];
UIImage *scaledImage = UIGraphicsGetImageFromCurrentImageContext();
UIGraphicsEndImageContext();
return scaledImage;
}
UIImage *smallImage=[UIImage imageNamed:#"1.png"];
UIImage *bigImage=[self scale:smallImage toSize:CGSizeMake(768, 1024)];
[UIImageJPEGRepresentation(bigImage,2.0) writeToFile:[[self applicationDocumentsDirectory]stringByAppendingPathComponent:#"upload.png"] atomically:YES];
Problem: Above code works cool and getting the expected size of images but only problem is I am getting pixel distortion on the end image.
Question:
Is there any good or efficient solution to get different dimensions with out distortion image from the small image or I need to get all my images from the UI designer. If we have normal Image can we create same image for retina display?
Is there a better solution?
It is impossible to create a larger image from a smaller image without distortion or pixelation. There is no way to magically fill in the additional detail.
The real world doesn't work like TV or movies where people zoom in on images and magically get a lot of detail. :)
If you feel that your app is too big when you include 5 sets of images for:
iPhone 3.5" non-retina
iPhone 3.5" retina
iPhone 4" retina
iPad non-retina
iPad retina
then you have a few options:
Make two apps. One for iPhones and iPod touches, and one for iPads.
Ship your app with only a small subset of images. Then when the app is run the 1st time, the app can download only the images required for the current device.
Only include the largest images. As the app needs each image, it can create a properly sized version of the image and use that. Each conversion would only need to be done once per image. Downsizing an image gives much better results than trying to upscale.
You can resize image programmatically but they will not look good. I wouldn't worry that much about bundle size. Just put native-resolution image for all devices and forget about resizing.
If you want, you can crop and scale down from the big images, but if you are scaling up, there will be quality loss because the file does not contain enough information for all of those pixels. I would suggest either:
1) The easiest method is to make a bunch of different versions of the image. (see rmaddy's answer).
2) If you really don't want multiple images, take the largest one and scale downwards. Since they have different aspect ratios, simply scaling will cause some distortion; you will need to crop as well.
Either way, you will need to open up your image editor and make a larger image.

UiTabbar Icon doesn't display correctly

I am trying to upgrade my app to display icons that look great on the retina screen of the iPhone 5. AS of right now I am not setting my icons using code, I'm simply selecting the image within xcode and it loads it on its own ( I don't know how to code in the icon so that's why I am doing it this way).
Anyways, when I set the icon I have to use a 24x24 icon or else it wont fit.
When I use my high-res icons 64x64 they do not fit correctly. My question is, how do I go about making it so my icons will be scaled to fit but still retain the high-res quality?
1) If your non-retina icon is 24x24, then your retina icon should be 48x48
2) You should set your icon to be the non-retina version in interface builder. The retina version will be swapped out automatically if its on a retina device, as long as you follow the standard naming scheme:
name.png (non-retina image)
name#2x.png (retina image)
Note also: if you do set an image in code, you can simply use [UIImage imageNamed:#"whatever"] and the retina image will be swapped out automatically for you too (you don't have to do if-else or anything like that).
just try to set this code in your .m file of your particular tabBar's parent view.. in viewDidLoad: method..
self.tabBarItem.image = [UIImage imageNamed:#"home#2x.png"];/// set your image name instead of home

Retina graphics

I'm using an image that fills the screen (like a background) to my app. The image is already in retina dimensions, but I scaled it to fit the simulator screen. Because it's already in retina dimensions, do I still need to add a copy of it with the #2x extension?
It's better to use separate images, normal & normal#2x. if you only use single image, small images will be distorted while bigger image will look squeezed.
don't forget the iphone 5 for background images for example.
3 images are required : Background-568h.png Background.png Background#2x.png
if ([UIScreen mainScreen].bounds.size.height > 480.0f) {
// for the iPhone 5
self.view.backgroundColor = [UIColor colorWithPatternImage:[UIImage imageNamed:#"Background-568h.png"]];
} else {
// for iphone 3.5 inch retina /non retina.
self.view.backgroundColor = [UIColor colorWithPatternImage:[UIImage imageNamed:#"Background.png"]];
}
the naming notation is required for compiler to detect your retina images.if you write image.png the compiler looks for image#2x.png and then image.png and if it can not find it(for retina displays).
So name all your images xxx#2x.png and provide also xxx.png for non retina devices.
On the other hand i would use exact image sizes for non-strechable images in you app.Resizing means extra time and naturally extra computation.On the other hand fractional image resolutions ends up with blurry images.
For iphone 5 images you should for instance include Iphone5BackgorundIamge#2x.png but call Iphone5BackgorundIamge.png in your code.
Iphone dont have to do with image dimension but it uses image name for checking whether it is to be used as ratina or normal image.You have to keep a normal size image with it's name like "image1.png" for normal display and ratina size image as "image1#2x.png" for ratina display.If your used image is already of ratina display then keep it with #2x format and put one half size image with normal name.

iOS not using -568h#2x.png

I have 3 images:
test.png
test#2x.png
test-568#2x.png
In IBOutlet, a UIImageView is set to display test.png.
On iPhone 3.5in without retina, it's displaying test.png
On iPhone 3.5in with retina, it's displaying test#2x.png
But on iPhone 4in with retina, it's displaying test#2x.png!!!
What's going on?
Thanks!
The -568#2x suffix only applies to the Default.png launch images. There is no special suffix used by UIImage imageNamed: (or the other UIImage methods). If you need a special image on the 4" screen, you need to add code to get the desired image yourself.
The following works for the iPhone. For the iPad, you would need additional images.
For the three versions of the background image, use the following names:
background-480h.png (320x480)
background-480h#2x.png (640x960)
background-568h#2x.png (640x1136)
(You don't need a "-568h.png" image because there's no 320x568 iPhone screen.)
When you set the background image, simply append the screen height to the image name:
NSString* imageName = [NSString stringWithFormat: #"background-%ih", (int)[[UIScreen mainScreen] bounds].size.height];
[view setBackgroundColor: [UIColor colorWithPatternImage: [UIImage imageNamed: imageName]]];
iOS automtically appends the "#2x" if applicable.
You could omit the "h" after the height in the image names, but I think it's nice to emulate the iOS convention for the default image.
I know it's an old thread but I was having trouble with the new screen sizes for iPhone 6/6+.
What I did is to use this naming convention for different image files:
none if #1x small old phones
#2x for iPhone 4
-568h#2x for iPhone 5
-667h#2x for iPhone 6
#3x for iPhone 6 Plus
And then to automatically generate (full size) images just by including the code from this Gist in the project:
https://gist.github.com/kevindelord/fe2e691d06ab745fbb00
You have nothing else to do. When you instantiate an image in your code:
[UIImage imageNamed:#"background.png”];
The categorised class from the Gist will automatically create an image corresponding to the current device.
There is a Pod for it UIImage+Autoresize documented on CocoaDocs.

iPhone: Do I have to have images for both retina and non-retina for all image?

I heard that you need to create images for both retina and non-retina.
And you need to name them like image#2x.png for retina and image.png for non-retina.
But I want use image.png for both retina and non-retina.
And scale it down in program because it is easier to adjust size of image by code than by recreating images with paint tool.
It is possible to do so using this code:
[button setImage:[UIImage imageNamed:#"image.png"] forState:UIControlStateNormal];
UIImageView *imageView = [[UIImageView alloc] init];
imageView.frame = CGRectMake(20, 20, 40, 40);
imageView.image = [UIImage imageNamed:#"image.png"];
image.png is scaled down to button size or image view size.
Is this a common way?
Does this way have any disadvantages?
Does apple reject if application does't have both image.png and image#2x.png?
[EDIT1 - SPECIAL CASE]
There is a SPECIAL case however to this problem. Since Apple' current 2x algorithm is essentially a pixel doubling (in each direction), if you images are made of of only vertical and horizontal lines, then I would go about providing those images as the 1x and let the API auto upscale those, an example would be an image for a button that looks like this
As this will have zero problems upscaling and still looking very crisp!!! (Tested on both iPhones, as well as both iPads)
[ORIGINAL]
If you are simply doing it for display, then one way would be to simply provide the image as it should be for the retina only, and allow the UIImageView to scale down the image automatically for the non-retina displays. It WILL do this and will NOT be rejected by apple.
For the retina display, the UIImageView will naturally take up the space of 2x the pixels in each direction, thus when the image is read in for display on a retina display, the API will recognize that no scaling needs to occur!!!
Be careful though!!! Downscaling images lets say for buttons can have effects that make your images or buttons come out looking unclean / pixelated. This is why it is "recommended" to provide both, is with lets say a vector based image, you would be able to generate the highest quality image for a given resolution. Kinda depends on how you want to use the images.
As a side note. I would recommend that if you do choose the resizing option, that you try to recognize the device' screen resolution up front and resize the images (if necessary in my case for the SMALLER resolutions) only once at initialization into the button or UIImageView etc... so that you won't suffer the slower performance each time it needs to be rendered to screen.
Well, you may not want to hear this but it is best to use a paint tool. If you have the device resize the images each time, it'll slow down your app - depending on how frequently you perform this task. I don't think apple will reject you for not including #2x images. I've forgotten them before with no issues.
If you don't want to include #2x images then your app will work both for retina and non-retina iphones. Apple is not going to reject your binary for this.
The only disadvantage is that instead of good quality images for retina you will be displaying normal images.