Shadows with CoreGraphics? - iphone

What is the proper way to implement shadows with CoreGraphics? I've looked around but haven't been able to find a whole lot on it. Is there a simple method for adding a shadow to a view, or will I have to subclass and override the drawRect: method?

You can also use CALayer shadows on any existing view, but the performance penalty is terrible. I don't recommend doing it, especially if you are supporting older devices.
view.layer.shadowOffset = CGSizeMake(2.0, 2.0);
view.layer.shadowColor = [[UIColor blackColor] CGColor];
view.layer.shadowRadius = 3.0;
view.layer.shadowOpacity = 1.0;

See Quartz 2D Programing Guide: Shadows. Basically, you call CGContextSetShadow(CGContextRef context, CGSize shadowSize, CGFloat blurValue) and then do your drawing.

Related

Bad performance on scroll view loaded with 3 view controllers, drawn with CALayer

i have a scroll view loaded with 3 view controllers. each view controller is drawing its layers with that code -
(there us more then that but I pulled it out to check if it will help). still i have very crappy sliding.
any help ?
shani
CALayer *sublayer = [CALayer layer];
sublayer.backgroundColor = [Helper cardBackGroundColor:card].CGColor;
sublayer.shadowOffset = CGSizeMake(0, 3);
sublayer.shadowRadius = 5.0;
sublayer.shadowColor = [UIColor blackColor].CGColor;
sublayer.shadowOpacity = 0.8;
sublayer.frame = CGRectInset(self.view.layer.frame, 20, 20);
sublayer.borderColor = [UIColor blackColor].CGColor;
sublayer.borderWidth = 2.0;
sublayer.cornerRadius = 10.0;
[self.view.layer addSublayer:sublayer];
Drawing things with CALayer often yields poor performance. We usually use a stretchable image to get adequate performance. When you think of it, it does make sense to render it before hand rather than using the iPhone's limited processing power to render it in real time.
It's possible that you can get adequate performance from CALayer, but drawing a png will probably still be faster, thus saving battery life time.
EDIT: So here's an example to explain the concept.
This code actually replaced a CALayer drawing that was too slow.
UIImageView *shadow = [[UIImageView alloc] initWithFrame:frame];
shadow.image = [[UIImage imageNamed:#"shadow.png"] stretchableImageWithLeftCapWidth:16.0 topCapHeight:16.0];
[contentView addSubview:shadow];
[shadow release];
shadow.png is 34 by 34 pixels and contains a shadowed square. Thanks to the stretchable image it's possible to resize the square without stretching the shadow. For more information about this I would suggest reading the documentation for stretchableImageWithLeftCapWidth:topCapHeight:. Also Google will help you find guides on how to work with stretchable images. If you have more questions I'll be happy to answer them.
You have a mask (assuming you somewhere say masksToBounds=YES) and a shadow on this layer. Both cause an off screen rendering pass.
Please watch the WWDC 2010 Session 425 - Core Animation in Practice Part 2
Which you can find here;
http://developer.apple.com/videos/wwdc/2010/

iPhone - How to draw something in a view

I'v got this piece of code :
CGColorSpaceRef rgb = CGColorSpaceCreateDeviceRGB();
CGFloat colors[] = {
1.0f, 1.0f, 1.0f, 1.0f, 0.0f, 0.0f, 0.0f, 1.0f,
};
CGGradientRef gradientRef = CGGradientCreateWithColorComponents(rgb, colors, NULL, sizeof(colors) / (sizeof(colors[0]) * 4));
CGColorSpaceRelease(rgb);
CGContextRef context = UIGraphicsGetCurrentContext();
CGRect rect = theCell.backgroundView.bounds;
CGPoint start = CGPointMake(rect.origin.x, 0);
CGPoint end = CGPointMake(rect.origin.x, rect.size.height/2);
CGContextDrawLinearGradient(context, gradientRef, start, end, kCGGradientDrawsBeforeStartLocation | kCGGradientDrawsAfterEndLocation);
And I wonder how I can make it draw into a designated view and a clipping rect passed in parameters to my function. Tip: I don't mind about drawRect, I'm not subclassing anything.
Tip 2: I don't want to insert any layers that I won't be able to remove later.
Tip 3: This piece of code does not draw anything that my eyes could see..... :-( Missing a graphic port ?
Tip 4: I'd like to erase the draw simply changing the background color, and it's done...
CGContextRef context = UIGraphicsGetCurrentContext(); will get the graphics context for the current view, so if you call this in the drawRect: method of a UIView it will draw.
I don't understand what you mean by:
I don't mind about drawRect, I'm not
subclassing anything
but if you want to do custom drawing you must either override the drawRect: method or use layers. To use layers you would call CGContextRef context = CGLayerGetContext(theLayer); instead of CGContextRef context = UIGraphicsGetCurrentContext();.
Ok, so I looked at the documentation and it says that you can get a CGContextRef by calling UIGraphicsGetCurrentContext() from the drawRectMethod. Here's what it says: In an iOS application, you set up a UIView object to draw to and implement the drawRect: method to perform drawing. Before calling your custom drawRect: method, the view object automatically configures its drawing environment so that your code can start drawing immediately. As part of this configuration, the UIView object creates a graphics context (a CGContextRef opaque type) for the current drawing environment. You obtain this graphics context by calling the UIKit function UIGraphicsGetCurrentContext. You save and restore graphics contexts using the functions UIGraphicsPushContext and UIGraphicsPopContext.
You can create custom graphics context objects in situations where you want to draw somewhere other than your view. For example, you may want to capture a series of drawing commands and use them to create an image or a PDF file. To create the context, you use the CGBitmapContextCreate or CGPDFContextCreate function. After you have the context, you can pass it to the drawing functions needed to create your content.
When creating custom contexts, the coordinate system for those contexts is different from the native coordinate system used by iOS. Instead of the origin being in the upper-left corner of the drawing surface, it is in the lower-left corner and the axes point up and to the right. The coordinates you specify in your drawing commands must take this into consideration or the resulting image or PDF file may appear wrong when rendered. See “Creating a Bitmap Graphics Context” and “Creating a PDF Graphics Context” for details on using CGBitmapContextCreate and CGPDFContextCreate.
Might I recommend you look into the CAGradientLayer, and add it as a sublayer of your view? Lots simpler, and it will be hardware accelerated which matters for table cells.
Example stolen partly from here:
http://tumbljack.com/post/188089679/gpu-accelerated-awesomeness-with-cagradientlayer
#import <QuartzCore/QuartzCore.h> // Also import this framework
......
CAGradientLayer grad = [CAGradientLayer layer];
UIColor *colorOne = [UIColor colorWithHRed:1.0f Green:1.0f Blue:1.0f alpha:1.0f];
UIColor *colorTwo = [UIColor colorWithHRed:0.0f Green:0.0f Blue:0.0f alpha:1.0f];
NSArray *colors = [NSArray arrayWithObjects:(id)colorOne.CGColor, colorTwo.CGColor, nil];
grad.colors = colors;
CGRect rect = theCell.backgroundView.bounds;
rect.size.height = rect.size.height / 2;
grad.frame = rect;
[self.layer addsublayer:grad]
You may have to play with the colors a bit, not sure if you had the gradient tilted or not...

iPhone UITableViewCell layer shadow

I'm trying to add a shadow to a UITableViewCell using the layer.shadowColor, Offset, Radius but it doesn't seem to affect it in any way. The table is grouped style. Any ideas why?
Here is the code i'm using:
cell.layer.shadowColor= [UIColor blackColor].CGColor;
cell.layer.shadowRadius = 5.0;
cell.layer.shadowOffset = CGSizeMake(10, 10);
You need to also set the shadow opacity, it defaults to 0 and you won't see anything if you don't explicitly set it.
CALayer Reference
cell.layer.shadowOffset = CGSizeMake(1, 0);
cell.layer.shadowColor = [[UIColor blackColor] CGColor];
cell.layer.shadowRadius = 5;
cell.layer.shadowOpacity = .25;
Also note, that if you don't set the shadow path you will have terrible performance on the iPhone/iPad. Use something like the following code to set a shadow path, it removes the need to blur the layers underneath your tableviewcell's to create a "high quality" shadow.
CGRect shadowFrame = cell.layer.bounds;
CGPathRef shadowPath = [UIBezierPath bezierPathWithRect:shadowFrame].CGPath;
cell.layer.shadowPath = shadowPath;
Watch video 425 (also 424 and 426) to learn more about shadows from the WWDC 2010 Videos available here: WWDC 2010 Session Videos
Just adding the #Paul Soult answer in Swift:
cell?.layer.shadowOffset = CGSizeMake(0, 1)
cell?.layer.shadowColor = UIColor.blackColor().CGColor
cell?.layer.shadowRadius = 1
cell?.layer.shadowOpacity = 0.6
// Maybe just me, but I had to add it to work:
cell?.clipsToBounds = false
let shadowFrame: CGRect = (cell?.layer.bounds)!
let shadowPath: CGPathRef = UIBezierPath(rect: shadowFrame).CGPath
cell?.layer.shadowPath = shadowPath
The view hierarchy of a grouped table view cell is really rather opaque. cell.layer is actually referring to the layer of the main view of the cell, which takes of the entire width of the table. The rounded part of the cell that is inset is actually handled by apple's private methods for drawing grouped cells.
You're probably going to have more luck creating a custom subclass of UITableViewCell.

Drop Shadow on UITextField text

Is it possible to add a shadow to the text in a UITextField?
As of 3.2, you can use the CALayer shadow properties.
_textField.layer.shadowOpacity = 1.0;
_textField.layer.shadowRadius = 0.0;
_textField.layer.shadowColor = [UIColor blackColor].CGColor;
_textField.layer.shadowOffset = CGSizeMake(0.0, -1.0);
I have a slightly different problem - I want a blurred shadow on a UILabel. Luckily, the solution to this turned out to be number (2) from Tyler
Here's my code :
- (void) drawTextInRect:(CGRect)rect {
CGSize myShadowOffset = CGSizeMake(4, -4);
CGFloat myColorValues[] = {0, 0, 0, .8};
CGContextRef myContext = UIGraphicsGetCurrentContext();
CGContextSaveGState(myContext);
CGColorSpaceRef myColorSpace = CGColorSpaceCreateDeviceRGB();
CGColorRef myColor = CGColorCreate(myColorSpace, myColorValues);
CGContextSetShadowWithColor (myContext, myShadowOffset, 5, myColor);
[super drawTextInRect:rect];
CGColorRelease(myColor);
CGColorSpaceRelease(myColorSpace);
CGContextRestoreGState(myContext);
}
This is in a class that extends from UILabel and draws the text with a shadow down and to the right 4px, the shadow is grey at 80% opacity and is sightly blurred.
I think that Tyler's solution number 2 is a little better for performance than Tyler's number 1 - you're only dealing with one UILabel in the view and, assuming that you're not redrawing every frame, it's not a hit in rendering performance over a normal UILabel.
PS This code borrowed heavily from the Quartz 2D documentation
I don't think you get built-in support for text shadows here, the way you do with UILabel.
Two ideas:
(1) [Moderately tricky to code.] Add a second UITextField behind the original, at a very small offset (maybe by (0.2,0.8)? ). You can listen to every text change key-by-key by implementing the textField:shouldChangeCharactersInRange:replacementString: method in the UITextFieldDelegate protocol. Using that, you can update the lower text simultaneously. You could also make the lower text (the shadow text) gray, and even slightly blurry using the fact that fractionally-offset text rects appear blurry. Added: Oh yea, don't forget to set the top text field's background color to [UIColor clearColor] if you go with this idea.
(2) [Even more fun to code.] Subclass UITextField and override the drawRect: method. I haven't done this before, so I'll mention up front that this depends on this being the designated drawing method, and it may turn out that you have to override another drawing function, such as drawTextInRect:, which is specific to UITextField. Now set up the drawing context to draw shadows via the CGContextSetShadow functions, and call [super drawRect:rect];. Hopefully that works -- in case the original UITextField code clears the drawing context's shadow parameters, that idea is hosed, and you'll have to write the whole drawing code yourself, which I anti-recommend because of all the extras that come with UITextFields like copy-and-paste and kanji input in Japanese.
Although the method of applying the shadow directly to the UITextView will work, it's the wrong way to do this. By adding the shadow directly with a clear background color, all subviews will get the shadow, even the cursor.
The approach that should be used is with NSAttributedString.
NSMutableAttributedString* attString = [[NSMutableAttributedString alloc] initWithString:textView.text];
NSRange range = NSMakeRange(0, [attString length]);
[attString addAttribute:NSFontAttributeName value:textView.font range:range];
[attString addAttribute:NSForegroundColorAttributeName value:textView.textColor range:range];
NSShadow* shadow = [[NSShadow alloc] init];
shadow.shadowColor = [UIColor whiteColor];
shadow.shadowOffset = CGSizeMake(0.0f, 1.0f);
[attString addAttribute:NSShadowAttributeName value:shadow range:range];
textView.attributedText = attString;
However textView.attributedText is for iOS6. If you must support lower versions, you could use the following approach. (Dont forget to add #import <QuartzCore/QuartzCore.h>)
CALayer *textLayer = (CALayer *)[textView.layer.sublayers objectAtIndex:0];
textLayer.shadowColor = [UIColor whiteColor].CGColor;
textLayer.shadowOffset = CGSizeMake(0.0f, 1.0f);
textLayer.shadowOpacity = 1.0f;
textLayer.shadowRadius = 0.0f;

Am I responsible for clipping when doing custom rendering using drawRect:?

When I call setNeedsDisplayInRect on a UIView, and the drawRect: method fires, am I responsible for making sure I'm not rendering stuff that's outside the CGRect I called, or will the framework handle that for me?
Example:
-(void)drawRect:(CGRect)rect
{
//assume this is called through someMethod below
CGContextRef ctx = UIGraphicsGetCurrentContext();
[[UIColor redColor] setFill];
CGContextFillRect(ctx, rect);
[[UIColor blueColor] setFill];
// is this following line a no-op? or should I check to make sure the rect
// I am making is contained within the rect that is passed in?
CGContextFillRect(ctx, CGRectMake(100.0f, 100.0f, 25.0f, 25.0f));
}
-(void)someMethod
{
[self setNeedsDisplayInRect:CGRectMake(50.0f, 50.0f, 25.0f, 25.0f)];
}
To simplify what Barry said: Yes, the framework will handle it for you.
You can safely ignore the rect, anything you draw outside of it will be ignored.
On the other hand, if you draw outside of the rect you are wasting CPU time, so if you can limit your drawing based on the rect, you should.
The framework will clip your drawing. On OS X (AppKit), drawing is clipped to the dirty areas of the NSView (as of 10.3). I'm not sure what the exact clipping algorithm is in UIKit. Of course, you can speed drawing by checking what needs to be drawn and only drawing in the dirty areas of the view, rather than relying on the framework to clip unnecessary drawing.